(06-11-2021 02:03 PM)Stugray2 Wrote: You guys are mislabelling "woke" to a wider politicized meaning. (Ironic as it is a political movement)
Woke should be more narrowly focused on ideological purity movement that seeks cult like thought control.
It should not be applied to broader reform movements that are not aiming for such thought control nor limiting of 1st amendment rights for political aims. There has been a steady movement in the US, from long before critical theory crept into progressive organizations, that has broad support, to remove many Wilsonian era statues and monuments.
To label every such thing woke is overreach. When I think of woke and wokies, I am thinking of those who act like the Red Guards of Mao's cultural revolution, and who are caught up in a pseudo-religious political cult movement that aims at thought control, which cancels people (very cult like behavior) and rigidly enforces mindless conformity.
Fellow travelers might be a term you want to revive. But woke doesn't apply here IMO.
Note, if you over apply the term it will become as meaningless as "liberal" or "conservative" or "socialist" in a few years. You normalize it by stretching it's meaning, and it goes from being a sharp cutting knife to a dull bladed butter knife.
This is what I was trying to say. No one forced them to do this change. There was no cult like "you need to change or else we protest" - they decided to do it on their own and of their own accord for their own reasons.
They could have kept it, but they decided not to. That it matched up with opinions on a poll doesn't mean anything, as the poll wasn't a binding thing. They were already in the process of changing their name, and wanted external opinions to see what rebrand would have the best potential. It's not "woke", it's the practical choice.
If someone says "I'm changing the name because it'll help my image and I'm really not that attached to the current one in the first place" you shouldn't jump in and try to stop them or guilt them into it - it's their decision to make. By having the response of "this is cancel culture/woke and a terrible thing because of that" you're doing the very thing you're getting angry about: trying to make someone do something for
your reasons instead of letting them do something for
their reasons. Again, they wanted to rebrand to make it a more nationally focused university (says so in the link to the focus group results). 65% said removing Dixie would have the best impact, they agreed. Time to move on.
What would have made this "woke": they weren't planning on a name change or rebrand, and people tried to force them into one by protesting and boycotting them. Trying to bring it up nationally into guilting them into the decision they wanted.
