Not Post-Woke Yet: The Ongoing Battle of Worldviews, By James Reed

Dr. David McGrogan's essay paints a stark picture: the assassination of Charlie Kirk lays bare a Left that's slid from idealistic reform to visceral hatred of conservatives, reducing politics to a raw struggle for power and recognition, echoing Hobbes or Kojève. He argues that wokeness, stripped of transcendent values, has collapsed into nihilistic rivalry, with the state as the prize in a zero-sum game. Yet, the notion of a "post-woke" era feels premature. We're not beyond wokeness; we're in the thick of an escalating clash of worldviews, woke progressivism versus conservative traditionalism, driven by deep cultural, political, and existential divides that show no signs of fading.

McGrogan's metaphor of lifting a stone to reveal squirming Leftist nasties, captures the venom unleashed online after Kirk's death, especially on platforms like Bluesky or X. But this isn't wokeness dying; it's mutating under pressure. In 2025, "post-woke" chatter is everywhere, yet it often reeks of wishful thinking. Articles speculate about a "post-woke art world," or ask if woke is fading, only to warn that what's next, like resurgent religious conflicts, could be worse. Others note both woke and anti-woke camps are exhausted, yet cultural skirmishes rage on. Progressives' calls to "reclaim woke" in 2025 prove its staying power.

This is no post-woke moment; it's a battleground at its peak. Woke ideology, rooted in equity, diversity, and dismantling hierarchies, still shapes institutions, from museums slammed by Trump as "woke," to British progressives plotting a comeback after setbacks. Meanwhile, conservatives, armed with Project 2025's anti-woke blueprint, see it as a poison to traditional values like family, hierarchy, and natural law. The twist? The Right's not just resisting; it's adopting the Left's playbook, birthing a "woke Right" with its own identity politics and grievances, mirroring the tactics it decries.

McGrogan nails the root: modern political philosophy's rejection of objective truth has reduced politics to self-interest. Yet, both sides cling to their truths, progressives to intersectional justice, conservatives to timeless principles. The Kirk assassination, amplifies this divide. On X, conservatives decry "woke delusions," while Left-leaning voices deflect or defend, rarely celebrating outright. Reddit's biases and corporate signals, like Bethesda's, keep the flames burning. Violence here is a symptom, not the end. As one TEDx talk puts it, clashing worldviews fuel global madness. Anti-woke movements risk their own illiberalism, while the Left adapts.

We're not post-anything, just entrenched in a worldview war. Ideologies don't die quietly; they evolve or double down. The flagstones still lifted, and the squirming beneath shows no sign of stopping. Whether this clash forges something new or just more chaos remains anyone's guess. The battle's far from over; and in fact, it's just beginning.

https://dailysceptic.org/2025/09/16/were-in-a-post-woke-world-now/