Being woke also means getting results
Dear Readers,
People around our ages and socio-economic brackets who live in big American liberal cities communicate in three places these days: on Twitter, Instagram, and now, IRL at protests. Some may dabble in TikTok, Signal, or Reddit, but wherever you find people like us on a given day, our world revolves more or less around the internet. Even as we joined the Black Lives Matter protests, when we weren’t marching, we were following the protest hashtag every spare moment.
For those of us immersed in this online world, it would be only natural to think that liberal America is ready to do away with police departments and walk away from mainstream candidates with disgust. Wokeness is the calling card on social media, and without it, “cancellation” looms.
Now imagine the collective surprise in these parts when Joe Biden became the democratic nominee for president. Sure, there were doubters -- that Warren might inch ahead of Sanders. But how on earth did that guy get the most votes?
Considering the relatively small segment of the population who are actually on Twitter (predominantly college-educated, left-leaning, with an income over $75,000), social media is (un)surprisingly effective at creating appearances.
This same phenomenon spills over into the media. When journalists look for sources, it’s often on Twitter, which means this same online demographic is heard from disproportionately in the media.
Our nation's most influential media outlets are also centered in the most progressive enclaves of the nation - proximity has an effect.
While the Democratic party is increasingly seen as dominated by this “woke” segment of its base (a phenomenon Trump is gleefully exploiting in an attempt to freak out moderate voters), the fact is that the IRL numbers show differently.
According to data from the Hidden Tribes Project, the outspoken group of Democratic-leaning voters on social media is outnumbered, roughly 2 to 1, by the more moderate, more diverse and less educated group of Democrats who typically don’t post political content online. What they do do, is vote.
If you’re on Twitter, it’s easy to miss that. The longer a platform is around, users tend to coalesce around a certain culture, and become further and further removed from the average person not on the platform. This other, larger, group of democratic voters are the mysterious offline voices that chose Biden: nearly 3 in 10 of his supporters are black, plus a large percentage of voters age 65 and older.
A real threat to the future of our country (read: what will become of it if Donald Trump wins the election) lies in the fact that our online communities have become, in some senses, detached from our greater reality. At a protest, we shout “this is what Democracy looks like.” It definitely does. But democracy also doesn’t look like a monolith. It looks like a protest, and it also looks like policy that can gain consensus and be made into law.
We believe white supremacy needs to be toppled, and police brutality and overreach must end. But if the root of “wokeness” is a desire to create a better, safer, more just country, wouldn’t that necessarily mean doing what is required to create tangible results? Is wokeness an attitude only, or would true wokeness imply a responsibility and commitment to the long term collaboration needed for broad change? To us, it’s the latter.
As much as we want to hammer through change, as loud as we may shout our demands, if we ignore the fact that altering the laws of our country requires consensus with people in other places, including the people we don’t see on social media, people who outnumber us, people who chose Biden - then we are not awake. These include the white suburban female voters who could tip the election one way or another. They include the many liberals who do not want to completely abolish policing, but rather wish to revamp approaches to public safety.
This is not to say that we can’t or shouldn’t create the massive, systemic upheaval envisioned in woke circles. But protesting isn’t enough to change things. Being on Twitter isn’t enough to change things. We need each other to change things. Dividing ourselves with all or nothing demands is more likely to get us no progress at all. We will lose the election and our country will continue forward with “LAW AND ORDER,” aka police brutality, racial profiling, and, quite possibly, the end of democracy.
Black leaders are energized and organized on the ground now, we have a system poised for change because of the uprising of its citizens, and we have the will to do it. But if we assert that only the most idealized, Twitter-approved version of our vision is the only acceptable version, we are not in our collective power. Has anyone asked what the people who have no idea what TikTok is are thinking about abolishing the police?
A democratic illusion carried out by voices that dominate the internet will simply shout Trump back into power.
Shout, protest, tweet (it does sometimes work), organize, vote, and get that man out. The way forward will then be cleared for reform, change, economic justice, racial justice, and much more. But if we shout so loud we can’t even hear the people who cast their vote alongside us, we’ll end up with nothing.
Anger leads us to awareness. Wokeness is leading to massive shifts in thinking already. But without a pathway to take effective action, we will get the opposite of progress. If we can’t move forward united, we will move backwards. We need to work together with the people around us to create the changes we want to see. This is, in fact, what democracy looks like.
-The team at Lioness
What we’re reading this week...
Not to be dramatic, but these are dramatic times, it is 150 days to the election, and we’ve recently been threatened with the military for asserting our 1st Amendment rights. The one thing Trump does tell the truth about is his plans. He’s not alone in this - most authoritarian figures do. As we see the Trumpian version of our country unfolding before our very eyes, this author points out that it’s often hard for us to think about the unthinkable, but with time running out before the election, we must take drastic measures to save our democracy. If we don’t, the consequences are already written down for us in history - and Trump’s Twitter feed.
Online justice can be harsh - especially when it’s targeted at the wrong person. When a grainy video of a man hitting children and ramming his bike into George Floyd supporters made the rounds online, the hate messages started to cascade into finance executive Peter Weinberg’s Twitter and Linkedin inboxes. Someone posted his Bethesda, Maryland address online, and an angry mob rapidly emerged to take down the racist and child assaulter in the video. The only problem? It wasn’t Peter in the video. The New York Magazine takes us through what it’s like to be falsely accused and doxed by a mob of online strangers.
From our readers...in response to last week’s newsletter, Do Not Fear Tension:
The other day, someone told me that I cannot befriend black people, date them or claim to appreciate them, because my social media response had not been up to par regarding current events.
I took the feedback in stride and returned to my ongoing research on the topics of racism, discrimination, white supremacy and prison reform, curating what I thought was practical information (documentaries to watch, ways to support the cause, books to read, statistics, historical facts) and sharing it on social media to stand in — digital — support.
However, as I was posting, I couldn't help thinking: if your response to white privilege and racism is limited to sharing social media posts, or you post before you directly address racist behavior in
your family,
your social groups,
your faith community,
your workplace,
YOURSELF,
than your activism is performative.
Social media is a tool, one of many. It’s a complement to the real, daily, in-person work. Does what we preach online align with the ways we live our lives? Away from and in spite of public scrutiny, are we acting in accordance to our values? And have we taken the time to re-evaluate those values and make sure we’re self-actualizing so that we can, in turn, upgrade the limping society we live in?
The bulk of our lives — the rage, the love, the grief and the incidents — is away from screens and social. As it should be. I will spend less time reposting overshared social content and instead text a governor and call my black friends, ask questions, sign petitions, offer my help, listen, lighten a load, welcome a stranger, read to increase my knowledge and understanding of the issue, donate, call out discrimination, stand in a Union Square protest or support a black business, organization or artist. I pledge, again and again, to do that.
However you choose to help and stand with people of color, whether you are an ideator, educator, organizer or healer — just make sure you do it, with all the honesty and empathy you’ve got in you. It’s crucial you do it, every day and in the long run.
Goodbye, while I go befriend, call, date, appreciate, stand with and next to black people, in the best ways I know how.
That’s our newsletter for this week! We look forward to hearing from all of you, with any reader responses, tips, or unsung stories of your own to share - reply to this email to share them with us.
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