Our 18th prompt comes from W. They say:
How being woke is a burden or blessing
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W,
Before I get started, I need to disclose that I’m tired of the word woke. In the same way I’m tired of adjectives like introvert, sustainable, disruptive, innovative, and whatever other buzzwords we are loving at the moment. They are bandied around so much, I don’t even know what they mean anymore. And, it seems enough to just label oneself and skip along without doing much else, because many descriptors people attach to themselves are for performance purposes.
Anyway, my grievances aside, wokeness is the state of being aware of one’s surroundings and the status quo; especially the ways it keeps people down through social injustices such as sexism, classism, tribalism, racism, homophobia and so on. You are awake to the situation, as opposed to being asleep or unaware.
The first thing I thought of when I read your prompt was The Matrix trilogy. I know, I know. How very cliché. Yet this movie captures the experience of being woke vs being asleep better than most widely consumed media, so I’ll use it for my explanation. Remember when Morpheus (praise be) offers Neo the choice to either take the red pill and see the world for what it truly is, or take the blue pill and go back to living a blissfully ignorant life? That is what wokeness is like to me. It is an unpleasant choice whose realizations become weightier the longer one stays in the struggle.
Just like in The Matrix, once one is woke (or takes the red pill), there is no going back to a state of ignorance. You are now aware of social injustice, and this awareness makes you realize that you are dealing with a system that has been designed to empower a few while disempowering everyone else. Much like The Matrix, it becomes apparent very quickly that any resistance to this system must be systematic. We quickly learn that the system fights back. In The Matrix we have Smith (who still scares me) and other agents (programmes) that have access and move in ways that the resistance can only dream of. They will stop at nothing to ensure that Morpheus and his guys are stopped. Here in our world, we have states with armies and weapons, institutions that discriminate against us, corrupt rich people, #NotAllMen, #NotAllWhitePeople and Lord knows how many other things we deal with.
Remember when Neo met The Architect, and was told that he was actually designed into The Matrix to stop the system crash that occurred in the five previous iterations? The crash that always happened due to human choice? He was offered the choice to either return to the source and reboot The Matrix (as well as choose people to repopulate Zion), or cause a crash in The Matrix, destroying humanity? Pretty daunting choice. Either accept the prevailing system and work within it, or die along with everyone you care about. Isn’t this what it feels like sometimes?
Yet, we see him take a third choice. One that was never put on the table – he assimilates Smith and puts an end to his terrorism. This was Neo’s idea – it could not have come from the machines, or the Architect, or the Oracle, because they did not have the imagination. Both he and Smith die, but in the end, the Architect agrees to give human beings the choice to leave The Matrix. Yes, they will go back to the real world, where the sun no longer shines – a dreary place, but they will be free.
This is what wokeness is to me – both a blessing and a burden. It is the beginning of the fight for our freedom. The insistence on the dignity of each and every human being. The demand that human beings be placed above capital. The statement that there are no illegal people. Is it fun? No. Will I live to see the world become exactly as I would want it to look? No – I probably won’t live to see much of what I fight for come to life. Like Neo, we will probably die birthing this world we envision. But, given the opportunity, would I take the blue pill? Not a chance.
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This post is part of a daily writing experiment that I’m running for a year. I’d love it if you took part! ?