How To Criticize The "Woke" Without Being "Anti-Woke"

If the Left doesn't learn how to do this, they face electoral disaster moving forward.

by Ben Cohen

The list of Anti Woke activists grows, mostly on Substack, by the day. Disgruntled employees, frustrated liberals, and angry libertarians have discovered a highly lucrative wheeze where they can rant against Woke Twitter and get paid for it. The OGs of the movement, Bari Weiss, Matt Taibbi, Glenn Greenwald, Bill Maher, and Andrew Sullivan have spawned not just a cottage industry, but a movement of sorts. They tweet each other’s work, promote each other on Substack, and basically write the same article over and over again for their devoted audience of Anti-Wokesters.

Here are three articles published on three separate newsletters in the Anti-Woke network within hours/days of each other:

All three newsletters had exactly the same take on Elon Musk Twitter purchase — a lazy jab at the ‘Corporate Woke Elite’ afraid of free speech because it undermines their control over society and so on and so forth.

I get it. I think elements of the Left are insufferable. I also think the Left is in real danger of becoming what it hates, and more importantly, at risk of destroying Democrats’ prospects in the midterms this year and the general election in 2024.

The problem is that the Woke and the Anti-Woke are now making it almost impossible to have a civilized debate because they reject absolutely everything the other side believes in. This endless tribalism and circular firing squad mentality will only ensure the success of the far right. There has to be a better way to talk about this, because the consequences of this endless warfare means one thing for Democrats: losing elections.

Identity politics: pros and cons

I am not a fan of identity politics in its current form, but I do acknowledge the obvious fact that ethnic, gender and sexual identity have a basis in reality.