Category: Politics

While the title of this essay could mean that Boebert and Greene’s culture war against “the progressives” and “the woke” got them into congress, it is not what I mean. What I mean is that progressive feminists fought for the rights of women to vote and hold office and without them, Boebert and Greene would be unable to do either.

The right in the United States tends to be ahistorical or mythological in their approach to the past and hence rarely talk about how many conservatives of today accept progressive views that their predecessors savagely opposed. An excellent illustration of this is women’s rights. Women were granted the right to vote in 1920 by the ratification of the 19th Amendment. While this might seem like a long time ago, there are people still alive that were born before then. Interestingly, the first woman served in congress in 1917, even before women had the Constitutional right to vote.

As would be expected, the battle over women’s right to vote and hold office  followed the template of conservative arguments for exclusion. One anti-suffrage argument was that women did not want the vote because they took care of the home and children and hence did not have the time to vote or stay informed about politics. Interestingly, this argument was advanced by the National Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage which was founded in 1911 by Josephine Dodge. Dodge had also led a movement to establish day care centers for working mothers and was apparently did not find her own arguments against political involvement by women to be convincing.

The other argument, a stock argument for exclusion in general, is that women are defective  relative to men. It was (and sometimes still is) claimed that they lack the mental capacity to engage in politics or are too emotional. A “nicer” version of the argument is based on the belief that men and women are fundamentally different and  women would be sullied by politics. There were also racist and class arguments against extending the vote: allowing all women the right to vote would allow, well, all women the right to vote and this would ibnclude minorities and those in the lower economic classes. 

There was also a “practical” argument that allowing women to vote would increase the cost of elections by doubling the number of voters. Some often unspoken “practical” arguments were concerns that women would act from maternal concern and vote for prohibiting alcohol consumption (which did happen with Prohibition) and vote for safer working conditions and limits on working hours.

While progressives and radicals (including some anarchists) backed women’s suffrage, one argument in favor of it rests on the stereotype of women as maternal and purer than men: the argument was that women voters would clean up politics and government. As noted above, these alleged qualities of women were also used to argue against allowin women to vote.  There were also more liberal arguments based on natural rights (citizens have a moral right to have a say in the government) and, of course, the classic “no taxation without representation” argument. Despite the stereotype argument, the movement for women’s suffrage  is best categorized as a leftist, progressive, and even radical movement opposed to some traditional family values. It is true that the Republican party of the time did support women’s suffrage, but the Republican party of the past is fundamentally different from the Republican party of today (and likewise for the Democrats). But, the Republicans  of today can claim that a party with the same name did fight for women’s rights.  But what does this mean for today?

Given that women’s right to vote and right to hold office are progressive and even radical views, the fact that the American right (mostly) accepts women like Boebert, Greene, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, and Nikki Haley in positions of power suggests three possibilities.

The first is that the right is more progressive than it believes and is willing to quietly embrace some progressive values, such as allowing women to vote and hold office. This seems unlikely, but the idea of closet progressives ruling the party does make a narrative that would appeal to conspiracy theorists.

The second is the “Queen Victoria” approach: while these women think they should be in office (and have equal rights), this is not a commitment to the general principle that women should have the right to hold office (and have equal rights). While possible, there is not much evidence either way—although Boebert recently claimed that women are weaker vessels and because of their frailty need men. I am inclined to think that these conservative women who hold positions of power think that the same right should extend to other women, but I could be wrong about this.

 The third is that while these were once progressive and radical ideas, they are now old enough and established enough that most do not see them as progressive or radical. If so, this indicates that traditional and conservative values can shift over time, albeit at a slower progression than for the progressives. On this view, the distinction between progressives and conservatives must include the factor of time: conservatives eventually embrace some progressive views but it takes them longer. This seems plausible, since if anyone were to suggest to Boebert and her fellows that they are embracing progressive views by holding office, they would probably deny it and then tear into the “woke” and “progressives” for wanting to do for others what the progressives once did for women. 

This gradual increase in inclusion relative to who gets excluded by the right suggests that in 100 years there might be a transgender conservative in office raging (and voting) against rights for (to use a sci-fi example) synthetic people. This is not intended to be against transgender people; the point is that members of any excluded group are people, and a person can be an exclusionary bigot even if they are a member of a group that is or was excluded because of bigotry. The American right demonstrates this every day. For example, not long ago Italian Americans were not considered white and were subject to discrimination and racism. But now Ron DeSantis, whose family immigrated relatively recently, is infamous for his anti-migrant policies and cruelty to migrants.

While I do not expect such people to experience a revelation about the inconsistency of their views this  undercuts the right’s professed world view. Far from holding fast to traditional values, the American right (slowly) shifts and progresses in terms of who is excluded and who is the target of bigotry. True, they do hold to the traditional values of exclusion and prejudice, but the tent really does get bigger. The right has already accepted, with some limitations, women, minorities, and homosexuals—groups they once violently excluded. As noted above, the scope of “whiteness” has expanded, allowing for a much more inclusive form of white supremacy than in the past.

This does lead to an interesting question about what will happen if the tent keeps getting bigger. Will the right need to stop expanding the tent or will they eventually need to kick some people back out into the rain? Or could progress eventually put an end to exclusion when there is no one left to exclude? As I suggested above, this might be where technology can save the right for a while: once all humans are included, they can briefly exclude synthetic people. But eventually there might be a right-wing AI member of congress raging against the people of Alpha Centauri and so on as long as they can find some outsider to exclude. So, the right had better get busy backing AI and warp drive research if they can’t keep enough people out of their tent.

The United States faces many problems, such as collapsing banks, closing hospitals, and radioactive waste contaminating elementary schools. While there are people trying to solve these problems, many politicians and pundits are focused on culture war battles over what often seem to be imaginary problems. While it is easy to lose track of the current battles of the culture war, I think there is still a war on woke and pugilism against pronouns.

While a rational person might respond to this with outrage that so much effort is being wasted when so many real problems exist, it is rational for the right to focus on these fights rather than on solving actual problems. Solving real problems is usually hard and fighting made up fights is easy. Also, seriously addressing the real problems most American face would risk the ire of their financial backers, rejection by their base, and put them at odds with their professed ideology.

While I thought that the right had largely moved on from the fight over pronouns, it turns out that I was wrong. On April 9, 2024 the governor of Idaho signed a law forbidding teachers from referring to a student by a name or pronoun that doesn’t align with their birth sex, unless the parents consent. So, the pronoun war continues, at least until the right needs to rebrand the fight.

While the pronoun war is largely a conflict manufactured by the right using a straw man and nut picking (treating the most extreme or unusual members of a group as representative of the group), there is a tiny bit of truth buried deep under all the hyperbole. There are some cases in which people do appear to be acting in extreme ways about pronoun usage and these can be weaponized to “argue” that the left is looney about pronouns. But, of course, this is fallacious reasoning. At best, it establishes that a few people exist who appear to be acting in extreme ways about pronoun usage. Pronouns are, of course, also linked to the culture war over gender.

To be fair, some people can seem to be engaged in pompous virtue signaling about pronouns and this can be annoying. This is analogous to the stereotype of vegans or people who do cross-fit annoyingly telling everyone. Posturing is annoying. But tolerating annoying behavior by having a proportional response is part of being an adult. As such, the right thing to do is politely tolerate such mild virtue signaling. But what about cases in which a person is serious (and not just virtue signaling) about their pronouns? My view of this is shaped by the “Mikey Likes It” commercial for Life cereal.

While my name is “Michael” I usually go by “Mike.” But, as you have probably guessed, people have called me “Mikey.” I do not like that. This is because when people use “Mikey” they have usually been trying to insult or provoke me. I respond by politely saying that I do not go by “Mikey. If they keep pushing it, it just becomes ever more evident they are doing it to provoke me. People have said they do not understand why I am taking offense at being called “Mikey” and even say that they can call me whatever they want. The pronoun wars reminded me of how much I disliked being called “Mikey” by people trying to mess with me when I was younger.

Looked at philosophically, my view is that my name is my name and I have the right to decide what name I will respond to. It is not up to other people to decide. This is especially true when they are misnaming me with malicious intent and are trying to insult or provoke me. While I don’t think this is a serious offense, it is still a hostile action, motivated by malice or cruelty.

When people insist that they be called by their chosen pronouns, I get it—I think of people trying to insult or provoke me by calling me “Mikey.” Their pronouns belong to them and thus they have the right to refuse to respond to pronouns they do not accept. People attempting to impose pronouns on them are most likely trying to insult them, be cruel, or provoke them—and hence are to be condemned in their misdeeds. But wait, someone might say, isn’t forcing people to accept your pronouns forcing them to accept your values?

When made in good faith, there is an interesting issue here of whether accepting a person’s pronouns entails accepting a specific value system about identity. To use an analogy, if I accept that King Charles should be called “King Charles”, would I thus be embracing the values system behind the British monarchy? On the face of it, I would just be accepting that that is what the British call him rather than accepting a political theory. But it could be argued that using the word “king” entails accepting that he really is a king and perhaps even that his kingship is legitimate.

On the one hand, it can be argued that expecting people to use one’s preferred pronouns is like me expecting people to call me “Mike” rather than “Mikey.” I am not forcing people who believe that “Mikey” is correct to adopt my world view about my name; I just expect them to respect my name when they talk to me. If this is too much for them, they can just call me “Michael.” Likewise, if a person has “they” as their pronoun, no one is forced to accept whatever world view might lie behind that choice—the other person can either use “they” or avoid pronouns if they have a sincere commitment against using pronouns in ways they do not want to use them.

On the other hand, one could argue that using a person’s preferred pronouns is to endorse or at least tolerate certain values. For example, a person might use “she/her” and someone talking to them might have a conceptual scheme in which that person is a “he/him.” As such, if they use “she/her”, then they would be respecting the other person’s pronoun choice at the expense of their own professed belief. Likewise, if a person had a sincere belief that “Mikey” is the correct short form of “Michael” then they would be respecting my choice at the expense of their own professed belief. Going back to the king example, it could be argued that referring to Charles as King Charles is to accept that he is a legitimate king and perhaps to endorse monarchy.

As another example, imagine that Sally is divorced and changed her name from Mrs. Sally Jones back to Ms. Sally Smith. Now, suppose Sally is talking to Ted at the DMV.  Ted sincerely does not believe in divorce, he believes a married woman must go by “Mrs.”, and that a woman must take her husband’s name. Sally is trying to get a new driver’s license as Ms. Sally Smith. Because of Ted’s beliefs about marriage, he refuses to refer to her as “Ms. Sally Smith” and refuses to issue her a new driver’s license.

His belief is profound and sincere (and based on his religion, if you’d like to add that), but it would be absurd to say that he has the right to refuse to accept her choice because he has a different conception of marriage. Likewise, one could say it would be absurd for someone to just impose pronouns on people based on their conception of proper pronoun use. Even if this is based on sincere beliefs. After all, it is not Ted’s beliefs that should decide how Sally refers to herself.

A person could be both respectful of the other person and act in accord with their beliefs by not using pronouns. If the person asked to use pronouns they disagree with sees it as an imposition, then they would need to accept that applying pronouns to a person who disagrees with them would also be an imposition. Consistency would require that they do not impose on others if they would not wish to be imposed upon themselves.

In closing, I obviously don’t think that people should be able to use the right to choose their pronouns and name to engage in identity theft. I also do not think that people would identify themselves as attack helicopters or whatever—I say this to show that I am familiar with the rhetoric used in bad faith “debate” over this issue. It does no more harm to use the pronouns that people wish to use than it does to use the name they prefer. If it is asking too much to do this, then the easy fix is to simply not use pronouns.

MEWF BarbieIn my last essay I discussed TERFs (Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminists), with a focus on the seemingly odd alliance between TERFs (or “gender critical” feminists) and the far right. J.K. Rowling is, sadly, the most famous example of what her critics see as a TERF allied with the far right. While a TERF need not be a racist, there is a category of feminism that often is, the MEWF (Minority Excluding White Feminist). While a TERF (Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist) excludes trans-women because they claim they are not women, a MEWF does not claim that minority women are not women. As such, their exclusion is not based on gender but on race. In some cases, this exclusion arises from ignorance rather than malice.

While we Americans like to claim that “all men are equal”, the United States is deeply segregated by race and economic class. For those who might doubt this, it is easy to acquire what is admittedly anecdotal evidence: walk around your neighborhood and see who lives around you. Then consider the diversity (or lack thereof) of your friends. If you have kids in school (or are a kid in school), look at their classmates. While you might be an interesting exception, you will most likely find that your neighbors and friends are similar in race and economic class. If you have kids, they probably attend a school where most other students are the same race and economic class as you.

This segregation entails that people will often be ignorant about people outside of their race and class. Thus, a typical white feminist (especially if they are in the upper class) will know little about the challenges faced by women of color (and women of lower economic classes). It is easy for such white feminists to be MEWFs out of innocent ignorance—they are simply unaware of problems that women of color might face as people of color. An obvious example is racism—while a white feminist has heard about racism, it is not something they experience in the way they experience sexism. One can criticize white feminists for such ignorance and argue that they have a moral obligation to correct their ignorance, but one should be sympathetic when it comes to the ignorance of others, since we are all ignorant in many ways. This is, of course, not to forgive willful ignorance. But there are other factors than ignorance that can make a person a MEWF, such as a difference in priorities.

A white feminist can be aware of the circumstances faced by women of color but be focused on their own concerns, making them a priority. It can be argued that it is rational for people to give priority to their problems, given the limited resources most of us have. As an analogy, if someone can barely afford to buy food, it would be unreasonable to criticize them for not feeding others.  One might also look at in terms of an airplane analogy: you should get your own mask on before helping others. This would certainly apply in analogous emergency situations in which not helping yourself first would make you unable to help others. An analogy could also be drawn to specialists—an oncologist should not be condemned for not being a general practitioner. After all, the oncologist is kept quite busy with cancer cases.

As such, perhaps it makes sense for white feminists to focus on matters that impact (or interest) them and ignore those that do not. This can easily result in their excluding women of color and of different economic classes. A feminist executive, such as Sheryl Sandberg, would tend to prioritize the problems of female executives and be less concerned with those faced by the women who work in the companies run by these executives. But there might be grounds for condemning such exclusion as selfish or too self-focused.

Rachel Cargle offers an interesting criticism of toxic white feminism, focusing on what she dubs “white supremacy in heels.” Cargle notes that white feminists can often be guilty of tone policing, spiritual bypassing (the notion that racism can be eradicated by “love and light”), the white savior complex, and centering (making it all about them). Other authors, such as Rafia Zakaria and Kyla Schuller, are also critical of white feminism. It must be noted that these criticisms are not attacks on white feminists for being white, but a criticism of the ideology of white feminism. This sort of distinction is often willfully ignored by those who make bad faith arguments that critics of racism are racists. This is on par with saying that a critic of corruption must be corrupt because they are criticizing corruption. Despite this discussion, some might find the idea of white supremacist MEWFs to be absurd. After all, feminism is often cast as “woke” and white supremacy is usually seen as inextricably linked to misogyny. But a look at American history shows how well white supremacy and white feminism can mix.

One often unknown fact of the women’s suffrage movement in the United States is that some of its members were members of Women of the Ku Klux Klan (WKKK). While pushing for the right of women to vote, their push was for white women and they wished to exclude Black women. A reason for this was that the votes of white women could be used to counter the votes of Black men. As might be guessed, the KKK tended to be in favor of this—resulting in unexpected consequences.

The women in the suffrage movement, including the white supremacists, developed political skills and networks that could be employed for other purposes—be they for progressive causes or to advance racism. Interestingly, a split developed between the male KKK and the female WKK: while both held anti-Semitic, anti-Catholic, and racist views, the WKKK embraced the idea of women’s rights and argued for what would seem to be some progressive positions, such as pay for housewives. But these rights and entitlements would only be for white, native-born Protestant women. One could say they have a good claim to being the original MEWFs. While this might all be dismissed as “ancient” history (the early 1900s), this form of MEWF is alive and well. As an illustration, consider Lauren Boebert and Marjorie Taylor Greene.

While it might sound odd, Boebert and Greene should be considered feminists (there are many versions of feminism). They both obviously believe that women have the right to vote, serve in political offices, and hold power. Boebert also believes in the right of a woman to divorce her husband. They also clearly think that women have the right to harshly criticize powerful men (such as Joe Biden), as opposed to being demure and polite ladies who defer to the patriarchy. Not long ago, these views and their behavior would have been seen as shockingly radical by the right—they would have been savagely condemned and criticized. Now they are mainstream feminists about these views, but feminists, nonetheless. After all, Boebert and Greene obviously disagree with most of the misogynistic views expressed by the right—they are not going to go back to the kitchen to make sandwiches for men. But their behavior and words make it clear that they are MEWFs. Greene seems to embrace white nationalism and Boebert seems to have a bond with white supremacy. Thus, the tradition started by the WKKK continues to this day. Rush Limbo, with his talk of Feminazis, was almost not wrong.

Fascist BlondeIn revising my Modern Philosophy class, I added the philosopher Mary Wollstonecraft. Based on recent revelations about philosophers such as George Berkeley (he owned slaves), I did some digging into the backgrounds of the other philosophers. I was surprised to learn that Wollstonecraft, long praised as a Modern era feminist, has been accused of being an upper class white feminist who appropriated slavery in her writings. While my experience with philosophical feminism is limited, my curiosity about this accusation introduced me to the TERF war and  that white feminism can be white supremacy in heels. Rush Limbaugh’s “feminazi” immediately sprung to mind, but with a rather different meaning: feminists who are actual fascists. As you might be wondering about the connection, a case can be made that there is right wing line that runs through the TERFs and the MEWFs (Minority Excluding White Feminists). In this essay, I’ll focus on the TERFs. In my next essay I’ll discuss MEWFs.

The acronym “TERF” was created by the trans-inclusive cisgender radical feminist Viv Smythe. It originally stood for “Trans-Exclusionary RadFem” but now also stands for “Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist.” In its early usage, TERF was presented as a neutral description in that it designated a radical feminist who excluded trans women. Over the years, the TERF category became more inclusive in that it now includes trans-excluding people who are not radical and perhaps  not even feminists. Some claim “TERF” is now a pejorative (or even hate speech) and feminists labeled as TERFs prefer to claim they are gender critical. J.K. Rowling, of Harry Potter fame, is probably the world’s most famous gender critical person. I will use the neutral definition and take a TERF to be a feminist (radical or not) who excludes trans women. But what does this exclusion mean?

Put bluntly, the exclusion is the claim that trans women are not women—they are men. Disingenuously but consistently, TERFs claim to be trans inclusive because they say trans men are women. While this view is not exclusive to the American political right, this does put the TERFs and the political right in agreement about trans people: trans people are wrong about their identity. This leads to the matter of what trans people are doing when they make their identity claims. Or at least how it is perceived.

Since a TERF thinks that trans people are wrong about their claimed identity, they need to explain this alleged error. They could claim that trans people have sincere but false beliefs about themselves—they think they have one identity but are in error. This would be an epistemic error, like a person who thinks they are hilarious but are not that funny. This, however, does not seem to be what the TERFs tend to think—after all, if trans people just had sincere false beliefs about their identity, then the reasonable response would be to simply leave them alone unless the belief proved harmful.  If an alleged  false belief did prove harmful, the reasonable response would be an epistemic intervention to address the alleged false belief. In general, this epistemic error view does not seem common among TERFs (or the political right).

The view that seems common among TERFS (and the right), especially in the context of their rhetoric, is the hypothesis that trans people are mentally ill. On this view, trans people would have sincere beliefs about their identity, but these beliefs would be caused by their mental illness. Until recently, being transgender was considered a mental disorder and called “gender identity disorder.”  Despite this change in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the idea that transgender people are mentally ill still remains popular in some circles. If TERFs (and the right) sincerely believe that transpeople are ill, then one would expect them to be sympathetic, in the way one would be sympathetic to someone with cancer or anorexia. But TERFs and the right are hostile to trans people in ways that one would not be hostile to people suffering from, for example, breast cancer.  But perhaps this can be explained in a way that is consistent with the illness hypothesis. While cruel, hostility towards people with metal illness is common and people with mental illnesses are routinely stigmatized and suffer because of this. As such, it would be consistent for TERFs and the right to stigmatize transpeople if they thought they were mentally ill—that is how the mentally ill are often treated in the United States. We have a bizarre system in which what is seen as mental illness is often dealt with by the police and punished rather than treated. One reason for this, perhaps, is that psychiatry has long been weaponized against those who are different and those who dissent. But there is also another possible explanation available to TERFs (and the political right).

While those hostile to transpeople often characterize them as mentally ill, there is also the view that trans people (especially trans women) do not actually believe their identity claims. That is, the view is that trans women are just pretending and know that they are men. But pretending to be a woman when one knows one is a man need not be a matter of concern. After all, actors have been doing this for a very long time and their goals are typically benign: they want to entertain. But TERFs (and the right) usually claim that trans women present a danger to women, and this is why they should be excluded. The TERF threat narrative is like the right’s threat narrative, which does explain the alliances between some TERFS and the right.

While J.K. Rowling is but one example, she provides an excellent illustration of the TERF narrative. According to TERFs, trans women are men and thus allowing them in women’s spaces puts women in danger. As would be expected, there is a great deal of focus on bathrooms by both TERFs and the right, with bathroom bills being a key part of the culture war and war on trans people. Both TERFs and the right advance the same argument: trans women should not be allowed in women’s bathrooms (or other women’s spaces) because trans women are men, and they are likely to assault women. The narrative is not always clear about whether the trans women are supposed to just be bad men pretending to be women so they can assault women or if transwomen believe they are women but still decide to act like bad men.

The varieties of feminism disagree about male badness. On some views most or even all men are bad and want to harass and assault women. On such views, it would follow that if transwomen were men, then they would (probably) be bad. For those who do not think that men are bad simply because they are men, then the motivation of trans women would need to be explained in a way that would link their bad intentions to being trans. This is likely to be the hypothesis that bad men would decide to become trans women for the purpose of doing evil to women and this seems to often be explained as a strategic choice that allegedly confers an advantage in doing evil. On the face of it, this is an odd claim since bad men can easily do evil to women without such a strategy and it seems to confer no advantage over the other methods bad men use to gain access to vulnerable girls and women.

 Some on the right and some TERFs also seem to share the view that women are naturally victims of men and require protection from men. This can be in addition to the view that men are bad or that women bring out the badness in men.   While women are all too often the victims of male violence and a transwoman could certainly be a bad person, there is no evidence that trans inclusive bathrooms are a safety risk.  While women have reason to fear being harmed by men, there is no evidence that transwomen pose an unusual threat.  So, the bathroom bills are, at best, merely useless in terms of protecting women.

Another shared area of concern between the TERFs and the political right is in sports. In addition to bathroom bills, Republicans have been advancing anti-trans sports bills. The argument is that transwomen are either male or keep the advantages of males when competing with females and this should not be allowed because it is unfair. As the NCCA has long had rules on transgender athletes and there are relative few transgender competitors, these seems to be little merit to these bills. If the right was truly concerned with fairness and equality for women and girls, they would get around to ratifying the ERA and address issues like pay inequality and the various real harms that women face. To be fair to the TERFS, they do sometimes also advocate for better treatment of women (except transwomen).

While it might seem odd for some feminists to ally with far-right white supremacists, some TERFS have found shared ground with them. The reason this should seem odd is that white nationalists are usually  misogynistic, but the alliance does make sense. As noted above, TERFs claim transwomen are men who will exploit being accepted as women to gain access to women’s spaces and thus assault women. White supremacists have long focused on protecting “the purity of white women” and both TERFs and far-right white nationalists make use of fictional narratives about sexual assault as rhetorical devices. More importantly, they can have a common cause in their commitment to gender conformity and opposition to trans people. While it might seem odd for self-proclaimed feminists to embrace the idea of immutable gender, this seems to be at the core of a TERF philosophy of gender. As noted above, TERFs exclude transwomen because they think transwomen are men and they (generally) include transmen, but as women. In their fear-based arguments, the seem to rely on the idea that men are by nature aggressive and that women are victims of men who require protection through gender defined spaces. That is, they embrace gender stereotypes and thus find a common cause with the far-right white nationalists who also embrace gender stereotypes. This provides a smooth transition to the matter of MEWFs—Minority Excluding White Feminists, the subject of the my next essay.

Smoking ZeppelinThanks to the endless culture war, those who want to keep up with the political language need to learn the definitions and re-definitions of terms and phrases. Recent examples include “critical race theory”, “DEI” and “woke.” This essay focuses on “woke.”

For some folks on the right, the word “woke” seems to mean everything and nothing. An excellent example of this is the governor of my adopted state of Florida. What does DeSantis mean by the term? It seems to mean whatever he wants it to mean. But “woke” has a long history that predates the latest battles of the culture war.

In the beginning,  “woke” meant “alert to racial prejudice and discrimination.” Through use, the term gradually expanded to include broad areas of identity politics and social justice. While originally seen as a positive term, “woke” has been forcibly redefined in increasingly negative ways.

Around 2019, started to be used ironically to mock people for insincere performative activism and virtue signaling. The negative definition became “to be overly politically correct and police others’ words.” While somewhat vague, this definition has a set meaning. However, “woke” has been subjected to a rhetorical modification to make it mean everything and nothing. This can be traced back to Christopher Ruffo redefining “critical race theory” in March, 2021: “The goal is to have the public read something crazy in the newspaper and immediately think ‘critical race theory.  We have decodified the term and will recodify it to annex the entire range of cultural constructions that are unpopular with Americans.”

It is notable that he did this in public, on Twitter (now X) and you can still see the tweet (assuming Musk has not destroyed X). He told everyone he was presenting disinformation about CRT without any concern that this would undercut his efforts. This seems to imply he thinks that his audience is in on this dishonest redefinition. This is like a con artist Tweeting that they are running a con; this only makes sense if they think the marks do not care or will happily go along with it.

What Ruffo did is create a Balloon Man. This is a variant of the Straw Man fallacy in which the target is redefined in an excessively broad or vague manner. This expanded definition, the Balloon Man, is taken to include a wide range of (usually) bad things. This Balloon Man is then attacked, and it is concluded that the original is defective on this basis. This Balloon Man redefinition of “critical race theory” proved successful but it was soon engulfed by the term “woke.” That is, critical race theory is usually now presented as but one example of what is “woke.”

This move could also be called creating a Zeppelin Man. Zeppelins are airships that contain multiple inflated cells, so they can be seen as being made of multiple balloons. As a rhetorical move or fallacy, this would be a matter of making a term that has been made into a Balloon Man part of another term whose meaning has also been redefined in an excessively broad or vague manner. A fallacy would occur when this Zeppelin Man is attacked to “prove” that the original is defective. For those who are aware that the term is now a Zeppelin, using it in this way is an act of bad faith. But it has numerous advantages, many of which arise because the vagueness of the definition also allows it to perform other rhetorical functions. Redefinition also involves other rhetorical techniques. This is all done to weaponize the term for political purposes.

A key part of the redefinition of “woke” involved the rhetorical device of demonizing. Demonizing is portraying the target as evil, corrupt, dangerous, or threatening.  This can be done in the usual three ways: selective demonizing, hyperbolic demonizing, or fictional demonizing. Selective demonizing is when some true negative fact about the target is focused on to the exclusion of other facts about the target.  Hyperbolic demonizing involves greatly exaggerating a negative fact about the target. Fictional demonizing is simply lying about the target. For example, “critical race theory” (which now falls under “woke”) originally referred to a law school level theory about the impact of race in the law. But, in addition to being made into a Balloon Man, it has also been demonized as something awful. Likewise for the other terms that now fall under “woke.”  The defense against demonizing is to critically examine such claims to see if they are plausible or not.

Some on the right have also been scapegoating wokeness by blaming it for problems. One example is the bizarre efforts of some conservatives to blame the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank on wokeness. As would be expected, no serious person gives this any credence since the bank collapsed for the usual reasons . Presumably this is intended to misdirect people from the real causes (a red herring) and to “prove” that wokeness is bad. Americans should feel both insulted and offended by this latest attempt at deceit. After all, even the slightest reflection on the matter would show that the idea that a major bank failed because of wokeness is absurd. As such, unless these people think that their base is onboard with their lies, they must think their base is ignorant and stupid.

Some of what is included under the redefinition of “woke” includes dog whistles. One version of the dog whistle is to use coded language such that its true (and usually controversial or problematic) meaning is understood by your intended audience but not understood by the general population. This is like how slang terms and technical terms work; you need to know the special meanings of the terms to understand what is being said. Another version of the dog whistle is a form of innuendo. A word or phrase is used to suggest or imply something (usually negative). If you do not know the special meanings or the intended implication, you are excluded, often intentionally so.  For example, “Critical Race Theory” has been assimilated into “woke” but the phrase is now a dog whistle.

Interestingly, the term “woke” itself functions as a dog whistle. Since anyone can technically be woke, someone using the term as a dog whistle has plausible deniability if they are called out. That is, they could claim that since a straight, white man can be “woke”, the term “woke” cannot be a racist dog whistle. In some cases, a person could be making this claim in good faith, thus providing cover for those making it in bad faith.

The dog whistle aspect of the redefinition is a critical part of weaponizing “woke.” After all, making something into a dog whistle means that:

 

  • Your fellows know what you mean, and they approve.
  • Your foes know what you mean, and they are triggered.
  • Critics can seem silly or crazy to “normies.”
  • In can have plausible deniability that “normies” will accept.
  • Can onramp “normies.”

 

The vagueness and demonizing enable the term “woke” to refer what could be called a universal enemy. This is a rhetorical technique of broadly defining something in negative ways so that it can serve as an enemy for almost anyone. If the universal enemy is successfully created, then the term can be effectively used to persuade people that something (or someone) is bad simply by applying the term. If pushed enough, this can also be a form of begging the question by “arguing” that something is bad by defining it as bad. If people see “woke” as whatever they think is bad and they think that something is woke, then they will think that it is bad with no proof needed. A defense against this technique is to recognize  that if “woke” just means “bad”, then it is effectively vacuous.

The vagueness of the redefinition of “woke” also allows for assimilation of anything that expresses criticism of “woke”, whether the critic agrees with the redefined term. For example, someone might create content that is critical of “woke” defined in terms of performative activism or virtue signaling. This person might believe that people should be alert to injustice and discrimination, but their content can simply be assimilated and used as “evidence” that “woke” is bad. One common tactic used to assimilate is headlining: using the title of something that seems to support what is being claimed.

The vagueness of the redefinition of “woke” allows it to function as a weasler—a rhetorical device that protects a claim by weakening it. Attacking such a vague definition is like attacking the fog with a stick—it is so diffuse that there is nothing solid to hit or engage with. If the critic does manage to have some success with one aspect of the term, the user of “woke” can simply move on to another aspect and claim victory because the critic cannot possibly engage everything that falls under such a broad redefinition. The defense against this is to recognize when the definition of a term is so vague as to be effectively without meaning. While pointing this out to the person using it in bad faith is unlikely to deter them, you would at least show that you have not been deceived by them.

In closing, the redefining and weaponization of “woke” is a clever move by the right in terms of crafting a rhetorical weapon to use in a campaign of deceit and division. However, polls show that most Americans have not accepted the redefinition of “woke” and see being woke as positive. While the use of “woke” seems to have dropped off from its peak, it is still employed. But, just as “political correctness” before it, the term will fade away and be replaced by a new term that just means “what the right does not like.”

Being nerdtastic by nature, my nerd sense picks up disturbances in nerd culture. One of the loudest types of disturbances is when people express outrage at gender and race swapping involving established characters. For example, when word that there would be a non-white Spider-Man, social media erupted with rage about wokeness. But are such criticisms automatically bad?

On the face of it, there can be reasonable criticisms of such swaps. One common criticism is that the swap is motivated by a desire to pander to a specific audience and this pandering should be condemned. A problem with this criticism is that while pandering could result in a worse work of art, pandering does not entail that the work is therefore bad from an aesthetic standpoint. An obvious problem with this criticism when it focused only on swapping is that what is labeled derogatorily as pandering is likely to be an attempt to appeal to a target audience. Those who bash works for pandering via swapping generally do not bash works that have white male characters (and actors) selected to appeal to a target audience. As a specific example, it would seem odd for most critics to bash the Top Gun movies for pandering to an easily identified target audience. And I certainly would not attack Top Gun for doing this. After all, if you want people to watch your films or read your books, you do need to appeal to your audience. Naturally, if efforts to appeal are done badly and harm the work, then this would be a reasonable criticism but this has no necessary connection to wokeness.

Another common criticism is that such swapping is the result of laziness and that new characters should be created instead of swapping existing characters. There is usually also the criticism that the swap is made to cash in on an existing intellectual property and not due to a good aesthetic reason, such as meaningfully exploring the swap. This criticism does have some bite but is more a criticism of the way capitalist media companies operate rather than proof that wokeness is killing art. Companies certainly engage in this practice, since they can churn out more content dressed in an established IP without the effort and risk of creating new characters. But to be fair, this does make good business sense. At least until the audiences become exhausted with the companies milking their IP. Once again, there is no necessary connection to wokeness.

A third common criticism takes us into the matter of aesthetic identity of fictional characters. In metaphysics, the problem of personal identity is the challenge of determining what (if anything) makes an entity the same person across time, distinct from all other people and things. This is a difficult problem because you need to work out the metaphysics of personhood and identity. In the case of aesthetic identity, the problem is a bit less daunting. For in-world identity of characters, this is settled by author fiat. For example, if a person is a soul in a fictional world, whatever body has that soul is the same character. But this does not settle the matter of aesthetic identity in the real world, which is the problem of sorting out what makes a character the same character. I think the easy and obvious answer is that aesthetic identity is a social identity: being the same character is a matter of the audience accepting the character as the same. But, of course, people can make good faith rational arguments about why people should or should not accept a character as being the same. As an example, Batman has changed over the years and there have been heated fights over the various actors portraying the character in the movies. But Batman is generally accepted as still being Batman, despite these variations. In the case of Batman, a gender-swap could probably be criticized in a good faith manner. After all, Batgirl and Batwoman are already established characters. In the case of Black Panther, swapping in a white or Asian person could be criticized because of the centrality of Black Panther’s blackness in the character. That is, a white Black Panther would not be the same character. That said, someone could make a good story looking at a female Batperson to explore what would be different if Bruce Wayne had been Betty Wayne or what impact having a white person as the Black Panther might change. In any case, valid aesthetic criticisms of swapping would seem to have no meaningful connection to wokeness or lack of wokeness.

I was a bit reluctant to voice my agreement with these criticisms since they are often used as dog whistles for racism and sexism. But they are used in this manner because they do have merit in their proper context. This raises the question of how you can discern the difference between a good faith criticism of swapping on aesthetic grounds as well as criticisms of capitalism motivating companies to make lazy efforts to milk their intellectual property and bigoted attacks on works using the swapping criticism as a dog whistle. This can be challenging, but there are often cases where the critics lay out their explicit sexism and racism.

 

A good example of this is the Battlestar Galactica (BSG) reboot. These days, some have gone as far as to claim that BSG was the last non-woke sci-fi series and now the Kara Thrace (Starbuck) character is well-liked and rarely attacked by the anti-woke folks. But back in the day, BSG was attacked for being a “social justice” show and Dirk Benedict, who played Starbuck in the original series, attacked the decision to cast a woman in the role of Starbuck. While this reboot aired in 2003, Benedict’s criticism will sound quite familiar today:

 

The best minds in the world of un-imagination doubled their intake of Double Soy Latte’s as they gathered in their smoke-free offices to curse the day that this chauvinistic Viper Pilot was allowed to be. But never under-estimate the power of the un-imaginative mind when it encounters an obstacle (character) it subconsciously loathes. ”Re-inspiration” struck. Starbuck would go the way of most men in today’s society. Starbuck would become “Stardoe.” What the Suits of yesteryear had been incapable of doing to Starbuck 25 years ago was accomplished quicker than you can say orchiectomy. Much quicker, as in, “Frak! Gonads Gone!”

 

And the word went out to all the Suits in all the smoke-free offices throughout the land of Un-imagination, “Starbuck is dead. Long live Stardoe!”

 

I’m not sure if a cigar in the mouth of Stardoe resonates in the same way it did in the mouth of Starbuck. Perhaps. Perhaps it “resonates” more. Perhaps that’s the point. I’m not sure. What I am sure of is this…

 

Women are from Venus. Men are from Mars. Hamlet does not scan as Hamletta. Nor does Hans Solo as Hans Sally. Faceman is not the same as Facewoman. Nor does a Stardoe a Starbuck make. Men hand out cigars. Women “hand out” babies. And thus the world for thousands of years has gone’ round.

 

 

While I disagree with what Benedict wrote, I do “respect” that fact that he did not hide behind dog whistles and openly presented his views of women. Someone could, of course, make a good faith criticism of the character change, since the original BSG had female Colonial Warriors, including Viper pilots such as Serina and hence there would seem to be nothing gained by the swap. But Benedict’s “criticism” is not made on aesthetic grounds, but on the grounds that the swap is part of a broader conspiracy to emasculate men and that, apparently, women should be limited to making babies and not piloting fighters. While anti-woke critics often appeal to “realism”, realism is against this sort of “biological realism.” In the BSG series, Battlestar Galactica is leading a refugee fleet of the last known human survivors of the Cylon attack. As such, humanity is in dire straits and needs everyone to participate in the fight. This situation is an even more extreme version of what happened in the real-world during WWII: women had to step into “traditional male” roles, such as factory work and even enter combat. This shows, beyond all reasonable doubt, that women can do such “men’s work” as well as men. Ironically, realism is on the side of “the woke” and this sort of attack is sexism and a denial of reality.

In closing, while there can be good faith criticisms about swapping, the claim that “wokeness” is killing art by forcing aesthetically bad swaps has no merit. There can be aesthetically bad swaps and swaps that can be justly criticized as lazy efforts to milk an IP but these do not arise from “wokeness.”  While some “anti-woke” critics might be operating in good faith, Benedict’s example illustrates what seems to drive much of the criticism: bigotry.

The original Mary Sue was created in 1973 by Paula Smith as a parody of Star Trek fan fiction. A Mary Sue character is usually presented as inexplicably competent, possessing special talents or powers, enjoying the admiration of others, lacking in weaknesses and flaws, attractive, and virtuous. A Mary Sue is usually a young woman, but there are male versions called “Gary Stu” or “Marty Stu.” While a Mary Sue is often a self-insertion by an author, in the “woke wars”, she is often claimed to be inserted into a work because of “wokeness.”

While a Mary Sue character will not always harm the aesthetic value of a work (after all, Superman seems to be a paradigm Gary Stu), they can cause problems. Such a character can seem implausible to the audience, they can overshadow other characters in a harmful way, and their capabilities can make their inevitable success seem unsatisfactory. As such, a Mary Sue (or Gary Stu) character could harm a work. But how does this connect to the claim that “wokeness” is killing art?

Given that the Mary Sue character is usually a woman, the usual anti-woke criticism is that the female Mary Sue was created as part of “the message” and “woke ideology.” That is, those who decide to include the Mary Sue character are making the work worse in service to their wokeness—thus, it is claimed, “wokeness” hurt the work. But, of course, a work could include a Mary Sue or Gary Stu for non-ideological reasons and be bad—so even if a character is a badly written Mary Sue, evidence would be needed that the inclusion is the result of ideology and that this ideology is “woke.” Even in such a case, the work would be bad because of the badly written character—unless it is simply assumed or shown that wokeness necessitates writing bad characters or, at least, meaningfully increases the likelihood.

Not surprisingly, the Mary Sue label is often applied by anti-woke critics to characters who do not seem to fit the definition. For example, Naru in the Predator movie Prey does not seem to be a Mary Sue. While she is competent, she earns this competence and while there are implausible elements, they are all well within those that should be expected in an action movie in the science fiction genre. Despite this, the movie was attacked based on the claim that Naru is a Mary Sue. While such critics might be using the term for its rhetorical value, it is worth considering why they would consider a competent female character to be a Mary Sue when such a character, as noted above, operates well within the usual parameters of a science fiction action films. The most relevant comparison is, of course, to the original Predator. Given her background as a hunter, Naru’s capabilities and actions are as plausible as those of Dutch (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger) given his background as an elite soldier. While both characters effectively use their intelligence, Dutch relies more on his physical strength—although he is outclassed by the predator in this area. It can be argued that the films do have unrealistic elements (aside from the Predator), such as how Dutch is able to beat the Predator when that same Predator effortlessly slaughtered its way through the movie up until that point. But that is the “reality” of this sort of science-fiction action movie and hence attacking Naru for being an action hero in an action film would say more about the ideology of the critic than the “wokeness” of the film. But someone is likely to say, it is realistic for Dutch to be the action hero because he is a man and not for Naru, since she is a woman.

Films, games, and shows with strong female characters are often attacked for being “woke” even when those characters are clearly not Mary Sue characters. The usual criticism is that a strong female character is written as an action hero capable of doing things like defeat men in hand-to-hand combat. This is seen by the critic as making the work worse and as resulting from the “woke ideology” of those responsible for the character. The criticism is based on a view of “biological realism”, since the usual criticism is that women are, on average, physically weaker than men. Thus, the critic reasons, a female action hero of this type is unrealistic, is included as part of “the message”, and harms the work through being unrealistic.

The easy and obvious reply to this criticism is that it is just an expression of sexism. After all, action movies are usually power-fantasies and these same critics generally do not apply this “biological realism” critique to action films with a male action hero doing things that are “biologically” unrealistic even for the most capable men in the real world. For example, they do not attack the John Wick movies on the grounds that John Wick’s abilities are unrealistic and blame some sort of nefarious ideology for ruining the film. Their “criticism” seems to be that they are mad when women can have a power fantasy about a female character of the sort that men enjoy about male characters. This just shows that “wokeness” is “ruining” the work for them because of their ideology, not because of an aesthetic flaw in the work.

 To consistently apply the “realism” criticism would not be a criticism of “wokeness” but a criticism of how realism is bent or broken in many genres—which would be, it seems, to say that action, fantasy, and science fiction would often be “bad” because of how their heroes deviate from the limits of mundane biology.

Interestingly, the anti-woke critics who make use of the Mary Sue criticism and the “biological realism” criticism do not apply this criticism to Ripley in Alien and Aliens or Sarah Conners in the Terminator movies (and other works). I certainly agree that Ripley and Sarah are not Mary Sue characters—their competence is both earned in the film worlds and plausible. But they are certainly both strong female leads acting in ways that anti-woke critics of today should be attacking, yet they generally do not. A plausible explanation is that these films are so well-established as being good, attacking them as “woke” would do nothing but undermine the claim that wokeness ruins works of art. This does seem to be a general theme: a bad work is attacked as woke and used to “prove” that wokeness made it bad, but good works that seem to have “woke” qualities (diverse casts, strong female leads, liberal values, etc.) have their “wokeness” explained away or simply ignored.  It might also be that these films are older, and past works might be protected by the haze of nostalgia.

A sketch of human faces, Not so long ago, diversity in works of art was criticized as the result of political correctness (PC). The current manifestation of this criticism targets Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Such criticisms can be about the content of the work, about the casting, or about the people involved in the creation of the work.

In terms of criticism of content, the obvious claim is that DEI content harms a work of art. This could be, as discussed in the previous essay, because the ideology comes at the expense of aesthetic quality, or it could be a claim that DEI content is inherently bad. But this is not an aesthetic judgment, but an ideological judgment and falls under the non-aesthetic areas of value theory such as ethics and political philosophy.

In terms of criticism focused on the cast of characters, this criticism can be of in-world characters or real-world casting choices. In-world criticism is aimed at the identity of the characters in the world of the work of art while real-world criticism is aimed at the identity of the actors portraying (or voicing) the in-world characters. In many cases, in-world and real-world identities are the same, such as when an African American woman plays the role of an African American woman character. In other cases, the identities can be different, such as a gay actor playing a straight character or a white actor portraying an Asian or Black character. And, of course, there is the famous fact that in early British theatre males played the female roles.

Both in-world and real-world criticisms focus on the qualities such as ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation of the characters or cast. One stock criticism includes claiming a work is somehow harmed by having a diverse cast of characters that the critic sees as somehow inappropriate. For example, a critic might emphasize that white people are either a minority or absent in the work. Interestingly, for those who see diversity as part of the aesthetic value of a work, a good faith argument can be made that unfairly excluding, for example, white, straight men from a work of art would harm the diversity and hence the aesthetic value of the work. But this, of course, rests on the assumption that diversity is a good—which would be a “woke” assumption. As such, the anti-woke critics would be hard pressed to make a good faith criticism of such exclusion. Their own opposition to diversity would seemingly justify such exclusion.

The most benign interpretation of the anti-diversity criticism is that anti-woke critics are accustomed to the less-diverse works of their youth and are responding negatively to this change. They are, in effect, upset that the people in movies, TV and video games don’t look like they did when they were kids. This is, of course, not an aesthetic criticism beyond “I don’t like this.”

Perhaps the least charitable interpretation is that this criticism taps into the ideology of the Great Replacement Theory. In general terms, this is the conspiracy theory that white people are being intentionally demographically and culturally replaced by non-white people. On this view, increasing diversity of casts (characters and actors) would be evidence of this replacement. This is, of course, not an aesthetic concern but one of ideology.

A similar, but less extreme, interpretation is that the anti-woke critics believe that the increasing diversity of characters and actors inflicts an economic harm on white actors and most especially white male actors. This argument does have some theoretical appeal. Historically, movies and television in the United States were dominated by white actors and white male actors. Whites even played many non-white roles (known in two manifestations as yellowface and blackface). This meant that white actors did not need to compete against non-white actors. As roles began to open for non-white actors, this could be seen as roles being closed to white actors. On the extreme side, white actors are unlikely to be cast in yellowface or blackface roles these days, which is a loss of roles. On the less extreme side, an anti-woke critic could argue that too many roles are being taken away from white/straight/male people and given to diversity hires. There are, of course, those who claim they cannot get hired because they are white/straight/male. While complaints about there being too much diversity are nothing new, these complaints are consistently made in the face of the facts: the diversity in the media does not match the diversity in the population. Also, as of 2023 white men are still getting most of the big Hollywood film roles. While some might doubt the statistics, this is easy enough to check if one has the time: grind through the casting of movies on IMDB.

This does lead to a question of concern to the “woke” and “anti-woke”: how diverse should hiring be in this (or any) context? But as an economic concern about employment opportunities, this takes us far from the claim that wokeness is making art worse as art.

In terms of making the connection between DEI “wokeness” and aesthetic harm, one stock argument is based on the claim that DEI hiring results in the employment of less capable people. This claim is connected to the reasonable premise that less capable people working as actors, writers, producers, directors, programmers, and such will tend to result in an inferior aesthetic product. Therefore, it is concluded, DEI hiring will result in an inferior aesthetic product. Or, in pop terms, “woke” DEI hiring will kill art.

The second premise is reasonable: the quality of a work of art, such as film, is causally linked to the capabilities of the people involved in its creation. While skilled people can fail and thus produce a bad work of art, they will generally produce better works than those with inferior skills. The movie Lady Ballers illustrates this nicely: a cast consisting mostly of conservative pundits and inexperienced actors directed by Daily Wire CEO Jeremy Boreing would have a hard time matching the performance of more skilled and experienced actors, directors, and writers. The film turns out to be what one would expect, given the talent and experience levels involved. It also serves as an ironic example of what happens when a work is focused on an ideological message first.  But what about the claim that DEI hiring results in the employment of less capable people?

This is, of course, the same criticism used against affirmative action and is based on the same assumptions about identity and competence. That is, it is assumed that certain people (usually straight, white males) are superior to other people and that if someone else is hired, it is likely to be an unmerited DEI hire. After all, it is assumed, a merit-based hiring would result in the right sort of person (usually a straight, white male) being hired because of their superiority. In blunt terms, this anti-woke criticism seems to be based on racism and sexism. One could reply by insisting that this view is not racism or sexism because the superiority is real, but that would seem to only serve to remove all doubt about the racism and sexism behind the criticism. And if it is not claimed that diversity hires are inferior because of the identity of those hired, the criticism of DEI “wokeness” falls apart: without an assumption of the inferiority of some and the superiority of others based on race, sex and so on, it cannot be claimed that a diversity of hiring would entail an inferior aesthetic work. As such, the anti-woke criticism of DEI rests, unsurprisingly, on what seem to be racist and sexist assumptions.

 

 

In America’s ongoing culture war, the right has largely embraced the idea that wokeness is a grave danger. While wokeness is seen as a general threat, there is a special focus on the damage that it is supposed to be doing to artistic media, such as movies and video games.

While The Barbie Movie did not fit the “go woke, go broke” narrative, Ben Shapiro claims to have “destroyed” the movie in a 43-minute review.  Given that the movie was a remarkable financial success that seems to have been sincerely enjoyed by millions of people, it is unclear what this destruction amounts to—but his review does serve as an example of the woke war and the movie is apparently a major battlefront in this war. Nerdrotic and the  Critical Drinker also provide examples of critics focused on wokeness on media. While some might be tempted to dismiss these criticisms as bait for a right-wing grift, I will consider the hypothesis that wokeness is causing the claimed harms.

An obvious problem is that the right uses “woke” as a catch-all term for everything they dislike. This seems to be intentional, as shown by the redefinition of “critical race theory” by Christopher Rufo: “The goal is to have the public read something crazy in the newspaper and immediately think “critical race theory.” We have decodified the term and will recodify it to annex the entire range of cultural constructions that are unpopular with Americans.” While this tactic is useful in right-wing politics, such a vague definition impedes addressing whether wokeness is damaging to media. After all, without having an adequate definition one cannot in good faith say whether it is causing the alleged harm. That said, a look at the criticisms of “woke” works reveals some common threads and these will serve as a focus for the discussion. But first, the matter of aesthetic judgment needs to be all to briefly addressed.

In Hume’s works on aesthetics, he notes that while tastes cannot be disputed, some aesthetic judgments are absurd and ridiculous. Roughly put, a person likes what they like and dislikes what they dislike, and it makes no sense to claim they are wrong. But claims about the quality and merits of works or art can be disputed rationally. While this dichotomy can be disputed, it does provide a good frame for the discussion.

If the critics who claim wokeness makes works of art bad (or worse) are merely expressing their dislike of the woke works, then they cannot be disputed. After all, if they do not like a movie because they think it is woke, then they do not like the movie and it would be absurd to try to dispute them. While one could try to convince them to reconsider, this is analogous to trying to argue someone into liking a food they detest. But if this is all there is to the claim that wokeness is making art bad, they are just telling people they dislike wokeness and this is not a meaningful criticism of the work itself, just as a child making a face and spitting out food is no meaningful criticism of the food—it is a mere expression of dislike. Naturally, this could also be performative in the hopes of imitation—that others will dislike the works they dislike. But this is also not criticism and does not show that wokeness is making artistic works bad beyond in any sense beyond their dislike. They could also simply be taking an ideological stance—woke art is “bad” because it is accused of expressing an ideology, they claim is bad. But this is not an aesthetic criticism of the work but of its alleged ideology. As such, a meaningful claim that wokeness makes art worse (as art) requires showing that the wokeness a work has a negative impact on its aesthetic qualities. There are those who do attempt to make this case.

Put in oversimplified terms, one causal argument is that wokeness causes art to be bad as art, or at least worse than it would be without the woke influence. When looking at the alleged causal connections, one must consider whether the wokeness is what makes a work of art bad. After all, a bad film set in London would presumably not be bad because it was set in London; but for other reasons-so a causal connection would be needed. That is, it needs to be the wokeness that causes the harm, not just the fact that a bad work happens to be woke. We would not say that comedy makes a work bad just because there are bad movies that contain comedy.

The causal claim cannot be that wokeness is a necessary condition for badness, since this would claim that if art is bad, then it is woke. There is an abundance of bad art that is not woke.  There does often seem to be the claim that wokeness is sufficient to make art bad, that if art is woke, then it must be bad. But someone with a more nuanced view could claim that the relation is a matter of causal influence—that a woke work is more likely to be bard art, although there could be good woke art. As nuance is usually lost in the culture wars, it does seem that most critics of wokeness see it as a sufficient condition for badness. But how does wokeness allegedly make art bad?

One general explanation is that the emphasis on ideology comes at the expense of the quality and aesthetic components of the work. What occurs, presumably, is that when those in charge must choose between making an ideological point and something that improves the aesthetic quality of a work, they will choose the ideological point. For example, the plot might contain forced and implausible events included to make a statement, even when doing so damages the story. As another example, a character arc might be abruptly terminated or abandoned because it would lead to a message contrary to the ideology that the work is intended to present.

On the face of it, this seems to be a good explanation of how “wokeness” could harm a movie. However, it is actually just a statement of the obvious: if aesthetic decisions are made on the basis of considerations outside of aesthetics, this will tend to lower the aesthetic quality of a work of art. While this would apply to a “woke” ideology, it would also apply to non-ideological concerns like costs or the desire to include product placements. For example, while an expensive special effect might make for a better movie, that effect might be cancelled due to the expense, thus making the work worse than it would have been.

It must also be pointed out that this applies to ideologies on the right. A good recent example is Lady Ballers. While “the left” has been critical of its anti-trans ideology and sexism, an analysis of the work as a work of art lays bare the problems that arise when ideology is chosen over aesthetic considerations.  Critics of God is Not Dead have also made similar points, noting that the antagonists are carboard caricatures created in service of the film’s message.

As such, the “anti-woke” critics are right that putting ideology over aesthetics can harm the aesthetics of a work; but this applies to all ideologies—even their own.  As such, while “woke” ideology could harm a work of art, this is not unique to “wokeness” but is simply a statement of the obvious fact that making aesthetic decisions based on non-aesthetic considerations can lower the aesthetic quality of a work. At best, the anti-woke critics could claim that some works might have been harmed by choosing ideology over aesthetic considerations—but this hardly shows that wokeness is ruining art. Rather, it just states the obvious: bad aesthetic decisions lead to bad works of art, regardless of whether the cause is ideological, budgetary, or a lack of talent.

 

 

Back when the Prius and other hybrids went on the market, some anti-environmentalists expressed their opinion by rolling coal (humorously dubbed “Prius repellent”).  The animosity against hybrids seemed to fade somewhat but the arrival of commercially viable electronic vehicles has sparked a new current of anger.  

I first noticed this on Facebook in the form of cartoons and memes posted about EVs. The cartoon usually showed an EV with an extension cord connected to a smoke-belching powerplant and the memes made a similar point. This struck me as odd since I knew the people doing the posting were generally pro-fossil fuel, anti-renewable energy, and skeptical about climate change. Given their professed views, if electric vehicles ran on electricity generated by dirty fossil fuels, that should either be a matter of no concern or even a plus.

While I have seen people posting in a similar manner against renewable energy, after Trump (a noted hater of wind turbines), I noticed posts attacking wind power on the grounds that it kills birds. When posted by people who never showed any other concern for the environment, this also seemed odd.

Most recently, I have seen posts critical of electric cars and electric stoves that reference the sorry state of the American electrical system. This also seemed odd, since improving the electrical grid never seemed to concern these folks in the past.

Given that these posts on social media were consistent in their posting points and they occurred at roughly the same time, I decided to determine what was behind this. I also wanted to investigate the facts of the matter. This led me away from cartoons and memes to in depth and often thoughtful writing.  I’ll start by looking at EVs.

The cartoons showing EVs linked to smoking powerplants do draw attention to a real concern and there are at least two other major concerns about these vehicles. Tilak Doshi, who “worked in the oil and gas sector as an economist in both private industry and in think tanks” wrote an informative essay for Forbes about the dirty secrets of EVs. While you should read the article for the details, he raises three main concerns about EVs.

The first is that the manufacture of an EV will typically result in significantly more environmental harm than the manufacture of a comparable fossil fuel burning vehicle. This disparity arises largely from the batteries used in the EV. As the media outlets who got the memo have hammered home, the batteries in EV are their dirty secret. Getting back to the cartoons I mentioned, Doshi also points out that if an EV gets its electricity from a dirty power source, like a coal-fired power plant, then it can be meaningfully more polluting than a conventional vehicle. Third, Doshi points out a problem that has been well known in the broader technology context for a long time: the mining of lithium is linked to significant harms to people beyond the environmental damage.

While I am not an expert on any of this, these claims are supported by reputable sources across the political spectrum. As such, I agree that the manufacture of these EVs is currently more polluting than manufacturing conventional vehicles, although this is clearly something that can be addressed. I also agree that powering EVs (or anything else) from dirty fossil fuel sources is a harmful way to generate electricity. And, of course, the human cost behind the manufacturing of these batteries is high and needs to be addressed. Now, let us move on to wind turbines and solar.

Trump, who hates wind turbines, consistently makes the true claim that windmills kill birds. Studies from 2013 and 2014 estimated that they killed 140,000 to 679,000 birds. The number killed is presumably higher now, due to an increase in wind turbines. As noted above, many people who oppose renewable power use the death of birds as a premise in their argument against it. They also refer to, correctly, that solar and wind power come with manufacturing and disposal issues that cause environmental harm.  

While not an expert on wind turbines and solar power, these claims are well supported and I have no reason to doubt that wind turbines kill birds or that renewable energy creates an environmental impact—after all, these turbines and panels need to be manufactured and eventually disposed of.

While some people might be tempted to reject claims from Trump and others who oppose renewable energy because they do not like these people, that would be a mere ad hominem. Also, to reject what people connected to the fossil fuel industry say about EVs and renewables because they have a stake in the matter would be another mere ad hominem. One should, of course, be wary of bias but this is not proof that someone is wrong. Likewise, if someone profits from EVs or renewable energy or is associated with them, it does not follow that they are wrong in their claims. That said, this approach taken to criticize EVs and renewables has made me both suspicious and curious. After all, these seem to be what are usually liberal arguments grounded on what appears to be professed concern about the environment, climate change, human rights, and worker exploitation. Why would, for example, a person known to be pro-fossil fuel, anti-renewable energy, and skeptical about climate change post a cartoon that seems to be criticizing EVs on the grounds that they contribute to fossil fuel pollution? Why would people with links to the fossil fuel industry make such arguments against EVs and renewable energy? Why would people who normally seem to lack concern about energy generation killing birds be so concerned about bird deaths?  While one can never know for sure what is in another’s mind, there are certainly reasonable claims that can be made.

One hypothesis is that these people do have concerns about the environment (and human rights) but the scope of their concern is extremely narrow. That is, they are only concerned about the environmental (and human) harm caused by EVs and renewable energy.

The fact that wind generated energy kills 0.269 birds per gigawatt-hour of electricity produced, compared to 5.18 birds killed per gigawatt-hour of electricity from fossil fuel projects does not concern them. We do not, for example, see Trump lamenting the birds killed by fossil fuel projects.

The fact that expanding public transportation and redesigning cities would reduce the need for both EVs and conventional cars does not seem to concern them, for they seem laser focused on the pollution created by EVs. Also, those posting the power plant cartoons do not post cartoons showing these EVs connected to renewable energy—something that would seem to address their criticism of EVs running on dirty power. Those rightly pointing out that the awful US power grid and the wiring of many houses will not be able to handle an increase in EVs and electric stoves do not mention that this challenge can be addressed with renewable energy and a meaningful investment in public infrastructure.

It is certainly possible that these people are making a good faith criticism of EVs and renewable energy based on their very focused and limited concern about the harm done by EVs and renewable energy. But this seems like a rather odd view; like only being concerned about deaths caused by colon cancer and having no concerns about all other cancers (and worse, being a proponent of some other types of cancer). After all, if the harm caused by EVs and renewable energy are bad, these same harms produced by conventional vehicles and fossil fuels would also be bad. But perhaps these folks do not have a narrow scope of concern; perhaps this is a rhetorical tactic being used against people who are more broadly concerned about the environment and harm to humans. This tactic can be called a “false concern argument.”

A false concern argument involves using as a premise or premises (which might be unstated) a concern that the person making the argument does not have and doing this in bad faith. While it is reasonable to craft an argument that will appeal to the concerns (and values) of your target audience, the problem with the false concern argument is the bad faith aspect: the person making the argument does not share the concern that they are intentionally exploiting in the argument.

Going back to the EV cartoons and other criticisms of EVs, the implicit argument seems to be as follows:  Because EVs are recharged from electricity generated by dirty fossil fuel plants, they are not good for the environment. Since you (the target of the cartoon) care about the environment, you should not buy an EV (or you should oppose them). Likewise for arguments involving the harms stemming from their manufacture.

In the case of wind and solar, the argument is built around the idea that because of the harm to birds (wind) and the environment (both), people concerned about birds and the environment should oppose solar and wind.

If we consider only the arguments in isolation, the reasoning can be good, and the premises can be plausible. As noted above, there are real concerns about EVs and renewable energy that give a person who cares about the environment (and people) reasons to be concerned about both. That said, someone who is concerned about the environment (and people) would also consider ways in which these real harms could be mitigated (such as recycling batteries) and would also compare these harms to those generated by the alternatives (such as fossil fuel energy). We can and should have good faith discussions about the harms of EVs and renewable energy. But bad faith cartoons, essays and arguments do not help.

As also noted above, rejecting these criticisms because of who makes them or because they are believed to be acting in bad faith would be to fall into fallacious reasoning. But what, then, is my criticism of these bad faith arguments and what is the problem with false concern arguments?

In terms of why these posts and arguments are in bad faith, there is the fact that they are generally made by people who are generally pro-fossil fuel, anti-renewable energy, and skeptical about climate change. They also usually do not seem overly concerned about birds in other contexts. Also, many criticisms of EVs and renewables comes from people in the fossil fuel industry and those who are paid to protect it. Again, this does not mean that their arguments are wrong, it is just that they are unlikely to be making these arguments from an anti-fossil fuel, pro-renewable energy, climate-change accepting world view. That is, they are most likely not concerned about fossil fuel pollution, climate change, etc. If they were, they would post and make criticisms about fossil fuel-based pollution and not limit their concern to EVs and renewable energy. This is to say, they do not have the concerns that their cartoons and arguments rest upon—they do not believe their own key premise(s). The person who posts the cartoon of the EV is most likely not opposed to the fossil fuel plant in their cartoon—they do not, for example, post critical cartoons of conventional cars driving past oil refineries and oil leaks from ships, wells, trains, and pipelines. What, then, are they doing?

A somewhat lazy explanation is that the cartoon posters and others are trying to “own the libs” by shoving in their faces the fact that EVs are a source of pollution. Liberals are supposed to love EVs and renewables, so this is a way to mock them. This does have some appeal as an explanation in some cases, but does not explain well written attacks on EVs that lay out evidence and maintain a reasonable tone.

While this is speculation, they seem to be well-crafted bad faith arguments intended to persuade pro-EV and pro-renewable energy people to change their minds in favor of conventional vehicles and fossil-fuel. Or at least raise doubts. I say they are (probably) bad faith because they make their case by writing as if environmental harm is bad (when caused by an EV or renewables), but do not extend this principle to fossil fuels and conventional vehicles.  For example, Tilak Doshi offers an in depth criticism of EVs, but if you look at his other essays he does not offer such harsh criticism on the same principles of conventional vehicles (or fossil fuels). In this case, the problem with their bad faith argument is, once again, that they do not seem to believe what they are arguing.

Fairness does require that I consider an alternative: they are not basing their arguments on a professed or implied false concern but are trying to prove to supporters of EVs and renewable energy that these are bad like conventional cars and fossil fuels. That is, they all do harm to the environment and people.

But this also leads to an obvious question: if they believe that EVs and renewable energy are bad like conventional vehicles and fossil fuels, why would they oppose them, given that they are not seem concerned with these harms? After all, if a coal-fired plant does not bother a person, then an EV powered by that plant should not bother them either. If fossil fuel plants killing more birds than wind power does not bother them, why should wind turbines killing fewer birds bother them? If the harm to people from the fossil fuel industry does not concern them, why should this harm concern them when it comes to EVs and renewable energy? As such, the harm arguments they make would seem to be in bad faith—they do not seem to care about the harms. Given this, a reasonable explanation is that one motivating factor behind these criticisms (and the cartoons arising from them) is that it is an attempt by the fossil fuel industry to harm a competing industry through a propaganda campaign. This campaign does seem to be having some effect, if only in the proliferation of attacks on EVs and renewable energy on social media.