There is a lot of talk now, not just about wokeness, but also about a so-called anti-woke movement – a counter-revolution.
For my part, I try as hard as I can to listen – really *listen* – not just to what people are saying, but also to what I am feeling as these things are being said.
For one, I think it is important to understand the motives underlying – and the emotions flowing through – these conversations. In many instances, of course, the recent rise of “wokeness” is a legitimate uprising against injustice and oppression. Indeed, it is part of a long-running moral arc of struggle – for the right of the slave to be free, for the right of the woman to vote, for the right of the poor to live dignified lives.
At the same time, I also recognise that as a straight Muslim Malay male, I am part of the dominant narrative in the land where I live. Many of the institutions and incentives are kindly predisposed (if not outrightly rigged!) – if not in my outright favour, then at the very least in the favour of those who look like me, who sound like me, who have names like mine.
It is too easy, I think, to simply dismiss “wokeness” – and the often-frustrating polemics that have arisen in the wake of its ascendance. Much of it can be grating, ingenuous, or even plain outrageous. But I think “wokeness” is, or should be, something that speaks to the core of what it means to live a moral life: to be just in our dealings with others, to treat others with dignity and respect, to do unto others as we would like others to do unto us.
One of the most gratifying aspects of my faith, for me, is that Islam was born in the deepest reaches of the desert, and that the message resonated most, in its earliest days, with the enslaved, the poor, the marginalised, the downtrodden, the oppressed. Muhammad did not pander to the rich, and indeed he refused riches when it was offered to him by the great and the good of Makkah, if only he would shut up on all that God business.
And Muhammad taught us that everyone had access to Him through His Scripture: there was no need for a Church or a Rabbinate to intercede or to mediate on behalf of the believers. Salvation was offered to anyone and everyone, and we will all be judged on the content of our character and the good works that we do on this Earth.
So whenever I get annoyed at reading something that someone had written or said, I try to remind myself that “wokeness” is, at the heart of it, a plea for justice. Yes, there will be those who try to profit from “wokeness” – either from what they stand to gain from through what is demanded, or merely from the satisfaction of being up on the moral high horse of performativeness. But we still have a duty to enact and perform justice by ourselves, in the acts that we do in our own small circle of existence.
That is all that anyone can truly ask for.