I’m not really exaggerating here. You probably are aware that last week, in the wake of the electoral disaster for Democrats, James Carville went on TV and gave his assessment of what went wrong: “What went wrong was this stupid wokeness.” Saturday, MSNBC hosted Roland Martin and asked for his reaction to what Carville said.

I think Carville should shut the ‘F’ up because I’m sick of these white men whining and complaining about wokeness when you like it when black folks and Latinos and young white voters and Asians are voting for candidates. How about this, James Carville? How about you go learn how to cut some Lincoln Project-type ads for the Democratic party?

Martin added, “I’m sorry, James, I need you to do your job and shut up and not pin the blame on people who are doing the work.” So basically just shut up.

It’s amusing that the Lincoln Project is now Roland’s standard for how to support the far left but Martin isn’t the only person wishing critics of wokeism would just stop talking. Over the weekend, Adam Serwer argued that anyone who is asked a question using this word should just push back by asking the questioner what it means. If you watch the clip, you’ll notice that Sen. Warner understands the question. The meaning of “woke” isn’t obscure, Serwer just wants more pushback against it.

Part of the utility of this kind of use of “woke” is that it expresses sentiments the people using it would be uncomfortable articulating directly, which is why anyone getting a question like this should simply respond by asking them to explain what they mean. https://t.co/GVJ0KxYkaF

— Adam Serwer 🍝 (@AdamSerwer) November 8, 2021

Glenn Greenwald points out that a Slate writer took this a step farther yesterday, suggesting “woke” was a “racial slur” and anyone who uses it pejoratively should be threatened with violence:

Govern yourselves accordingly. pic.twitter.com/OxWfQa4d0C

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) November 8, 2021

Over at his Substack site, Freddie deBoer has a great response to these tweet. Instead of threatening critics of your revolution for their word choice, why don’t you just tell us the word you’d prefer.

If you ask these people, are you part of a social revolution?, they’ll loudly tell you yes! Yes they are! They’re going to shake society at its very foundations. Well, OK then -what do I call your movement? You reject every name that organically develops! I’ll use the name you pick, but you have to actually pick one. You can’t just bitch on Twitter every time someone tries to describe your political cohort, which again you yourself say intends to change the world. Name yourself or you will be named.

He’s exactly right. The left popularized the term woke in the first place. My memory of this is that DeRay McKesson used that term a lot on Twitter. Remember this image from when he was arrested in 2016?

Black Lives Matter activist DeRay McKesson arrested in Baton Rouge https://t.co/9Q9nBqAATB pic.twitter.com/xEV6IxcYDY

— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) July 10, 2016

But now that the right has basically adopted a term BLM and others popularized, it’s considered a racial slur. The same thing has happened with Critical Race Theory which many people, myself included, have admitted is not a very accurate term for the far left ideology many on the right oppose. It’s true that CRT isn’t taught as an academic subject in public schools. It’s also true that wokeness (or whatever you call it) is making its way into schools and many other institutions.

So in the wake of last week’s election, the left basically has two choices. The first is to continue to claim wokeness is a made-up problem and force the critics who say otherwise to shut up. The other option is to acknowledge the problem, as Carville did, and call out the extremists who are spreading it. There’s a decent example of what this looks like at New York magazine. Author Eric Levitz does a lot of throat clearing up front to establish that he doesn’t agree with the right but, nevertheless, he winds up sounding a bit like a conservative on this issue.

Contrary to popular punditry, I don’t think Tuesday’s results proved the political toxicity of “CRT,” “wokeness,” or any of their synonyms. But electoral necessity shouldn’t be a prerequisite for progressives to engage in internal criticism. And it seems to me that some of the practices that Rufo & Co. have dubbed “CRT” do warrant the left’s disavowal, less on grounds of political pragmatism than on those of ideological principle…

A key flashpoint in Virginia’s CRT brouhaha came in July, when Loudoun County’s public schools revealed the contents of a training on “culturally responsive teaching” that its faculty had undergone. That training included a slide outlining the distinctions between the supposed individualism of white culture, and collectivism of “color group” culture:

…it is a reductive summation of research on the ways that cultural insensitivity can impair educational outcomes for immigrant children.

It is also, by all appearances, racist. The notion that expecting one’s children “to form and express opinions” and “questions elders” is a definitionally white parenting style, while expecting children to “show respect by quiet listening” is a “color group” one, is a racial caricature. As is the broader idea that white families prize individualism over communal obligation. Positing fundamental cultural distinctions between people with different pigmentations — not different class, regional, national, or religious backgrounds, but merely different concentrations of melanin — is a task better left to white supremacists than equity coaches…

a similar tendency towards racial essentialism crops up regularly in the progressive firmament. Last year, The Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture infamously published (and then retracted) a graphic that described “rational linear thinking,” the valorization of “hard work,” “respect for authority,” and an inclination to “plan for the future” as values and traits peculiar to white culture — sentiments that would hardly be out of place in a Steve King speech, or Stormfront thread.

Again, he’s careful not to align himself with the right but ultimately he is making the case that the left should do what the right is already doing, pushing back: [emphasis added]

None of this validates the right’s panic over “critical race theory.” America’s schoolchildren are not being indoctrinated into Tema Okun thought. But a decent number of progressive groups and well-intentioned school districts do seem to be hiring quack consultants to dispense laughable race malarkey and recipes for organizational self-sabotage. Which is bad.

If the left wants to neutralize the pushback on wokeness, CRT, pop anti-racism or whatever you choose to call it, this is how they could do it. Call out the “laughable race malarkey” that seems to be taking over the far left and insinuating itself into colleges, corporate culture and, gradually, K-12 schools. If parents see that stuff is being rejected, they won’t be up and arms and the right has no issue to exploit next year.

Or you could do what Slate and Adam Serwer and Roland Martin and Joy Reid, etc. are doing, i.e. tell the critics to shut up and keep arguing about terminology. Do that and next year will be a GOP blowout election and Democrats won’t advance any more legislation for the rest of Biden’s term at a minimum. Despite the choice being so stark, my guess is the party will mostly fail to have any kind of Sister Souljah moment with the woke left. Calling the ideas that are currently animating most of your activist class “race malarkey” is easier said than done.

Update: It’s almost like a memo went out yesterday or something.

People think Fox News is just about indoctrinating right-wingers, but it’s also about conditioning Dems on what to run away from. Framing racial justice as “controversial” is key to delaying the protection of voting rights (& others) until it’s too late. We shouldn’t indulge it.

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) November 8, 2021