THE WEST'S 'WOKE OLYMPICS' WAR

The western world is in the middle of a war where values have become weapons. On one side are those who swear by what they see as the tried and tested ways of life they believe built their societies and gave them values. On the other are those that insist almost everything that has been traditional to this point in time must be re-thought and many of those concepts abandoned.

There is no complete right and wrong in this scenario. Much of the past was characterised by injustice, prejudice and a plethora of inhibitions regarding behaviour and many of the social movements since the end of World War II have had the goal of correcting these.

Across the western world (but primarily in the USA and UK) after WWII social movements that were inclined to attack primary elements of the status quo began to arise.

In the USA the beatnik movement, though limited in size, had an important effect in the Fifties. In the Sixties the hippie movement with all its rejection of traditional ways of American life grew to a significant extent before declining. It's effect however has stayed as a feature within the western world in many other forms, many of them extremely antipathetic to established norms. These two movements had highly positive as well as negative effects, but their overall effect can at least be characterized as disruptive of traditional norms.

The 'Womens Liberation' movement of the Seventies and Eighties continued the process of undermining some of the negative aspects of traditional life as known to that point. The struggle for gay rights was another movement that continues to this day. In very recent times came the 'Me Too' movement. And more recent still the hot topic of gender identification.

There is nothing inherently wrong with societies becoming freer in respect of individual liberties, however, the effects on societies where these changes take on the aspect of war and the 'other side' is portrayed as 'the enemy' can only be highly destructive for all. 

Just as those who don't wish their national culture to be changed by other cultures are called labelled racist, so those who have found traditional ways of life to be soundly based are subjected to similar abuse in an attempt to demonize them. I have observed that the so-called 'woke' tend to demand rather than request that their requirements be met. If not immediately met then they will cry 'foul' and regularly attempt to demonize those denying them. Whether in the liberal West it is appropriate to demand whatever right you feel you are entitled to is considered appropriate is not the issue, it is the resultant bitter, divisive and corrosive atmosphere it ignites. The resultant feelings tend to be bitter on all sides, divisions naturally deepen rather than otherwise and the corrosive effect on society as a whole is obvious.

In this way, the entire western world is threatened with a turmoil of assertions and accusations from one side or another with the 'woke' tending overall to be the most influential in government circles. The danger of tyranny taking the place of tolerance is, in my estimation, very real.

It is right and proper that every individual should be treated respectfully within the law. What I find dangerous for the West is the adoption of 'woke' notions for their own sake then asserted forcefully as a kind of fashion statement rather than as a true reflection of conviction, then demonizing those who question these 'realities'.

It is very easy, as the expression goes, to throw the baby out with the bathwater. It cannot be right that most if not all traditional values be abandoned simply for the fact of being traditional. A high degree of common sense must surely prevail if destructive societal chaos is to be avoided. Observing the western world at this moment reveals anarchy of demanded change and character assassination is occurring instead.

In spite of the many information highways allowing access to more points of view and facts than ever before in the history of humankind, many are clearly narrowing their focus down to fixed dogmas.

It mirrors computer languages to some extent. If you are THIS then you must believe THAT.

And this tells you where the West is in this age of access to information in every direction possible. Many appear to be settling into their political 'caste', selecting their trenches in the war taking place where one side is always right and the other wrong.

If you are ‘on the right’ then you must always voice certain talking points and dismiss those of others. You must remain forever divided from the ‘other’ who is in your mind racist, fascist, Trump-loving, Biden-loving, gun-toting, redneck, sub-human or snowflake.

And who is sitting arms-folded, smile on lips watching this civil war among the warring, terminally partisan rebels over there? The established elites of course. The Establishment. The Great and the Good, The Movers and Shakers.

While those below battle it out they can predict that their own 'army' of dogmatists will stay loyal on their side of the battlefield. Their position is safe. The ONLY problem they would potentially have is if both these battling sides stopped fighting each other, agreed a truce in the realization that their true enemy was their incompetent and lying elites, not each other.

Extremes of both right and left are indicative of ego-trips where individuals are so far from embracing the complexities of any given situation that they believe in the most simplistic of answers and expect others to fall in line with them.

In the western world each and every person is expected to have a permanently strong view on each subject. They have been told they are exceptional in every way, heirs to great privilege, each one a king, queen or other in their own right.  

The battle of such egotistical individuals cannot help but be bloody. Immediately there is a disagreement or expression of doubt concerning some aspect of another's view, sexuality, personality or attitude epithets are thrown, insults are traded.

And yet another hysterical day in the West's 'Woke Olympics' War begins...