anarchyjc.com

What Happened to the Word?

Perhaps the most revealing part of the story is that woke didn’t become politically powerful because it stopped meaning something. It became powerful because it began to mean too many things at once. That made it adaptable. It could describe a political philosophy, a social movement, an activist, a corporation, a university, a television show, a government policy, or a person. Sometimes it was used sincerely.

What happens when a society starts asking whether everything should have a price?

For most of the last century, socialism carried a particular weight in American politics. It was less a political philosophy than a warning label. Socialism meant government control. Communism. The Soviet Union. Central planning. Bread lines. The loss of individual freedom. For generations of Americans, the argument was settled before it began. Capitalism meant freedom. Socialism meant the opposite.