Woke

We hear the word "woke" a lot these days. What's up with that?

Imagine you and your friends meet at the park to play basketball. You're not teams, you're just some friends having fun. You see a guy watching your game. This guy is in a wheelchair. It occurs to you that this guy might be wishing he could play some basketball. So you think, "Why not?" You walk over to him and ask him, "Hey, would you like to join us for a little while?" His face lights up. You made his day.

There's nothing wrong or stupid about inviting a handicapped person into a game of pickup basketball. Winning and losing don't matter because the game is all about having fun. It's good to include people who may often feel left out.

But if a park official or other bureaucrat tells you that you and your friends must include a handicapped person, or a gay person, or a trans person in your game, that's when it becomes "woke." Now the rulemakers have gone too far. It's not fun when someone tells you that you are only allowed to have fun their way. Of course, actual games where a score is kept are entirely different. Then, rules matter and must be followed or the game becomes meaningless chaos.

Aren't most of us tired of hearing the word "woke"? It seems like "woke" is a short way of saying, "You're going to do the right thing even if I have to shove it down your throat." There's also the much older aphorism that goes, "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions." So true.