| Wealthy and WokeWokeness is not really about fairness for minorities,the oppressed and the poor, past or present. By: VICTOR DAVIS HANSON April 8, 2021(emphasis added) Ed Bastian made $17 million in 2019 as chief executive officer of Delta Airlines, Georgia’s largest employer. Bastian just blasted Georgia’s new voting law. He thinks it is racist to require the same sort of ID to vote that Delta requires for its passengers to check in. Yet most Americans believe voting is a more sacred act than flying Delta and, moreover, may have noticed that Delta has partnerships with systemically racist China. Also, a recent Associated Press poll showed that 72 percent of Americans favor requiring photo ID to vote. The most privileged CEOs of corporate America — those who sell us everything from soft drinks and sneakers to professional sports and social media — now jabber to America about its racism, sexism and other assorted sins. The rules of cynical CEO censure are transparent. First, the corporation never harangues unless it feels it has more to lose — whether by boycotts, protests or bad publicity — than it stands to gain in staying neutral and silent. Second, class concerns are never mentioned. Bastian made about $65,000 for each working day of 2019. In a sane world, he might seem a ridiculous voice of the oppressed. Third, CEOs never fear offending the conservative silent majority, who are assumed not to boycott or protest. The woke revolution is not a grassroots movement. It is powered by a well-connected and guilt-ridden elite. Yet the religion of wokeness assumes that these high priests deserve exemptions. Their wealth, credentials, contacts and power ensure none are ever subject to the consequences of their own sermons. Multimillion-dollar NBA stars blast America’s “systemic racism.” They utter not a word about Chinese re-education camps, the destruction of Tibetan culture or the strangulation of Hong Kong’s democracy. Player salaries depend on coaxing a huge Chinese market. Players’ domestic endorsements hinge on a young, woke American clientele. Defending the professional sports lifestyles of rich and famous stars apparently requires loud penance by blasting an unfair America. Examine almost any woke hotspot and a growing class divide is clear. Academia? Tenured administrators and university presidents pulling down seven-figure salaries are far more likely to virtue-signal their universities’ “racism” than are untenured, poorly paid, part-time lecturers. It is easier for a college president to blather about his own “unearned privilege” than to support the rights of exploited part-time faculty — much less resign to give someone else a spot. The woke media? Its clergy are elite network newsreaders, not so much reporters on the beat. The military? The retired and current officers who lecture us on the evils of Donald Trump or promise to ferret out “insurrectionists” among the ranks are mostly generals and admirals — and some retired top-brass multimillionaires. We don’t hear much about privates, corporals, sergeants and majors pushing through subsidies for transgendered surgeries or petitions to garrison a quiet Washington with barbed wire and National Guardsmen. The richest people in America — the heads of our biggest corporations — are the most likely to voice their derision for the unwoke lower and middle classes. Ditto the multimillionaires of politics — Al Gore, Dianne Feinstein, John Kerry and Nancy Pelosi. Celebrity billionaires such as Jay-Z, George Lucas, Paul McCartney and Oprah Winfrey weigh in often about the oppression of the supposedly rigged system they mastered, but rarely about the plight of the less-well-paid in their own professions. So wokeness is medieval. Sin is not given up as much as atoned for — and excused — through loud confessionals. Self-righteous elites rant about carbon footprints, needless border security, defunding the police, gun control and charter schools. But they rarely forgo their private jets, third and fourth homes, estate walls, armed security guards and prep schools. Apparently, the more you rant about “privilege,” the less you need to worry about your own. Wokeness is an insurance policy. The louder the damnation of American culture, the more likely a career will be saved or enhanced. Wokeness is classist and elitist. Those who made or inherited a fortune, got the right degree at the right school, made CEO or a four-star rank, live in the right ZIP code or know the right people believe they have earned the right to decide what is moral for their inferiors. So, some of them have created an entire vocabulary — “deplorables,” “irredeemables,” “clingers,” “dregs,” “chumps” and “Neanderthals” — for the peasants and losers who must do as they are told. Wokeness is not really about fairness for minorities, the oppressed and the poor, past or present. It is mostly a self-confessional cult of anointed bullies, and hypocrites of all races and genders, who seek to flex, and increase, their own privilege and power. Period. HAT TIP: RIP McINTOSH |
-
Join 1,485 other subscribers
Archives
- April 2025
- March 2025
- February 2025
- January 2025
- December 2024
- October 2024
- September 2024
- August 2024
- July 2024
- June 2024
- May 2024
- April 2024
- March 2024
- February 2024
- January 2024
- December 2023
- November 2023
- October 2023
- September 2023
- August 2023
- July 2023
- June 2023
- May 2023
- April 2023
- March 2023
- February 2023
- January 2023
- December 2022
- November 2022
- October 2022
- September 2022
- August 2022
- July 2022
- June 2022
- May 2022
- April 2022
- March 2022
- February 2022
- January 2022
- December 2021
- November 2021
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- July 2021
- June 2021
- May 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- November 2020
- October 2020
- September 2020
- August 2020
- July 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- October 2019
- September 2019
- August 2019
- July 2019
- June 2019
- May 2019
- April 2019
- March 2019
- February 2019
- January 2019
- December 2018
- November 2018
- October 2018
- September 2018
- July 2018
- June 2018
- May 2018
- April 2018
- March 2018
- February 2018
- January 2018
- December 2017
- November 2017
- October 2017
- September 2017
- August 2017
- July 2017
- June 2017
- May 2017
- April 2017
- March 2017
- February 2017
- January 2017
- December 2016
- November 2016
- October 2016
- September 2016
- August 2016
- July 2016
- June 2016
- May 2016
- April 2016
- March 2016
- February 2016
- January 2016
- December 2015
- November 2015
- October 2015
- September 2015
- August 2015
- July 2015
- June 2015
- May 2015
- April 2015
- March 2015
- February 2015
- January 2015
- December 2014
- November 2014
- October 2014
- September 2014
- August 2014
- July 2014
- June 2014
- May 2014
- April 2014
- March 2014
- February 2014
- January 2014
- December 2013
- November 2013
- October 2013
- September 2013
- August 2013
- July 2013
- June 2013
- May 2013
- April 2013
- March 2013
- February 2013
- January 2013
- December 2012
- November 2012
- October 2012
- September 2012
- August 2012
- July 2012
- June 2012
- May 2012
- April 2012
- March 2012
- February 2012
- January 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- February 2011
- January 2011
- December 2010
- November 2010
- October 2010
- September 2010
- August 2010
- July 2010
- June 2010
- May 2010
- April 2010
- March 2010
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
-
Recent Posts
- REFLECTIONS BY VICTOR DAVIS HANSON ON THE COUNTER-REVOLUTION
- The Church’s conscience must always be clear in examining any conflict between the Divine and natural law when justifying the acceptance of government aid and largesse.
- THE PATRIOT POST SCORES AGAIN
- THIS IS TOO IMPORTANT FOR YOU TO NOT READ IT
- MY LAST COMMENT ON THIS!!!
Top Posts & Pages
- AT LEAST THEY ARE NOT DECAPITATING CHRISTIANS IN EAST LANSING, MICHIGAN, BUT NONE THE LESS IT IS STILL PERSECUTION
- GUNS ARE NOT THE PROBLEM, THE PROBLEM IS THAT THERE ARE TOO MANY MENTALLY DISTURBED INDIVIDUALS WHO ARE NOT MONITORED
- THE END GAME OF THE LGBT RIGHTS MOVEMENT INVOLVES CENTRALIZED STATE POWER AND THE END OF FIRST AMENDMENT FREEDOMS
- FRANCIS PRESENTED FIVE DUBIA OF HIS OWN TO CARDINAL MUELLER MINUTES BEFORE HE FIRED HIM
- German relief agencies financing Amazon Synod, predict ‘unmistakable’ change in Church. They cannot destroy the Church but they can deform it so that it will not be recognizable any longer as the Roman Catholic Church
- ARCHBISHOP GREGORY OF WASHINGTON, D.C. AND THE SCIENCE OF LOATHING
- The meaning of linguistic politics is thought control. Its purpose is to get people to adopt a new mindset, one that mirrors the politics of elites. The consequences are far reaching. Those who control our words control our thoughts, and our thoughts influence our behavior. They know what they are doing. Today's brand of journalists and educators are masterful practitioners of thought control. They are convinced that it is their job to have us talk the talk. Their talk.
- _If you do not take an interest in the affairs of your government, then you are doomed to live under the rule of fools. Plato
- THE CATHOLIC PRIEST
- SURROGATE MOTHERS SELLING THEIR BODIES, THE NEW WAVE
Top Clicks
- None