Woke

When Richard Pryor started using the N-word in his stand-up act he powerfully turned a hurtful term into a badge of pride. The same with the gay community and the word ‘queer’. An oppressed group took a derogatory word and turned it around. Who could have imagined that the right-wing nutjobs of America and their European echoes would do the same in the other direction?
The word ‘woke’ came from African American slang and initially meant ‘awake’ and then ‘socially aware’. But then the haters and their billionaire bulletin boards twisted it to mean something between naive extremist to rabid communist.
I propose we use the word ‘compassionate’. I propose we be ‘compassionate’. These are precisely the times we need to look after each other, listen to each other and refuse to be silenced. Cruelty has never been okay and it doesn’t suddenly become so because of the spasms of the unbalanced political system of a dying empire.
Let them know we are Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, Bahais, Atheist, Humanist and everything else….by our love.