Ok, so...I notice some leftists on my youtube feed are attempting to defend "Woke 1" and blasting Bernie and AOC for distancing themselves from Francesca Hong. And...I find it cringe. I admit, I sub to different people for a variety of perspecives. But yeah, these takes, I hate disagree with.
Look, NO ONE LIKED THE WOKE 1 CRAP. It was a weird hugbox of leftists and virtue signallers that came off as cringe to anyone with any normie instincts. Some people dislike the attempts to laugh it off by saying it makes people look insincere and how it "throws people under the bus", but I'm going to be honest, I believe that this stuff WAS insincere among a lot of people. Maybe not DSA types, but liberals? hell yeah. A lot of it was weaponized cynically to attack economic progressives and distract them from focusing on economic issues. Like, my big critique as a "non woke" leftie has always been that it sucks the air out of the room and stops us from having political discussions about anything else. It also came off as extremely pharasaic. Ya know, like the pharisees? And the bible? And the whole virtue signalling moral gestures that are superficial and fake. A lot of people did that stuff for the social approval. the SJW cult was to liberals and leftists what church is for conservatives, an overt display of external moral superiority followed by a lot of internal social games and hierarchies among the participants. And yeah, the second that stuff became radioactive, a lot of people started distancing themselves from it.
Of course, this alienated the true believers and the like. YOURE GONNA THROW US UNDER THE BUS! Oh boo hoo. Like really, I'm tired of this. It's the same guilt trip I've heard since 2015 and I've been immune to it. I swear that's another thing. A lot of people in these communities who benefit from this stuff end up being mentally unstable narcissists who use their underprivileged status to get a lot of free internet affection, and if you DARE break their little hugbox, they'll attempt to mod you, punish you, etc. I had this happen last year when the first signs of it ending were happening and I basically told someone that they need to stop making politics all about them. Again, you see where I'm coming from? I HATE this stuff, I've ALWAYS hated this stuff. It's always been fake, it's always been a distraction, it's always been enforced by a lot of weird social hugboxing and heavy internet moderation. And again, normally, I wouldn't mind sharing a coalition with people with other interests, but when the hug box literally sucks the energy out of the room to focus on anything else, it gets old.
And you know what? I'm not alone. Most normies hate this stuff. A vast majority of people hate it. Not just the right, but also the center and even more blunt and honest members of the social "center left" like me. It appeals to like 1/6 of the population, it turns off about 2/3 of them (1/6 being neutral arguably). And here's the thing. We need to win elections. So....if you went off and went on some online screed about how thanksgiving sucks because colonialism, and the people look at you and think you're a whacko, well....yeah. I get it, inside those hugboxes there's heavy social enforcement where a lot of people were goaded into saying some straight up insane crap at the time, but that's always why I've tried to be that dude in the asch experiment who is like "no, you guys are choosing the wrong line, are you blind?" Social hugboxing will make people blind, socially, where they dont understand how crazy they come off to people outside of their little clique.
And for people who are true believers who say that they shouldnt have to give that stuff up to run for office...well...DON'T. You can be an influencer trying to change the moral landscape, I am myself. But let's be blunt, do you think me, the autistic unemployed anti work guy would make for a good political candidate? I'd be Doreen Forded and I know it. And I dont wanna give up my perspective ever, so I dont run for office. I just say what I wanna say and try to inspire the world to change. And maybe, someone like Andrew Yang will run for office on views similar to mine. And you know what? Despite having similar views on UBI and even work to SOME degree (more so than most others in society at least), yang can at least sell those ideas to moderates. He's far more electable than say, I am in that regard. Even if I do think he has a lot of shortcomings. But that's the thing, I'm trying to push things where I wanna see them. Im not looking to run for office myself as I know I'd be unpopular to some degree, as Id have lots of baggage in the form of this blog, reddit comments, etc. Rather, I'm trying to win the battle for ideas.
When you run for office, you gotta try to be electable. When you have unpopular opinions, you gotta "hide your power level" as some say on the left, or otherwise do the equivalent of dog whistle politics. You know how the right wing did that? They couldnt just show how racist they were so they hid behind terms like forced bussing, or welfare queens, blah blah blah, Reaganism actually formed as a form of this politics, where small government was actually originally a dog whistle to screwing black people but they had plausible deniability.
Now we're getting to the point we need that on the LEFT. If you wanna do the "anti racist" stuff, you need to distance yourself from woke 1 rhetoric, which was what AOC was trying to do with the "woke 1 was crazy" comment. It's smart politics, and if anything she was trying to cover for Hong with that. She read the room and adjusted her rhetoric to meet the moment. As much as those of us on the left would love to move the overton window to be more blunt (I mean, I'm like this on economics), sometimes you gotta be a little more opaque. Graham Platner understood this trying to distance himself from his reddit history. "Oh I was in a dark place, I dont think like that any more." Maybe he does, maybe he doesnt. People grow and change, but sometimes it is just hiding one's power level. Idk. But yeah, you gotta play that game sometimes. And if you cant do it, well, dont run for office. I sure as fudge aint running. We gotta understand, elections are popularity contests. Leaning into your ideology can help you...if your ideology is popular. But if it's not, well...youre gonna lose. And Hong just had that SJW cringe all over her where she couldnt win elections, and where even Bernie and AOC rightly read the room and refused to endorse. Sorry, not sorry.
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