Reflections on a week in the wild (and supporter perks)
I've been on vacation for a week, and it puts things in perspective.
If you value my work, please consider a $5/month or $50/year subscription. I’m funded entirely by you.
If you can’t financially support my efforts, please consider sharing my work with your friends and family to spread the message. I can’t do it without you.
PAID SUPPORTER PERKS
If you are already paid subscriber on Substack, you can find your links to this week’s supporter perks at the bottom of this post - that helps me put them behind a paywall. This week’s perks are:
Movie night in the Supporter Discord tonight (Sunday) at 8pm eastern.
Writers group on Thursday evening in the Supporter Discord for creatives.
Two private, unrecorded supporter zoom calls on Monday evening and Wednesday afternoon.
If you are a supporter on another platform like Locals or Patreon, you can find the perk information on that platform.
Reflections on the unwoke space after a week on vacation
Well, there’s not much of an Unwoke Roundup this week because, for the first time in nearly three years, I took a week off.
A whole week.
I didn’t check my email (sorry if you emailed me but I promise I’ll get back to you), I didn’t make videos, I barely even tweeted.
I had a ton of ideas of things to write about (and I will) but I wanted to allow myself to have some downtime and give myself a chance to breathe and talk to people in the real world.
In no particular order, here are some of my thoughts.
I’d enjoy your reactions if you’d like to leave me a comment and let me know what you think.
I’ve just spent a week surrounded by real people in the real world, barely connected to the internet in any real way, and there are a few things I know for sure:
Most people genuinely have no idea of what is going on in the world in regard to the woke ideology. Even the ones who are tuned into current events more than most.
Most people are busy. Learning about this ideology is complicated and takes time.
There are a lot of bad teachers out there who themselves are not fluent in what they are teaching.
There are many different levels of experience and understanding of what “woke” means, how it shows up in the world, and how it impacts ordinary people, and we cannot overestimate what people understand and what they don’t.
There needs to be more basic, introductory content for people who are just waking up.
Nuanced content in the so-called “anti-woke” space is almost non-existent, and it’s more important than ever.
The space is littered with outrage porn, click bait, and moral purity tests. This does not teach people or convert people to our team. It only entrenches people and makes those of us trying to fight the good fight look insane. This only creates more problems, not less.
We can win over people from all different sides of the political spectrum if we present information factually and let people decide for themselves.
The content should speak for itself, in its full context. Present it, share it, and then let people decide if they’re comfortable with it.
That means one of the most important ways I can contribute is by documenting what’s going on in the world in a nuanced way. It’s not sexy, it’s not glamorous, it will never get as many views as outrage or clickbait…but it’s the only way we change minds.
When I started commenting on the woke ideology over three years ago, it was a different time. A time before the grooming purity spiral moral panic had begun on the political right. Critical Race Theory was my entryway into this arena, and in many respects, it was a simpler time. The focus on grooming in recent years has changed things.
There is a difference between human beings naturally exploring their gender identity and sexuality as a part of growing up, and having adults they trust plant ideas in their heads to make them believe they are something they are not before their brain is developed to make logical decisions.
Exploring gender and sexuality has been a constant part of the human experience since human beings have existed. There is nothing wrong with it, nor is there anything wrong with adults making decisions about their bodies and how they want to show up in the world.
The exploration of gender and sexuality, even in underage children, is not something that will ever end. And more than that, it’s not the real problem of queer ideology in schools. There was a time when young boys hid Playboys under their beds, and everyone managed to survive. More than half of people lose their virginity by the time they graduate from high school, and that’s been true for decades.
My perspective has always been, and will always continue to be, that I do not believe schools should be practicing psychology without a license in order to indoctrinate children into the far-left queer political ideology.
Queer is not the same as trans or lesbian or gay or bisexual. We must distinguish between LGBT people who are just trying to live their lives and those who are advancing a political ideology, which is what queer is.
We must distinguish between these things. The purity tests and the moral panic around grooming is now encompassing normal human development that has existed for as long as any of us have been alive.
The anti-woke movement will fail if we allow it to be hijacked by a conservative Christian nationalist movement, who are nothing more than woke authoritarians on the right.
You can be a conservative Christian without insisting that your ideas are forced onto people who do not believe in nor practice your religious ideology.
We must defend parental rights for everybody…including people you may disagree with. If parental rights fall, that’s the ball game. Parental rights for you means parental rights for others…not just for people who pass your moral purity test.
Live your life however you want. Live by whatever values you want. But you cross the line when you start trying to force those values on other people. You are no different than the woke left when you do that, and you only drive people away.
The arts change culture, and we need more understanding of the human experience, not less.
The purity tests that exist in the “anti-woke” space hold us back from a full exploration of the human experience.
We cannot create art or change culture if we are adhering to a purity test that prevents conversation.
You cannot engage people in authentic discussions that change hearts and minds when people fear being canceled for saying something offensive.
And by “offensive,” I don’t mean something that’s offensive to the woke left. They find everything offensive. I mean offensive to the woke right.
The woke right are engaging in online purity tests - they are canceling people for not adhering to their worldview and they are inhibiting our ability to wake people up, particularly disaffected lefties and people who have more socially liberal values.
Everyone who disagrees with them is a groomer. Anyone who doesn’t want to ban books is a groomer.
There are legitimate groomers in the world. But when you accuse everyone who disagrees with your political views and your personal moral beliefs a groomer, you are the problem.
These people make everyone who disagrees with the woke ideology insane, and they don’t care…because they don’t care about solving problems, they only care about online clout.
There is no point in working to make the world a better place if we cannot fully discuss the human experience.
Discussing the human experience will sometimes be offensive. If you don’t like it, don’t read it.
So, fuck the purity tests. Pardon my language, but fuck purity tests. The only place they matter is Twitter, and Twitter has no relation to what people care about in real life.
The most significant inhibitor of my content in the past few years has been those engaging in woke right witch hunts. That ends today.
If you are offended by things, you have two choices:
Don’t read them
Offer a different perspective civilly, and make a better argument.
I’m going to create content on this, and on my other platforms and Substacks, that I find personally compelling on two levels:
Content that breaks down and explains the woke ideology and how it shows up in the world in a nuanced way that can be shared with people of all different political affiliations.
I’m going to do the best I can to download everything I know for you.
I’m going to do the best I can to make it simple to understand. I need to continue to push on this, because there are many people who still don’t understand the basics. That’s not a failure on their part - that’s a failure on the part of the “anti-woke” space to teach them.
I’ll answer questions and offer clarification as my time allows.
My goal is to wake people up and to teach them, so they can teach others.
I’m going to create art and cultural commentary that reflects the human experience of our times. Some of that content will piss off the woke left…and some of it will piss off the moral panic right that call everyone who disagrees with them a groomer.
If you don’t like it, offer better ideas or create your own content.
This was generally the path I was on anyway, so this is not new information. However, after the last week, I’m more convinced than ever that it is the correct path forward.
We need to allow people to have a human experience. Woke authoritarianism on the left and the right destroys our ability to have an authentic experience in the world.
So, let’s keep going.
Supporter Perks
As always, I will continue to do the work your influencers and journalists refuse to do to show you what’s really going on in the world and what you need to do to fight back.
I’m completely funded by you, and I hope I’ll earn your support today.
As a thank you for supporting my work, I offer private supporter and community activities several times a week. If you’re already a supporter, find those links below. If you are a supporter on Locals or Patreon, you can find the links on those platforms.
This week, we have the following perks:
Movie night in the supporter discord tonight (Sunday) at 8pm eastern. Tonight, we’re watching Fight Club.
Writers group on Thursday evening, also in the Supporter Discord.
Two supporter zoom calls on Monday evening and Wednesday afternoon.
If you’re not yet a supporter, become a subscriber and join us.