This was a great and enjoyable read. I think whoever runs this substack ought to consider renaming, as the name "The Upheaval" kind of conjures the image of some far out conspiracy website, like "A Storm Is Coming" or the like. When in reality, it's some really solid geopolitical and historical analysis.
The site's logo is the Chinese/Japanese character 乱, usually glossed "disorder" or "chaos" but often larger in scale than the English words imply: many events we'd call civil wars are 乱 in Japanese and Chinese.
Which seems appropriate: the blog post here is forecasting some serious geopolitical turbulence that's about to hit economic turbulence, with unpredictable but highly likely unpleasant consequences. And it doesn't even mention a potential civil war (乱?) in the US, which is starting to move from unthinkable to merely unlikely.
It started with some interesting analysis of the war in Ukraine. By the time it started trying to parse out the hidden meaning behind Biden's reference to a "new world order", I was getting a little suspicious. Then it started complaining about censorship, making an argument I'm sympathetic to but which seemed largely irrelevant. (Meanwhile it picked Hillary Clinton of all people to quote.) And then it pivoted all the way to full-scale complaining about wokeness.
Edit: In particular, the article quotes Biden claiming that "democratic progress is under assault" in "so many places, including [..] the United States." Biden is presumably trying to make a point about domestic issues ranging from the January 6th riot and Trump's attempt to contest the election results to Republican voter suppression laws – all issues on which there can be debate, but which are clearly related to democracy or the lack thereof, and not directly related to 'wokeness'-type social issues. But the article uses the quote to support the proposition that: "it has to be Woke. Otherwise it is not a real Democracy, but something else."
I don't think it's so much complaining about wokeness itself as noting the US's unfortunate habit to attempting to force this down the throats of other countries, which seems likely to go down as well as, well, every other time the US has tried to force an abstract ideology down another country's throat (eg. democracy in Iraq or Afghanistan).
US trying to get behind the International Criminal Court prosecuting Russian war criminals, while insisting that similar actions against well-demonstrated US war criminals would merit military action against it, is particularly rich.
I am still waiting to see capital charges filed under US law against instigators and eager participants in the torture regime. Just turning the perps over to the ICC, upon conviction in the US, would satisfy me, such that returning them to the US after prosecution there would be followed by their immediate execution. Keelhauling would be too good for them.
The first half was interesting, and I think the conclusions hold in broad strokes. But the second half was so speculative and occasionally bonkers that it made me question the first half.
A progressive elite controls policy in Washington? We can’t even get a vote on a national health plan or immigration reform or loan forgiveness. I’ve left the Democratic Party in California because the old guard just bulldozes through everything. I was finally forced out to avoid a baseless defamation lawsuit. And I’m moderate: they treat the woke crowd worse. By moderate, I mean I would vote for moderate parties if I lived in western Europe, but the only choices in the US are center-right and right-populist.
Back to the article, I don’t think this bipolar cabal to remake the world order exists, and I won’t change my opinion until data can flow to the US under a GDPR-equivalent. German military spending can also be seen as a way for Europe to not be reliant on US military guarantees, and a future where Europe can choose between the China and the US on its own power.
How many Democratic Party meetings have you been to? I’ve been to hundreds. While they pay lip service to supporting racial equality, they won’t actually do anything that would make business suffer, except for the environment. They are a pro-business party not interested in actual economic equality, while Republicans are a pro-business party interested in promoting economic inequality. I don’t mind the pro-business side really, I’m just saying are no elected leftist parties in America.
it made sense to me. If they make human rights as the main talking point to push this realignment, it'll certainly involve rights for marginalized folks.
If their definition of democracy requires rights for all, then you can't be a democracy and not be "woke".
I certainly agree with that. Of course by that definition i am of course "woke" myself.
Wokeness explicitly applies and relies an ideology of Marx's Conflict Theory, a paradigm that divides the world into oppressors and the oppressed and focuses on framing individuals as members of a group to label them as such.
The woke are incapable of making important distinctions and treating people as individuals outside of such groups. Distinction is the basis of rationality. Equality requires that, and demands that individuals supercede groups in the application of law and opportunity.
That's why wokeness does not focus on individual equality, but group equity, putting the collective ahead of the individual and exiling individuals when they stand for themselves and not a given group. Democracy as Aristotle explained, is the majority ruling over the minority. In other words, mob rule. Democracy is only good when it is not ruling and making decisions that serve everyone, and not just the majority, equally. This he called a polity.
"The right kind of democracy, if you will, is a polity: An ideal democracy that governs for the interests of all, not just the leadership."
https://fs.blog/aristotles-politics/
Aristotle is not the word of god on democracy, and in general the Greek version of democracy leaves a lot to be desired by contemporary standards. When you quote him saying "the interests of all", it's about as disingenous as quoting the founding fathers of the USA talking about freedom for all people (well, except the slaves, and the women and ...)
Your definition of "woke" is one that has been applied to a set of concerns, ideas and strategies from the outside. It is how those who wish to reject those concerns, defeat those ideas and strategies define it. You're quite welcome to do that - it's not as if this is the first time this has happened. But "woke" (an almost absurd term that seems rarely by anyone outside of the conservative right at this point) doesn't have anything to do with the way you define it to the people you actually consider "woke". I think that's worth reflecting on.
As for fears of the majority ruling over the minority, it's far from clear whether that is actually worse, given at least a reasonable legal system, than the minority ruling over the majority, a condition that one could make a reasonable case for defining the current political system in the USA.
> Your definition of "woke" is one that has been applied to a set of concerns, ideas and strategies from the outside. It is how those who wish to reject those concerns, defeat those ideas and strategies define it. You're quite welcome to do that - it's not as if this is the first time this has happened. But "woke" (an almost absurd term that seems rarely by anyone outside of the conservative right at this point) doesn't have anything to do with the way you define it to the people you actually consider "woke". I think that's worth reflecting on.
I found it to to be the exact opposite. GP has written of the best descriptions of wokeness and gets to the core issue without beating about the bush.
> I found it to to be the exact opposite. GP has written of the best descriptions of wokeness and gets to the core issue without beating about the bush.
It may get to your perception of the core issue. It does not get to the publically stated perspectives of the people to whom the term is generally actually applied.
Who gets to define the group and who gets to define what is good or bad for the group? Who gets to decide who is in the group and who needs to be cast out? Who gets to speak for the group?
Have a look at the history of politics and pay special notion to those strands which centre around grouping people, whether that be "proletarians versus capitalists", "those_who_belong_to_my_religion versus those_who_do_not", "those of our nation versus those from elsewhere" and now this "those who belong to my identity group versus those who do not".
Also have a look what most of these group-centred ideologies have in common, namely the identification of a specific scapegoat group which is blamed for all the woes - including those caused by the application of the group-centred ideology - which beset the in-group. In Bolshevist Russia is was the Kulaks [1], in Nazi Germany it was the Jews, in theocratic Iran it is "the great Satan" (i.e. the USA and its allies) while in this new "woke" cult it is the "cis-gender heterosexual white man".
The problem with all these group-centred ideologies is that groups do not have a voice, only individuals posing as the group do. Those individuals can gain a lot of power and as such either tend to get corrupted or are drawn to the role of spokesperson because they already are corrupt. Group-centred thinking works well on a small scale - family, small neighbourhood, etc - but it often fails when the members of the group no longer personally can know each other since that makes it possible for the corrupt spokespeople to make their play.
> Democracy is only good when it is not ruling and making decisions that serve everyone, and not just the majority, equally.
But you’re arguing that wokeness, which focuses on the interests of minorities which are being oppressed by the majority, is in opposition to this goal?
Russia still offers China one very valuable capability, it's nuclear arsenal. China can 'help' to wield that threat without risking sanctions by actually making nuclear threats itself.
China has its own nuclear arsenal with about 400 active warheads (compared to about 1500 for the US and just over 2000 for Russia). China could easily make more if they wanted to, but for now the official Chinese doctrine is deterrent only / no first use.
Furthermore the haphazard use of the nuclear threat has never actually been a cause for sanctions, nor for that matter has it been a threat that yields concessions. China doesn't need Russia to threaten to melt the world over some Pacific Islands or for calling Taiwan a country or whatever. The threats not credible.
I'm well aware China have their own nukes, and their policy around them.
Would they invade Taiwan, and use a nuclear threat to cover it? Almost certainly not. Yet.
But Russia would, and have, in the case of Ukraine, and it has worked, in terms of preventing direct military intervention, whether it's 'credible' or not.
