Insults Without Context
I was called a fascist for the first time when I was 11 years old. I remember looking it up and telling the person that I wasn’t in an Italian political party. To the other kid, “fascist” was just an intellectual-sounding insult. Not only did he use it devoid of its original meaning, he used it without any of its secondary meaning, either.
The secondary use of “fascist” is to denote a white Christian male who disagrees with you. There are many synonyms for this word, such as Nazi, racist, capitalist, fundamentalist. Sometimes Christians like to throw terms around, too, but they don’t want to reuse these terms. They use the next closest synonym. Instead of racist, they’ll say kinist, and instead of fundamentalist, they will say Pharisee. None of these terms are used today with anything like the meaning they originally had. And frankly, that’s not the point. The desired result of all of these insults is the same, no matter the source: “I called you a mean name. Therefore, I can disregard you, your beliefs, and as much of your humanity as I want.”
The new term that is emerging is “the Woke Right.” Just like the others, it’s devoid of its original meaning. It’s just a run-of-the-mill insult. I wonder if it was terms like this that Jesus had in mind when He said, “If anyone says to his brother, ‘You Fool!’ he will be liable for judgment.” I assume so.
The History of the Term “Woke”
I remember when the term “woke” rose to popularity around 2015. Contrary to what you might think, it was actually meant as a compliment. Woke was a term invented by leftists to denote someone who was no longer asleep to social injustice, but awake to it. It could apply to someone who supported things like the LGBT agenda, Critical Race Theory, climate change, or any of the other issues that were always lumped together with these ones.
Congratulations. You are no longer asleep. You are woke.
The politically conservative have used a similar term for themselves: “red-pilled.” The term came from the movie The Matrix, where the main character could “take the blue pill” and not learn the truth about the world, or “take the red pill” and experience the real world for the first time. One of the biggest features of being “red-pilled” is that once you see reality, you can’t unsee it. There is no going back. Many people proudly referred to themselves as “red-pilled” until the term started falling out of fashion around 2020.
But the term “woke” suffered a different fate. The left side of the political spectrum, the side that controls Hollywood, the media, public schools, and virtually all of the public sector, embraced wokeness wholeheartedly. They forced wokeness into every sport or book, every movie, TV show, or video game from a major corporation. It got to the point where people would look up each new piece of media to see if it was woke–and if it was woke, they would avoid it.
The word “woke” identified a specific group of people with specific characteristics. These people are still around today, and the term still applies accurately to them. The term didn’t start out as an insult, but it quickly turned into one. If something was woke–and nearly every major corporation and institution was woke–it was to be avoided. It was going to be poor-quality art with horrible messaging. For example, Disney’s Star Wars franchise, Marvel movies after 2018, Amazon’s The Rings of Power, the fifth Indiana Jones movie. These movies were all terrible, and they were labeled woke. The slogan ‘Get woke, go broke’ spawned from this phenomenon. Thus, “woke” became an insult, despite its definition never changing. Woke people meant it for good, and the right meant it for ill.
Theoretical Secondary Meaning of “Woke”
Before I talk about “the Woke Right,” I would like to break wokeness from its primary meaning and give it a secondary meaning. (Remember that the first meaning of “Fascist”
was a specific Italian political party, and the secondary meaning was an oppressive authoritarian
regime.)
In order to make a secondary meaning, I want to avoid regular vices and characteristics that can be applied to nearly any group. For example, Wokeism is a religion, but it’s not significantly similar to Islam or Buddhism. Woke people are immoral, but other people are immoral, and not all immoral people are alike. James Lindsey’s attempt only depicts three general vices that are not exclusive to woke people.
I’m sure many of you already have a picture in your head. Maybe you have seen the same viral videos on social media of a person who defines wokeness: an overweight white woman with an unnatural hair color who is shrieking, chanting, or calling someone a Nazi. Let’s take the climate, race, and LGBT agendas away from her and see what’s still there. There might be some elements I missed, but I came up with three:
- The woke refuse to discuss or defend their beliefs.
- The woke are antagonistic to nature.
- The woke dehumanize people to make violence morally acceptable.
1. The woke refuse to discuss or defend their beliefs.
I like a good debate. I think a lot of Christians do. I want to see two ideas compete and one come out on top as the victor. I love it when Christians pick their champions and have two qualified men discuss issues like baptism, eschatology, Calvinism, politics, and all the other things we shouldn’t argue about during Thanksgiving dinner. I try to give the guy I disagree with a fair shot, and hopefully I can change my mind if I’m wrong–or refine my thinking on the issues.
But woke people do not debate. I don’t know who their thought champions are. I have never seen them discuss their ideas with anyone in a public setting. The only way to get a debate out of woke people is to debate college or high school students in a social media video. They don’t debate otherwise, because they know their ideas are indefensible. If they were released to the general public, people would reject them to their face. Matt Walsh did that very thing with his documentary Am I Racist?
2. Woke people are antagonistic to nature.
They dye their hair unnatural colors to signal the group they’re in. The women will often shave the sides of their heads. They choose clothes that are meant to make them look uglier. They will purposefully make themselves look androgynous. Women will try to look more masculine, while men will try to look more feminine. They reject natural families and instead form polyamorous romantic groupings with multiple men and women. Many are homosexuals, and even ones that aren’t will make up an LGBT label just to fit in with the group.
3. The woke dehumanize people to make violence morally acceptable.
They have a short trip from calling someone a Nazi to hitting them on the head with a blunt weapon. Their thought process goes something like this: Language is violence. That person is saying things I don’t like. Since words are violence, I can use physical violence to defend myself. Then they will attack someone with lethal force. They have slogans such as ‘Punch a Nazi.’ Then they label everyone a Nazi.
In 2017, woke activist Eric Clanton attacked four strangers with a metal U-lock bike lock. Eric Clanton was a college professor of philosophy and ethics at the time.
Can Christian Nationalists be labeled “the Woke Right?”
Let’s take an honest look at each element of the term and see how well it fits. Is “Woke Right” a meaningful phrase, or an oxymoron.
1. The woke refuse to discuss or defend any of their beliefs.
Do Christian Nationalists refuse to defend their positions? No. Christian Nationalists want to debate and discuss their views. A new Christian Nationalist podcast springs up every day.
But at the time of the writing of this article, James White, professional debater, still refuses to debate Stephen Wolfe. Men from G3 will criticize Christian Nationalism from afar, and will not discuss their disagreement with actual Christian Nationalists. Stephen Wolfe, on his channel, will listen to criticisms of his book on Christian Nationalism, because these people refuse to talk to him face to face.
Ligon Duncan did two interviews on the Room for Nuance Podcast attacking Christian Nationalism. Why doesn’t he do one talking to them? He’s the Chancellor of Reformed Theological Seminary. Shouldn’t he be a pastor to pastors and show them how to deal with Christian Nationalism?
Christian Nationalists have no problems finding Christian leaders who will talk about them–but they struggle to find Christian leaders willing to talk to them. have a hard time finding Christian leaders willing to talk to them–but they have no problem finding Christian leaders who will talk about them. Woke element number 1 doesn’t apply to them.
2. Woke people are antagonistic to nature.
Are Christian Nationalists antagonistic to nature? Christian Nationalists support having children and raising them in church. They want people to stop eating seed oils and industrial byproducts in their food. (Have you read a food label lately? You need a chemistry degree to get through it.) They advocate for men losing weight, lifting weights, and getting healthier. Christian Nationalists aren’t antagonistic to nature.
3. The woke dehumanize people to make violence morally acceptable.
Do Christian Nationalists dehumanize people to the point where violence is morally acceptable? They use mean words from time to time, but I’ve never heard of a Christian Nationalist getting violent yet. But the movement is still young.
However, I feel I should point out that Christian Nationalists are often called “kinist” by other Christians. This is dehumanizing. Kinist is a replacement word for racist, and it means the same thing in every sense. This is a serious charge, and you’d better have solid evidence before you accuse a brother of kinism.
Is it fair to call Christian Nationalists the “Woke Right?”
None of the elements of wokeness were satisfied, other than Christian Nationalists saying mean things sometimes. Christian Nationalists are not “the Woke Right.” The term “Woke Right” doesn’t apply to anyone alive. This is a term for a phantom that people like James Lindsey can “warn” Christians about–while continuing their grift of exposing the phantom dangers right in our midst.
“Woke” is a real term with a real meaning. It doesn’t just mean “people I don’t like.” The original meaning is still connected to the original people who made it for themselves. These are specific people, and they are still in power, and they still have influence over our institutions. It doesn’t make sense to remove the term from the people it describes and try to apply it to another group.
I worry that some people don’t know the history of the term, so they think it’s just an insult that is thrown around. It makes more sense for one 11 year old to call another 11 year old a fascist than for anyone to use the term “Woke Right.” It is a nonsense term and should be rejected to its face.
