How to Build the Post Woke Movement | TER Post Woke

It won't be easy, and we need a plan.

Welcome to TaraElla Report Post Woke, where we consciously aim to move beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars, and towards a post-woke model of culture and politics. Previously, I have outlined what a post-woke alternative would look like. Today, I want to talk about how we can advance the post-woke alternative in the cultural discourse.

As I said before, the current cultural and political discourse of the West is dominated by two echo chambers, the so-called woke and anti-woke. The existence of these echo chambers essentially keep other ways of thinking at the margins, severely limiting the influence of any post-woke ideas. Moreover, the echo chambers are maintained by everything from confirmation bias and habitual behavioral patterns, to cancel culture, to deliberate organization and interests backed by lots of money. Therefore, the key to building a successful post-woke alternative is to pierce and disrupt the echo chambers on both sides. If we can do this, then we can truly end the woke vs anti-woke wars. If not, then post-wokeism will remain no more than a nice theoretical idea, with very little practical influence in the real world.

I guess the first thing to do is to accept that we are not operating on a level playing field, compared to the media personalities and influencers on both sides, who use their big platforms to reinforce the dominant ideas of the echo chambers. This means that we have to start small, be patient, and wait for it to snowball into something bigger over time. We need to insist on talking about the post-woke alternative, and providing the post-woke voice when it comes to various social and cultural debates. Some days we might get very frustrated, feeling like we are essentially shouting into the void. Other days it might all feel futile, as our well-reasoned positions get drowned out by the loud culture warriors on both sides. But we need to keep going, if we are to have any chance of changing things at all.

Next, we need to recognize that many people who are trapped in the echo chambers actually feel uncomfortable with the status quo too. This even includes people whose work are essential to holding up the dominant narratives of the echo chambers, like journalists, media personalities, intellectuals, influencers and more. They might be quietly questioning the dominant narrative in their echo chambers, the echo chambers they are otherwise helping to maintain. We need to help that questioning process along. For example, whenever a culture war flare up occurs between the two sides, it actually provides a good opportunity to intervene, to help people question the soundness of the whole thing.

Finally, we need to be able to regularly come up with unique and innovative solutions to the problems and controversies that make up the fault lines of our cultural landscape. This is the best way to demonstrate the advantages of the post-woke approach compared to both the woke and anti-woke orthodoxies. People generally pay attention to something new, and prefer fresh ideas to talking points that have been repeated over and over again. Moreover, many people out there are actually looking for ways to build bridges across factions, perhaps because they want society to function again, or perhaps just because they don't want their family and friends to keep fighting the same old fights all the time. Anyway, the post-woke movement should provide these answers, when the woke and anti-woke factions can't and won't. Many people will appreciate it, and it will make our movement bigger and stronger over time.

Summing up, this is my three step plan for building the post-woke alternative: firstly, we need a lot of patience and perseverence, and recognition that this isn't going to be easy. Secondly, we need to seek opportunities to help more people question the status quo. Finally, we need to provide solutions to build bridges and resolve conflicts where the woke and anti-woke won't.