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OpEdNews Op Eds    H3'ed 8/12/20

The Moral Panic of the Woke Generation

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Message Richard Gale

Richard Gale and Gary Null PhD

Progressive Radio Network

It is one thing to show a man that he is in error and another to put him in touch with truth" No man's knowledge can go beyond his experience" - John Locke (Essays Concerning Human Understanding)

Locke was not alone in questioning what we believe to be true knowledge, and pointing out the consequences of failing to discern falsehoods from reality. In fact Locke was in excellent company. Due to the scientific revolution that inspired several generations of deep thinkers, naturalists and philosophers, including Rousseau, Kant, Spinoza, Darwin, Bacon and Voltaire, the Age of Enlightenment or Age of Reason dominated the intellectual world of ideas for nearly two centuries.

Locke's statements are important because today there is a new generation that has been indoctrinated by the shortcomings of scientific materialism originally launched during the Age of Reason. It was intended to bring forth a new purity, an idyllic perfectionism of thought and beliefs founded alone upon objective inquiry. Now, we are observing a juvenile revolution in the ideas of identity politics, wokeness and a passionate micro-aggression that derives hedonist pleasure in ridicule and insult. One of its more lofty goals is to end free speech as we know it - except for those who are woke. Other goals are to institute a faux collectivism and to abolish meritocracy or social rewards earned through effort and achievement.

Important voices of critical thought - Noam Chomsky, Henry Giroux, Jordan Peterson, to name a few, have been warning us for a decade that this day was rapidly approaching. However, since there are no dynamic leaders in the youth's woke moment of Maoist-style cleansing and purging wrong-views, wrong attitudes and wrong beliefs, most of us in the older generations wrongly assume it would be a passing phase. But it wasn't.

In fact, the consequences of this unleashed furor, evidence by an absence of self-reflection or critical thought, has been channeled into a mob rule of dissent and abuse. In the street gatherings of protest, and across the social media, it is virtually unstoppable at this moment. No one is challenging them, neither the mainstream media nor the majority of academia. Rather, corporate leaders and persuasive forces in the democratic institutions are coming to their aid. Therefore, it proceeds under the cover of a silent political power to sustain its energy.

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Producer, Gary Null Show (NPR and Pacifica radio stations), nation's longest talk show on health and nutrition Executive Producer, Progressive Radio Network Co-Founder, Chief Editor, Elixir Magazine Author, journalist, poet, spiritual activist
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