By now you have likely heard more than you ever wanted to hear about being “woke.” What does being woke mean? Woke people are “alert to injustice in society, especially racism.” Woke folks are also cool and smarter than everybody else!
You’ve probably also heard a lot about “cancel culture.” Essentially, cancel culture is shaming people or even businesses for doing, saying, or supporting something that is wrong or bad. Shaming usually occurs via social media, though traditional media outlets often follow suit with “news” stories that support whatever shaming is popular on social media.
One of the most recent examples of woke folks invoking cancel culture involves Georgia’s new voter reform act. You may remember that many states changed voting procedures during 2020 elections, blaming the pandemic for forcing the changes. At the very least, those last minute changes raised questions of voter fraud in a number of states. Georgia was one of those states.
The Republican dominated legislature in Georgia voted last week to make some changes in the state’s election law. You must understand, Republicans are neither woke nor cool, and they are not generally inclined to cancel anyone’s culture through shaming.
Cool people, by definition, are on the LEFT and are the most woke people in America. Shaming bad people, ideas, and symbols (think Trump supporters, Mr. Potato Head, and Aunt Jemima) is the raison d’etre of woke folks. It’s what they are called to do!
Let’s circle back to that new Georgia law. Woke people all across one end of the political spectrum are raising the alarm against Republican lawmakers and the Republican governor of Georgia, to the extent that corporate CEOs, the commissioner of Major League Baseball, and even President Biden are shaming them with many misrepresentations of what the new law does and doesn’t do.
Moreover, these powerful critics are withdrawing corporate support from businesses and industries in Georgia, removing the 2021 MLB All Star Game from Atlanta, and President Biden has labeled the new law “Jim Crow in the 21st Century,” saying, “It must end.”
Woke folks declare any voter ID laws are racist because it’s just too difficult for “underrepresented voters” to show any kind of ID. Hypocritically, Delta Airlines requires all passengers to show a photo ID. Only woke folks understand why it’s racist to require voters to show some kind of ID (driver’s license, utility bill, last four digits of SS#, or any other kind of traditional ID). Woke folks believe some voters are simply incapable of identifying themselves.
As a woke person, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said, “I have decided that the best way to demonstrate our values as a sport is by relocating this year's All-Star Game and MLB Draft.
Major League Baseball fundamentally supports voting rights for all Americans and opposes restrictions to the ballot box.” Of course, he did not identify how voting rights had been restricted in Georgia.
Commenting about the new law, President Biden said, “What I’m worried about is how un-American this whole initiative is. It’s sick. It’s sick. Deciding that you’re going to end voting at five o'clock when working people are just getting off work.” Biden’s woke statement, outrageously misleading, received four Pinocchios from the Washington Post.
Why would all these powerful critics lie? Shaming others is always based on lies.
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Daniel L. Gardner is a syndicated columnist who lives in Starkville, MS. You may contact him at PJandMe2@gmail.com.
