Has Woke 2.0 Started? Jason Arday, Lindsay Clancy, and Cornell 7 Episodes Resemble 2020

Ever since AOC quoted a local city councilman as saying, “Woke 1 was crazy,” a troubling thought has been lurking in my mind: The phrase “Woke 1” means there must be a Woke 2 — and potentially a Woke 3, Woke 4, and so on. I never believed that “wokeness” died; it simply grew quieter because its loudest activists retreated to private rooms for off-the-record discussions. Still, I’ve been wondering when the second era of wokeness would emerge.

Now, I believe I’ve already seen it. This summer, I observed aggressive illiberal extremism in three particular cultural episodes that eerily resembled the fashions of 2020: the Cambridge cover-up, the Clancy trial, and the Cornell case.

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Abigail Anthony

Abigail Anthony is a staff writer at National Review.

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Ever since AOC quoted a local city councilman as saying, “Woke 1 was crazy,” a troubling thought has been lurking in my mind: The phrase “Woke 1” means there must be a Woke 2 — and potentially a Woke 3, Woke 4, and so on. I never believed that “wokeness” died; it simply grew quieter because its loudest activists retreated to private rooms for off-the-record discussions. Still, I’ve been wondering when the second era of wokeness would emerge.

Now, I believe I’ve already seen it. This summer, I observed aggressive illiberal extremism in three particular cultural episodes that eerily resembled the fashions of 2020: the Cambridge cover-up, the Clancy trial, and the Cornell case.