There Is No Woke Right, Part 4
Dismantle Unjust Systems
Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 available at American Reformer
In previous essays, I’ve argued that the notion of “woke” is a particularly weak concept, and is altogether invalid when applied to Christians on the political right. Using Neil Shenvi’s four part definition, I’ve illustrated the way that the concept of “woke” is misinterpreted, overgeneralized, or represents a misunderstanding of valid scientific principles. In this final essay, I intend to show that Shenvi’s misunderstanding of the concept of an unjust system undergirds his misapplication of the term in his essay.
The fourth point in Shenvi’s definition is framed as the conclusion to a series of arguments made in points 1-3. This is a reasonable way to interpret most political arguments because it is generally true that the conclusion should be derived from a set of valid assertions. Facts exist independently of any arguments, which are contingent arrangements of those facts with logical consequences. However, in the case of gnostic political religions, this is not the case. Shenvi’s definition fails because point 4 is in the wrong place. Point 4 is actually Point 1. Injustice is the unexamined prior assumption of “woke” ideology, not the conclusion of a rational investigation because the desire to transform society into a desired, utopian image precedes any particular set of facts. It is instead grounded in a spiritual dissatisfaction with the fallenness of existence and a lack of faith in the fundamental goodness of reality[35. Voegelin. Gnosticism. p 59.]. There is a humorous adage that “Marxism is a solution constantly in search for a problem.” The humor lies in the awareness that this is, in fact, true. Gnostic political religions do not ground themselves on phenomena of existence or on empirical social facts but on a felt sensibility of alienation from being.
What is “alienation from being”? This phrase is a way of expressing the feelings that all people have when the world seems “unheimlich” or uncanny. It is the feeling that things are not as they should be, that the individual doesn’t belong, and something profoundly wrong is happening. Unheimlichkeit is one of the most important themes in philosophical treatments of modernity because this alienation is becoming more fundamental to the spiritual character of modern mankind. The uncanniness of being can be expressed in a variety of behavioral modes, including loss of social trust, violence, and extreme introversion, and cannot be reduced to a mere psychological medical condition. Unheimlichkeit is a condition of the human soul as it exists in a fallen world. What makes it particularly salient today is the way in which modern societies both aggravate these feelings in individuals and make everyone particularly vulnerable to the negative effects of these feelings. Cosmopolitanism, technocracy, and managerialism all represent facets of the modern world which both exacerbate the effects and nullify our resistances to disorders which evolve out of poorly-managed feelings of alienation.
Of course, it should be clear to Christians that unheimlichkeit is a product of sin and these feelings are caused by our disconnection from the God who created us. When we separate ourselves from Him in our sins, we should feel like things are not as they should be, that we don’t belong, and that something profoundly wrong has occurred. The solution to these feelings is repentance and submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. This solution, however, is painful because it involves a recognition of our own blame and responsibility for our condition. It involves a sacrifice of a part of our existence which is contrary to our own good, our “libido dominandi” or will to power. It is only when we admit that we are not God, and that reality belongs to him, that we can escape our unheimlichkeit and make peace with reality. Those who fail to accept this truth, and who insist that reality bend to their own will, will find themselves devoured by their alienation until they are enemies not just of some persons but of humanity and God himself. This is the meaning Voegelin finds behind what Nietzsche calls the “murder of God.”
Gnostic political religions prey on people who suffer from an inability to cope with this experience by providing a scapegoat for these feelings, which absolve the individual of any responsibility for their condition. The reason that a person suffers these feelings is the fault of society, one’s parents, or unfavored groups in society, and the feelings themselves are the evidence for injustice. It must be remembered, however, that the core experience of this alienation rests on a desire to become like God, and to define all reality by one’s own will and desires. The very definitions of justice and injustice are warped, until justice becomes “my will” and injustice becomes “against my will.” A political religion provides a means to organize a collective of such disordered souls by uniting them under a collective will, or a General Will. The clash of individuals, each seeking out their personal desires, is channeled and empowered by the higher Will which they serve. In this way, a movement emerges in which adherence to the movement is just, and anything against the movement is unjust. Just as there is no rational argument which can negate the feelings of the disordered individual, so too are collective movements of this type immune to logical persuasion. The injustices must be true because its members feel it so strongly, and because the movement establishes it so authoritatively.
As Herbert Marcuse explains in his essay, “Repressive Tolerance,” society’s injustice is a priori, and must be acknowledged before any kind of intellectual work or activism begins. There is no evidence that can prove or disprove that society is unjust, and the very question is off limits. Permitting people to question the premise that society is unjust or the identities of the oppressed and oppressors is to materially contribute to the forces of oppression. Shenvi wrongly attaches the fact of limited human perspective to this principle because he doesn’t grasp Lenin and Marcuse’s point about the nature of pseudo-injustice. The fact that all people are blind to certain aspects of the world has nothing to do with the diagnosis of injustice. When they say that you “can’t” question it, they are not saying that you lack the ability to question it. They are saying that you are not permitted to question it, and if you do question, you will be destroyed. The diagnosis of injustice against society is imposed by the political needs of the movement, independent and prior to any observations or facts in reality; the very act of marshalling objective evidence for or against the cause is itself an act of treason. The ideal follower “feels” the truth by a kind of faith, made perverse by the claim that evidence itself is proof of faithlessness. The solution is predetermined by the leadership and goes forth seeking to marshal problems it can “solve.”
The key element here in distinguishing “woke” movements from ordinary justice-seeking movements is whether injustice is pre-predicated of social order or a deviation from the norm. Saying that the current crop of social elites are evil and should be replaced is not “woke.” Saying that the legal-political system is broken and should be replaced is not “woke.” Saying that a society’s culture is trash and should be replaced is not “woke.” None of these imply that injustice is inherent to society or pre-predicated of social order. All of these are arguments that can be judged on the basis of their factual merit and whose prudence (or lack thereof) is determinable by reason. Shenvi fails to comprehend what is meant by “system” in radical Critical Theory. “System” is not a legal-constitutional order, an economic system, or a cultural dominance. The “system” is nothing less than the Hegelian World-System, or the fundamental order of reality itself, which incites the feelings of alienation from being. As Voegelin describes, the key characteristic of gnostic political religions is the immanentized eschaton: an intramundane horizon across which the fundamental characteristics of human order are altered or abolished. “Woke” transformation involves a new world where fundamental conditions of existence such as human differentiation, economic scarcity, social and political disunity, ignorance, poverty, and the embodied characteristics of the human organism cease to exist. It is the creation of Heaven on Earth. The more impossible the change, the more empowering it feels to members of a political religion. Just as Christ’s authority is proven by his miracles, so does it seem that the rightness and authority of a political religion is proven in its claims to fundamentally change that which cannot be changed. There is no power high so great as the claim that one can change existence with one’s mind. What is a woman, after all?
I should hope that it’s obvious that few, if any, of the people Shenvi smears as “woke right” have anything to do with this kind of ideology. None are trying to perfect reality, or change its fundamental characteristics through intramundane, human means. In fact, all the people he attacks are opposing these kinds of immanentized, utopian, cult ideologies, albeit in flawed ways. I believe that all of these men would acknowledge that the Hegelian World-System is fixed until the return of Christ in the End Times, and that any attempt by human beings to alter the fundamental conditions of reality would end in a Babel-like tragedy. In fact, I would strongly predict that all three of them would make this very point themselves: that our society is sprinting as fast as it can to a destructive New Babel future, and all they want is to avert that tragedy for themselves and their communities. Is this woke? I think not.
Conclusion
Shenvi’s overbroad generalizations fail to narrow in on the discrete type of phenomenon he’s criticizing, which is why he ends up lumping genuine justice-seeking movements with “woke” political religions. As Voegelin details in his studies of totalitarianism, political religions are inherently violent due to their key characteristics: the Oppressor-Oppressed Dichotomy, a membership made up of pathological individuals who instrumentalize truth on behalf of their intentional desires, and the goal of a transformation of the World-System of reality itself. We should expect such movements to begin with personal attacks, and move on to petty violence, property damage and vandalism, escalating to rioting, and finally murder. This is the logical progression of a quasi-gnostic political movement, and the evidences of its wicked nature. Movements that systemically use extralegal violence deserve our contempt, regardless of what phony pseudo-injustice they use to rhetorically justify their evil. The key word here is systematic: one march gone wrong or a fringe lunatic here and there is not representative of the whole. Nobody blames the Pro-Life movement for the occasional violent lunatic, at least in good faith, because everyone knows that violence is not inherent to that position and is not justified by its members. It is when we see violent act after violent act in succession that we’re forced, at least if we’re thinking in good faith, to begin digging into the reality of a movement that masquerades as a justice movement.
The body of work about the so-called “woke right” represents a lazy tendency in modern political speech. It is far easier to slap a negative label on one’s opponents rather than to do the difficult work of investigating their claims and answering them with facts. Part of this is not the fault of the authors. They are simply unqualified to deal with these kinds of questions and should not have waded into this in the first place. We have a culture problem in the Evangelical Movement that we expect theologians to be our public intellectuals, despite the fact that theology is not sociology, psychology, political theory, philosophy, or ethics[2. Noll. The Scandal. p 16.]. Part of the answer involves a need for Evangelical scientists to step up and contribute, but a larger part involves the Seminary-educated leadership knowing when to step aside and share the stage with those who the Lord has gifted with a different, more appropriate expertise to the situation. I hope that nobody has taken this as a personal attack, and I do not impute any bad faith on Shenvi in his work. As I’ve mentioned a number of times, most of his errors are shared in common with all Evangelical leaders and a flawed intellectual culture described by Noll. His errors, however, are dangerous in that they divert attention from a real threat to the Church today: the New Civic Religion. Wolfe, Isker, and Engel are loyal to the Church of Jesus Christ, even if they err at times, and should be corrected through brotherly dialogue. I’m happy to participate in that conversation, as needed. They are not, however, “woke.”
To move forward requires an informed, accurate understanding of the essential problem that the Church faces today. “Wokeness” is not the problem, but a convenient label that distracts us. The lunacy and absurdity of the extremes that we see on social media should not consume our attention. Crazy people holding crazy ideas should be expected. What should concern us is when normal, decent people begin holding ideas that are the logical roots of the insanities of the so-called “woke.” Pneumopathologies, or what Blaise Pascal called les désordres du coeur, are contagious and spread through the mainstream adoption of diseased belief systems. Christian thinkers need to come to terms with the fact that the real threat is a competing faith, the New Civic Religion, which is defined by a “retreat from spiritual insight,” corrupting and perverting the souls of its adherents. We can see the effect of the most advanced cases, but fail to apply any remedy when we perceive an initial infection. This is what “woke” is actually about, and why Christians must give up the petty bickering amongst ourselves and rededicate ourselves to confront the crisis of these times.
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