If you believe in any sensible values like democracy, free speech, merit, and equal dignity, you need to reject the woke agenda, marginalise those who perpetuate it, and work for an alternative model of a better world.
I daily behave, think, act as a liberal and progressive individual, and my beliefs are deeply anchored in principles like equal opportunities, democracy, fairness, and ensuring that everyone is treated equally, irrespective of their gender, ethnicity or sexual choices. I deeply respect human rights and I think we need, as a society, to preserve the inherent dignity of all individuals.
I also draw significant inspiration from John Stuart Mill’s work, “On Liberty.” This influenced my strong appreciation for a diverse society, which thrives on intellectual heterogeneity; this concept in fact easily translates to a community teeming with problem solvers, hence increasing our collective capacity to devise effective solutions to an array of challenges. I believe this intellectual diversity is an actual strength that stabilizes and propels society forward.
I also stand by the fact that there are prejudices against specific groups that some of us need to overcome, and most of all that our society isn’t perfect, but that’s probably common sense.
I, last but not least, know that all the premise so far will still be completely useless as lots of you will antagonise me and this article anyways, but it’s OK. For me it is fundamental in any case to state that I despise all extreme right-wingers, all pseudo-nazi, all white supremacy movements, and such. And I equally know that this will probably attract enemies and opponents from every side, but I don’t mind, because in a world of polarised discussions, the main goal of this article is to restate the importance of how freedom and democracy are contingent upon the manner in which values are applied and communicated, and that this is important, perhaps, even more than the values themselves.
And so, exactly for all the reasons above, I believe that the woke agenda is literally one of the worst things that could happen to this world.
Many of you then may ask me why I didn’t write an article against the “opposite” part, the right wing extremists. A first answer may be: I may do it in future. A second one though may be: while we could all agree what the right wing extremist agenda could be easily recognised and rejected by common sense, the extreme left wing one, on the other side, is being so sneaky, so subtle, so falsely based on apparently “virtuous” principles, that in my opinion its dangerousness is into how much it is effectively penetrating our society, corporate culture, entertainment and such. Again, this is my opinion. And in general, “If you’re attacking A why you don’t also attack B” is a false argument, so I simply won’t take or acknowledge it. If you want to read articles about other topics, sorry, but my invitation is simple: try reading other articles.
That said, here’s a list of the points I feel worth sharing in this “manifesto”:
Any cultural agenda based on authoritarian bullying must be rejected in a free, democratic society, no matter the initial intentions
I find absolutely fundamental to reiterate the central theme of this manifesto, as it will stand paramount in our discussion: the method you employ to communicate your values is as significant as the values themselves. This suggests that while a deplorable, aggressive, authoritarian approach to persuasion won’t necessarily invalidate your values, it certainly will still make you despicable and/or dangerous. If your strategy involves promoting a culture of division, creating an “us-versus-them” dynamic, followed by ridiculing, shaming and intimidating the “other”, then anyone sensible should reject the ideology this strategy is coming from.
I truly understand the frustration some may feel towards groups they perceive as oppressive. We’re all human and we all have our weaknesses. However, it’s crucial to acknowledge that any prejudice towards a group of people is a bias, without exception. We may have been hurt by specific individuals or groups, but definitely not by an entire category of people. This brings us to restating the importance of individual responsibility, which will be my next point.
And, what’s even more important, is that channeling such hard feelings into revengeful bullying is the worst possible way to do so. I firmly believe that countering one extreme with another isn’t effective, and it never will. You can’t combat Hitler’s atrocities by emulating Mao’s tyranny, nor can religious extremism be defeated by becoming an extremist of a different religion. The appropriate response to extremism, resentment, and hatred lies in upholding the fundamental tenets of democracy: respect, freedom of speech, and open, constructive dialogue, where the goal is solving problems and not finding revenge against an enemy. I think it’s desirable for everyone to build a society where polarized discourse, insults, and any form of aggressive behavior, whether overt or passive-aggressive, are not the norm, and so, ideological groups that encourage such divisive communication should be marginalised, rather than accommodated. Also because, as some of you probably know very well, accommodating bullies won’t calm them down, but it’ll simply make them return, wanting for more.
Labels or categories shouldn’t determine anyone’s value or role in society, ever
Your race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation — whether Caucasian, Black, Asian, European, cisgender, transgender, part of the LGBT+ community, or heterosexual, do not intrinsically determine your worth as a human being, and it never will. This assertion may seem like common sense, but it often falls by the wayside in the face of this identity and labelling politics. Such labels, especially when assigned rather than chosen, can be misused as a tool of control, simplifying very complex individual identities into easy categorisations of who’s “good” and “bad”, who’s the victim and who’s the oppressor.
I would argue that your worth as a human being will be defined by your capacity to solve complex problems, to contribute positively to the world, and to express empathy and compassion. Or we could discuss on the subjectivities and nitpick on this all day long, but the point is: whatever we agree on what some “good human being” traits may be, we should also inevitably agree that these traits aren’t confined to a specific category or group, and they will never be. If you don’t agree with this, then you’re probably equal to the enemy you are trying to fight.
That being said, let’s take just a little step back, again: it’s obviously also true that there are groups of people that too often endure prejudice, neglect, and invisibility. But making society more mindful of this cannot be achieved by ascribing some artificially built value to some groups rather than others. What we really need is a genuine discussion that appreciates the role of personal responsibility, individual values, diverse intellectual viewpoints, and how these can be worked together for a sensible cooperation, towards formation of more effective groups of problem solvers, and a better democratic society. If we fight labels by creating more labels, and we just inject some manufactured importance wherever it is politically convenient to, we’re fighting air pollution by polluting more. But also, if we lose sight of individual responsibility, and we start giving all meaning to labels themselves, then we lose any sense of reality, we risk losing a vital part of our democratic culture, and we essentially hand over absolute power to those who decide these labels.
Leveraging on sense of guilt is a proven, despicable way to foster authoritarian power
I acknowledge, again, that numerous minority groups have faced and continue to face significant hardships at the hands of other groups, and seriously, I empathise with them (as, we may argue, I live in a place where I am a minority and I feel constantly marginalised by the attitude of most of the native locals).
But let’s start dismantling the idea that hence it is fine for some people to live by blaming other groups, and let’s look at history, first: while events from centuries or millennia ago might still influence our society, they don’t dictate our current identity as individuals. This troubling concept of “sins of the fathers being visited upon the sons” has been resurrected from pre-age of Enlightenment times, implying some “metaphysical” hereditary culpability that, if taken seriously, would really leave no one blameless. This notion that we carry the burdens of sins from past ages, which hence we somehow need to atone for, is inherently unjust, unscientific, and contrary to any rational sense of individual accountability. We are responsible only for our actions, not those of our ancestors nor the group we’re associated with (see what said above). Walking away of centrality of personal responsibility, as already stated, is extremely dangerous, as allows any group to prosecute others in the name of the same rules they arbitrarily decide.
Plus, let’s look at facts: in such a bloodbath, as human history is, everyone’s got their own dose of bad deals. Someone more than others, of course, but that’s not the point. What really matters is that if, for any reasons, it ends up being data-proven true that your category, or ethnicity, or the one you “fight for”, had the toughest time in past, in any case reducing the conversation to a competition of who suffered the most becomes just an unproductive, inescapable maze, as it poses the basis for punishment and vengeful action, rather than real problem solving.
In light of this, I find it deeply concerning that individuals keep ending up seeking attention or power by deliberately exploiting a sense of guilt among those they choose to consider the “historical wrongdoers”, the sinners; and that this is done with a good amount of public consensus. Expecting changes in behaviours, and public apologies for whatever is considered unjust or offensive (according to constantly changing rules), and not accepting any alternative to this, is just a shortcut to enforce authoritarian power on others via fear, guilt, and a constant sense of threat (see also what said above about bullying).
Guilt, after all, is a universal feeling, making it a potent tool for manipulation and persuasion. Religious institutions have exploited this emotion for centuries, justifying all kind of atrocities under their banner of moral righteousness. Because indeed, by gaining a status as a moral authority you also gain significant influence, perhaps even to the extent that it allows one to bypass the safeguards established by the legal system. This could, in theory, permit a few to take on the roles of judge, jury, and executor, potentially even with public approval. After all, this is why the people embracing “woke” culture in bad faith always start with the presupposition that their view is the only one that’s morally right, while everything that questions it is offensive, bad, wrong, and hence needs conversion, expiation and change of direction: because dogmas reinforce the power of those who wield them. Such maneuvers, anyways, remain utterly deplorable, which adds to the reasons why the sensible intellectual world should strongly reject such approach.
Complexity reduction is toxic
Our reality is complex, our world is complex, our society is. The more we reduce complexity the more we get further from reality, and hence, from a viewpoint that‘s reasonable, rational and scientific. This is a direct consequence of what stated when we talked of labelling and categorising, but it’s worth its own point.
Still, “woke” agenda tends to do this at three different, fundamental levels: history level, societal level and individual level.
Oversimplification in history interpretation is what we talked about before: things in human history are so complex and harsh that it is really hard to save anyone. Still, it is often easy and convenient to simplify the reading of it, and reducing all of it to some sort of “All the problems in history happened because this one group did something bad to the others”. But every serious non-ideologised academic will tell you it’s way more complex than this. Still this reductionist mentality allows woke ideologists to deliberately decide every time who the “historical sinner” is, so that they can leverage on their sense of guilt to easily obtain power, as described above.
But also oversimplification in societal dynamics, as if all problems in the human world could be solved by spotting and defeating one, simple group of oppressors, allows them to create a fascinating narrative, which unfortunately, as every narrative, is often used to manipulate reality, hide facts and scientific data that don’t support it; and what’s worse is that for this, as any sectarian, absolutist way of thinking, it can very easily target vulnerable, resentful individuals. Which brings directly to the oversimplification at the individual level: as individuals, I’d argue, we need to daily grow and improve ourselves mostly with the art of doubt, by daily applying scientific experimental method and by exercising compassion. Again, we could discuss the whole day about how personal improvement should be implemented and what values matter most, but one thing is sure: no serious expert in the field will ever say that it is healthy to find purpose, growth, or sense of improvement in opposition to some manufactured category of “others”, of “enemies”. This form of simplification offers an enticing yet deceptive shortcut, a scapegoat that totally diverts attention from any form of personal development and self-awareness, enabling a culture of immature individuals whose only purpose is to live by this sense of opposition, and find any reasonable excuse to perpetuate it.
Such practices are not new; history is replete with examples of societies and movements that employ this tactic. It’s an awfully troubling method, offering an illusion of purpose and meaning through confrontation and division. It appeals to our most basic instincts and for this it is, ultimately, a deceptive, limiting and dangerous approach.
Conclusions
I hope my message, at the end, is clear: we may all want to to make this world better, and I’m sure that there are people out there that are victims of segregation, prejudices, biases and that for this deserve more attention and compassion. But by embracing woke culture to help these people, we’re just accepting to use only the worst possible tool to solve a problem, since it is full of logical fallacies, moral ambiguity and could easily pave the way for a toxic society of cultural oversimplification, herd mentality, neglect of any individual responsibility, and aggressive factions who believe they can sidestep democratic legal systems.
I’m aware also of the so-called “slippery slope fallacy” so I won’t expect my prediction here is exact. However, I don’t even need it to be a precise prediction. The adverse effects of this approach are already occurring and thriving due to the acquiescence of people, corporations, and ideologists who are either acting in bad faith, driven by fear, or lacking the necessary understanding to recognise this state of things.
I also recognise that a bias someone could find in this article is that while I claimed to reject labels, I repeatedly used the “woke” label. And while this is true, I’d say that it is important to use this word to denote the ideology, rather than the people who hold or exhibit them. In short, don’t feel targeted: if you just feel a “liberal”, but you don’t recognise the authoritarian, aggressive, values I described above, then don’t worry, I’m not talking to you specifically. Keep working hard to make the world a better place.
But also, if you feel that you pertain to any category, any minorities that by any chance fails under the “protection” of the agenda, be the first person out there to reject it. Say, very simply, “I share the fundamental idea that every human being needs dignity and recognition, but not this intellectual, toxic way to bring such values to the world”.
Just try to stand, everyday, for a more diverse world, where “diversity” isn’t built ideologically, and doesn’t descend from the vengeful decision that some groups, by being classified as “victims of history”, need absolute attention or power now; but rather by encouraging the idea of valuing every single intellectual viewpoint that can add value to the contemporary world.
Let’s stand for a world where individual responsibility is honoured, and society problems are solved by facing and understanding complexity, rather than by blaming the last “trending” enemy or, what’s even worse, by trying to bend scientific and historical facts to pure ideology; a world of free speech and moral debate, where any form of authoritarianism is rejected, and people are simply seen and treated for their merits, for the value they bring to society. But most of all, reject any “enemy culture”, always, even if it now maybe protects you. Because remember the most obvious and still most underrated of all facts: today you support any toxic, persecutory means, you allow them to “infect” societies, and you do it because it serves you, but tomorrow winds may change, and you may be the next enemy to prosecute. And you may find no judge, jury or court to defend you, anymore.
