[Peace] AWARE: A Post-Mortem

[David Green]

*An AWARE post-mortem: The Reactionary Wages of Identitarian, Neoliberal
Wokeness*

David Green

July 28, 2020

This message addresses issues raised by a recent exchange on the AWARE
(Anti-War Anti-Racism Effort of Urbana-Champaign) Facebook
<https://www.facebook.com/groups/305897426305> page, during which Danielle
Chynoweth and Elizabeth Simpson claimed that they had “co-founded” AWARE
(2001) but left “years later” because of “sexism” and “patriarchy.” The
post that they were responding to, from Carl Estabrook, promoted opposition
to abortion. Chynoweth also created a new post, stating: “I am calling for
everyone on this group to please leave it. Long ago AWARE is taken over by
sexists and should be abandoned. Good bye.”

************

I will speak from experience, knowledge, and interpretation; of course, I
only speak for myself as someone highly if at times sporadically involved
for many years, until 2018, when I continued to assist in tabling at the
Farmers Market.

I will refer to more general perspectives on the current *Woke/Identitarian/BLM
“anti-racism”* scene, which has, unfortunately, nothing but dire
implications regarding what is still called the Left: a Left that no longer
includes either the working class or even cogently class-based, material
perspectives, no less “anti-war” perspectives.

My general political perspective is best characterized by this article
<https://www.thebellows.org/on-strasserism-and-the-decay-of-the-left/> on
the current “upper-middle class Left” by Swedish writer Malcom Kyeyune and
 this concise, clear 45 minute podcast
<https://soundcloud.com/user-653544961/sanders-2020-an-intermortem> by
Marty McMarty that is referred to in that article, which is a post-mortem
of the Bernie Sanders campaign and describes the evolution of U.S.
political party/social class formations since World War II. I would also
refer to an important recent blogpost by the political theorist, Benjamin
Studebaker <https://benjaminstudebaker.com/2020/07/14/the-four-centrisms/>,
which very much informs my understanding of insidious Wokeness in
*ideological* categories and context. In addition, this article by Michael
Lind <https://www.thebellows.org/the-double-horseshoe-theory/> plausibly if
schematically lays out the material *class structure* that we have arrived
at in the neoliberal era; nevertheless, the ideological categories that
Studebaker articulates only map onto the *capitalist* (top of the
horseshoe) class, broadly speaking; not onto the *working* (bottom of the
horseshoe) class.

************

In brief, I would argue that, of course, AWARE is not likely meaningfully
different than other localized, on-the-ground, material (as opposed to
virtual) anti-war organizations, whether newly formed or pre-existing, that
were activated by 9/11. These movements have receded or been disbanded as
American military presence in the Middle East, etc.—along with an expanded
volunteer army—has been normalized; as the neoliberal era has proceeded
from crisis to crisis, whether financial, environmental, or medical; as
capital accumulation and economic inequality has increasingly brutalized
domestic material life in the U.S.; and as domestic politics has
increasingly been characterized by submerged class conflict: “right-wing”
populism and “left-wing” Wokeness (upper-middle class identitarianism). The
latter is generated largely by the Professional-Managerial Class (PMC, or
what Lind calls the Professional Bourgeoisie), and has politically
weaponized Wokeness in a series of campaigns, since 9/11, regarding, sex,
gender, immigration, and race—all to the economic benefit of no more than
20% of the population, over-represented in coastal urban regions.

In that context, antiwar movements have obviously not only taken the back
seat but have largely been thrown under the bus. The apotheosis of this
trend, as I will argue below, is the one-two Woke punch that we see now in
relation to (corporate, foundation-driven, neoliberal) Black Lives Matter
and the panic-driven, anti-materialist transgender “movement.” The
consummation of this unholy matrimony was an event a few weeks ago in
which, during a pandemic, an estimated 12,000 (tightly) gathered in front
of the Brooklyn Museum in order to declare that “black trans lives matter.”
One would be hard-pressed to imagine anything more incoherent as a
“movement” in relation to capitalism, class struggle, economic justice, and
opposition to war and empire. But this is the point of Woke, “progressive”
neoliberalism; that is indeed *exactly* the point of what is surely a
petty-bourgeois class project.

************

>From early on, as AWARE proceeded in a framework prescribed by neoliberal
American politics, and by a Woke academic and activist community and
context, it became increasingly clear that the “anti-racist” aspect of this
mission—as articulated by emerging local critics—was indeed in
contradiction to the anti-war aspect. This was determined by the
fundamentally neoliberal nature of “anti-racism” as has been
well-articulated by Adolph Reed
<https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10624-017-9476-3>. This
contradiction played out nationally, ever more clearly during the political
ascendancy of Barack Obama; and locally, in very concrete ways, given his
presence as a Senator for this state and his “controversial
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2005/09/29/illinois-anti-warriors-and-the-attractive-senator/>”
visit to our community.

After Obama’s election as President, AWARE limped on while black lives (and
wars) that allegedly now matter only got worse for nearly a full decade,
regardless of the “racial” background of the President. While AWARE for all
practical purposes ceased public operations (demonstrations, tabling) last
Fall, it’s only fitting that the coffin lid should finally be closed shut
not only during the pandemic, but during the current racialized (and
incredibly and under-reportedly violent
<https://medium.com/@mtracey/two-months-since-the-riots-and-still-no-national-conversation-12a7e3e4e006>)
moral panic that calls itself Black Lives Matter; with its attendant moral
panics regarding gender and sex, intensified during the Trump Era for
obvious (Democratic Party) reasons, in ways that such panics could not be
intensified during the Trayvon Martin/Ferguson/Obama era.

I would only add, perhaps in a self-serving way, that the anti-racism
pertaining to what came to be called Islamophobia has arguably been the
most successful aspect of either the anti-war or anti-racism efforts. AWARE
made a distinct contribution to a community-wide effort. But this also has
to be qualified in relation to ongoing wars, continued Israeli occupation
of Palestine, and the inclusion of such anti-Islamophobic efforts into the
current panoply of neoliberal, “pro-immigrant” Wokeness in what is now, for
all practical purposes, and notwithstanding Steven Salaita and Cary Nelson,
the post-active Zionist era.

AWARE’s function, from the start, was to bring the truth about our nation’s
wars to the local community. I feel that it did quite well in this regard.
We utilized many if not all of the local communal and media resources
available. I would stress that regarding the general trajectory of AWARE
over a period of 18 years, what happened was, for better or worse, *nobody’s
fault*. Therefore, it should not be the subject of anybody’s *judgment*,
least of all those who were essentially *non-participants*.

I doubt that AWARE has been any different in its trajectory, for better or
worse, than hundreds of other local organizations that arose after 9/11.
Nevertheless, it’s clear that the material conditions of the American
population do not currently lend themselves to an organized working-class
opposition to the forces of Capital and War. Moreover, such a movement will
never emanate from an academic community, not in 21st Century America, not
in any-century America.

************

On July 21st, *Danielle Chynoweth* commented on the AWARE FB Page:

*I am one of the founders of AWARE along with Laura Haber Mark Enslin (who
conceived of the name) Susan Parenti (who started the first demonstrations)
and others. There were over 100 people at our first meeting at the YMCA. I
facilitated the first meetings. A few years in it was hijacked by Carl and
a few other white men who discarded the anti-racist and anti-sexist roots.
It became the Carl show. We formed CUCPJ to focus on the racism in the
militarized criminal justice system here at home while always remaining
connected to anti war.*

*One day later*, I made two separate comments in a short period of time:

*Could you be more specific? Or is your purpose just to play the victim?*

*Danielle, you were nowhere to be found at meeting or other activities,
well before "a few years in." Therefore I can hardly expect a specific
answer regarding "other white men." Sorry Danielle, I don't buy your
slanderous Woke feminism. It's utterly disingenuous, among other things.*

Danielle responded:

*thank you for illustrating my point. and i sponsored the anti war
resolution before city council with AWARE, organizing intensively for
months while dealing with the slander of sexists*

I responded on the same day:

*You live in a fantasy world of victimization. If someone challenges you on
your exalted self-image, and calls you on your slanders, you then accuse
them of being sexist, or patriarchal. I've always found you to be
impersonal, condescending, and strangely detached from ordinary human
connection. You are a raging narcissist, and you depend on having people
around you who conform to your expectations of exaltation and obedience.
That's not sexism on my part. That's calling a narcissist a narcissist, and
I could probably call you worse, especially after the whole IMC post office
fiasco. Yes, I'm sure you organized intensively for months (re Urbana City
Council resolution). Just like Barack Obama in Chicago. What a sick joke.
And of course, you pick up your toys and go crying home, taking your
supplicants with you. How predictable.*

Danielle responded on the same day:

*I am calling for everyone on this group to please leave it. Long ago AWARE
is taken over by sexists and should be abandoned. Good bye.*

*Opening a different thread to reply to me, she stated in large letters:*

*Cancel*

She proceeded to tag several other people, including Aaron Ammons, Rachel
Storm Sandra Ahten, Stuart Levy, and Karen Medina.

At that point, I commented:

*Yes Danielle, marshal your forces; you are loved, admired, worshipped, and
feared.*

On the first thread, after my comments, *Elizabeth Simpson* commented:

*I was also a founder of AWARE, and also ended up leaving (MANY many years
ago) because I found some members (enough to carry a majority) to be
questionably evasive about the anti-racism aspect, and because my
experience of it as being polluted by patriarchal and domineering (despite
many members who wished otherwise) made it not worth my time. At some
point, it could be really powerful to do a post-mortem about what worked
and didn't, and why, so that current projects can learn from its strengths
and drawbacks, especially the dynamic of so many folks leaving and those
left not having the wherewithal to continue, though we all remain committed
to an anti-war stance and for many, engaged anti-war activities. RIP AWARE.
Many thanks to Stuart Levy and others who really stuck it out for the good
reasons.*

I responded to Elizabeth:

*What has killed the antiwar movement in this country, such as it is or
was, is invoking cultural politics rather than class politics. AWARE was no
exception. Some more than others have been more blatant about invoking
cultural (identity) politics as a way of avoiding the capitalist basis of
war. No post-mortem is needed, saved you the trouble of a boring meeting.*

I later continued my response to Elizabeth Simpson:

*groups like SURJ, which you promote in this community, have exemplified
the Woke Left's shallow, race-reductionist and white guilt approaches to
politics. That leads us away from any coherent analysis of capitalism and
war, and any understanding of the relationship between exploitation and
racism. Instead, we have aestheticized, performative virtue signaling in
what is basically a neoliberal, market-driven, therapeutic framework.
Performative virtue signaling is something you excel at, and I find it
irrelevant, cloying, and obnoxious. SURJ is ultimately reactionary, as is a
group like School for Designing a Society. It leads to nonsense like
painting over a historical mural in San Francisco. I have never known you
to be seriously involved in antiwar discourse or action in this community,
or any serious truth-telling in this community. Your accusations of
"patriarchal" etc. are pro forma, performative, thoughtless, and off-base.
You wouldn't know patriarchy if it bit your butt. You do not suffer from
patriarchy, but the "left" community, such as it is, suffers from your Woke
ignorance. Considering the source, I don't take your insulting and ignorant
comments personally. Neither do you deserve to be taken seriously. Just
rest assured that I don't.*

On the second thread, that had been started by Danielle, there was also an
interaction between me and Elizabeth Simpson, when she intervened between
me and Danielle, which ended abruptly when I told her:

 *fuck you*.

************

Before moving on, I must say that I went to almost all the weekly meetings
between 2001 and 2005; I can recall neither Danielle Chynoweth nor
Elizabeth Simpson being at more than a handful of them. I suspect that,
combined, they attended less than a dozen. They played no role whatsoever
in organizing and participating in specific AWARE activities that I am
cognizant of, and I certainly would recall if I had had any positive or
productive interaction with either of them. They contributed no coherent
perspectives, factually, historically, or theoretically, regarding issues
surrounding war, foreign policy, the Middle East, etc.

I have no problem with their not finding AWARE to have been their cup of
tea; that’s their business, that’s their lives, and in lieu of their recent
intervention I would have no reason to address their slanders. But after
nearly two decades they both found it worthwhile, in tandem no less, to
gratuitously level false and ugly criticism of those willing to sustain
their participation in terms of time, effort, funding, and conscience; that
included me, of course, in terms of hundreds of hours and at least $2,000,
and I will respond accordingly.

At bottom it must be stressed, because they claim to be “antiwar,” that
they evidence no genuine interest in the topic or the “movement,” beyond a
checklist of moral virtue signifiers. That’s not a problem, I don’t care. I
do care that they somehow found their way to the AWARE FB page in order to
denigrate those who do; and all of this based on the alleged and implied
credibility of their now meaningless claim to have been “co-founders.”

************

In relation to Danielle Chynoweth, I would add that I served on the Board
of the Independent Media Center for two years, 2011-13, with Chynoweth. At
no moment, before, during, or since, did I have any experience of an even
superficially normal friendly connection, the kind that people experience
routinely with their colleagues and co-workers. I seriously doubt that I
was the problem in this regard.

I haven’t really known Elizabeth over the years, but I’ve been aware of her
career as an emotional manager <http://cooperativeconflict.org/>.  While I
think that there are huge ethical issues with this sort of process, I will
leave that aside for now. She also leads a group called Standing Up for
Racial Justice. These are the same folks who wanted to whitewash the famous San
Francisco murals
<https://ncac.org/news/san-francisco-mural-controversy-perspectives>.
SURJ’s “white privilege” approach, a la Tim Wise, should have long been
discredited. But in relation to Robin DiAngelo
<https://barpodcast.fireside.fm/17> and “white fragility
<https://barpodcast.fireside.fm/bonus2>,” it’s back, in the form of an
intensified, white-administered version of “white-shaming.” That’s what
Elizabeth Simpson is about, beyond trying to shame men on the AWARE FB page.

************

Beyond these individuals, I would note the general local activist context,
especially the *School for Designing a Society*, with which Elizabeth
Simpson is identified. While I have no interest in their work as
“activists,” I would in this context only assert that their work has
nothing whatsoever to do with politics, with the working class, and with
the material needs of the population. Woke activism of this nature is
characteristically affective, therapeutic, performative, and aestheticized.
It is a distraction from understanding the world as it is, in material
terms.

I have no problem with people calling themselves artists or therapists or
activists, however performative these labels are. But they aren’t serious
political actors and shouldn’t claim to be. They are not part of any
coherent movement, and they’re not doing politics; far from it, they in
effect support the social order as it exists. This has never been clearer
than during the Trump era and, and it is also highlighted by the problems
of the Sanders campaign that are discussed in the podcast linked to above.

************

It is not by accident that SDAS took up the issue of immigration, which so
easily lends itself to Woke activism. What follows is my letter to the
editor that was published in the News-Gazette from October of last year.

While immigration policy has historically been rhetorically shaped by
racism, it has been more fundamentally structured by globalized economic
exploitation and (since WW II) our foreign wars and geopolitical alliances.
During this four-decade neoliberal era, *immigration policies of all
administrations have been consistent with (i.e., supportive of) massive
redistribution of income/wealth upwards*, decline of unions, austerity, and
“free trade” policies that offshore jobs, suppress wages, and send economic
refugees north (NAFTA).

Compassionate policies towards immigrants are obviously desirable.
Nevertheless, such controversies obscure continuities regarding the
abandonment of American workers (and children), while stereotyping them
(especially African-American and rural folk) as “unskilled,” if not worse.

When Jeffrey Brown advocates for increased immigration, he promotes
intensified immiseration of the working class; that’s what business school
deans do. When Mike Doyle of the Campus YMCA supports business leaders’
“Heartland” and “skilled immigrant” agenda, he displays his ignorance and
compromises his institution.

The well-publicized supporters of our “welcoming community”—Bend the Arc,
Solidarity Sundays, CU Immigration Forum, Unitarian-Universalist Church,
etc.—are oblivious to the class politics behind their agenda. That’s
because they’re immersed in class privilege, while disingenuously claiming
to have rejected “white privilege.”

Ironically, Thomas Garza of the Immigration Forum (read Immigration
Doctrine) stereotypes those who disagree with his views as xenophobic
bigots, thus revealing his own bigotry.

Garza’s overtly anti-Trumpian electoral advocacy serves establishment
Democrats (anti-Sanders/Gabbard, pro-Biden, etc.). Thus, when the Urbana
Free Library endorses Garza’s annual awards program, it not only displays
inappropriate partisanship, it effectively supports Brown’s 1%,
Gies-driven, pitiless economic agenda.

************

I would emphasize the ability of immigration advocates to deny the need and
demand of the wealthiest among us for cheap labor, and its relationship to
the four-decade immiseration of the working class (black and white, etc.)
accompanied by the accumulation of wealth into very few hands.

Beyond that are the elitist and stereotypical assertions regarding the
“white working class,” the so-called “deplorables,” who are easily and
haughtily dispensed with in rhetoric and reality by those who claim to
embody “anti-racism” and use the phrases like “white nationalism” and
“white supremacism” all too loosely. Indeed, what we have among the
Democrats and the Woke, including locally, is the  racialization of the
working class, in order to obliterate them from political consideration as
those who actually produce most of the items that still make this a rich
country.

Meanwhile, blacks have literally nowhere politically to go, aside from
their ineffectual representation by black politicians. Immigration
activists work hard to get themselves to think and believe that immigration
has nothing to do with the black working class, to keep their ineffectual
anti-racism credible.

Again, if people want to support the well-being of immigrants in this
country and protect them from the harms that may be inflicted upon them by
our federal government, fine, I have no problem with that, obviously. But
it’s a charitable (bourgeois class project) “cause,” that’s all it is. Just
don’t pretend that it’s serious politics, no less “transformative” politics.

************

The interlude that follows is transcribed from the indispensable podcast What’s
Left
<https://soundcloud.com/whatisleftpod/police-brutality-state-violence-w-malcom-kyeyune>
(June 4th), immediately following the George Floyd and reaction in
Minneapolis; they are meant to re-iterate and expand upon my previous
arguments:

*Aimee Terese*: I usually have a few different drums I’m beating at any
given time. I’ve been beating the anarcho-liberalism (Woke) drum for quite
some time. I think for a lot of people it started to make a bit more sense
this week as we see these complete wing-nut anarchists, and also the
Hillary voters all using the same hymn book at once. A lot of people are
having trouble making sense of that, and I think basically the constituency
of the Democratic Party at this point is split between PMC
(professional-managerial class) and then a lot of desperately poor people
of color. And so the anarchic discontent, regardless of the class content
of the proponents on the ground, that’s always going to line up behind the
PMC constituency of the Party because *anarchism is inherently
petty-bourgeois* in the way it operates.

So that’s why you’re seeing all these rich liberals enjoy the chaos, and
ultimately—because the Democratic Party is in bed with Silicon Valley,
finance, and the Feds—they can reinvest in all sorts of surveillance
technology, an increasing mandate for the use of discretionary force by the
state. At the same time, the rich suburbanites can have their egos stroked
with this race-reductionist narrative, knowing that “it’s race not class,”
that they’re the good ones, the woke ones, and the NGO-industrial complex
will see another increase in jobs for activists, post-grads, organizers,
politicians, failed sons, all of that. None of this organizing takes on
Capital. It’s a self-reinforcing cycle that keeps most of the Democratic
coalition occupied. As long as they can keep workers divided along
nationalist ideological lines, then the repressive policing and violence
and brutality is going to keep happening. But they’ve managed to set up
this anarchic feedback loop where the more this happens the more this feeds
its own circular dynamic.

*Oliver Bateman*: The two worst things that we don’t want to happen will
happen: the rich will continue to feel good because it’s not a class
problem, in fact if they say the right words and donate to the right
things, they’ll be fine. If policing methods can be made softer but no less
harmful, not as visible, not going to create social media. You can see this
among the policing of the protests right now. A lot of the forces are
clearly being very careful; this is not like the 1968 Democratic
Convention. Atlanta fired two or three officers today for misconduct during
the protest, so they’re going to figure out ways to be just as repressive
if not more, but with a heavily overlay of Human Resources, and that’s what
people are thinking about right now. That’s where the minds are going.

************

Accusations of “sexism” and “patriarchy” are curious in this current
political context, in any event. As Helen Pluckrose
<https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/07/24/wokeness-is-being-pushed-on-everyone/>
has argued, correctly I think, “Activists are not so worried about women as
a sex anymore. This is evident from all the *Karen memes*. Similarly,
activists feel gay men are not consistently being intersectional, and have
lost some of their interest in the gay identity cause. What we have ended
up with is race and transgender.”

This absolutely resonates with me in relation to recent events. In 2016 I
wrote a long article on Counterpunch regarding “rape culture”
<https://www.counterpunch.org/2016/06/24/rape-culture-the-hunting-ground-and-amy-goodman-a-critical-perspective/>
on college campuses. It was around then that the absurdities and
contradictions of Woke politics during the #resistance era became
impossible to ignore; it was around then that I was reminded of the
capabilities of moral/sexual panics: A black woman could accuse a black man
of having raped her, in relation to a case that had already been legally
adjudicated against the plaintiff, on Democracy Now, without Amy Goodman
batting an eye; indeed, she validated it. Many of the cases addressed in
this “documentary” involved black men
<https://harvardlawreview.org/2015/02/trading-the-megaphone-for-the-gavel-in-title-ix-enforcement-2/>
accused of being rapists. “Feminism” was thus on the top of the gender/race
“intersectional” Woke agenda, so to speak.

Much has changed, as Pluckrose points out, and the contradictions are
impossible not to notice. Now we have the “Coopers affair.” A white woman,
Amy Cooper, reacted quite stupidly and disturbingly to a black man,
Christian Cooper, in Central Park; nobody was injured. But we are no longer
amid a “feminist,” “rape culture,” moral panic. We are amid a “Black Lives
Matter” (+ black trans women) race panic. So this white woman, this
“Karen,” has to be punished and erased, with utmost derision and contempt,
even though if this were 2016 perhaps the “Hunting Ground” moral panic
would have not only saved her but supported her; certainly so if she were
on a college campus rather than in Central Park, where Title IX doesn’t
apply.

No, she must lose her job and career, from a Wall Street firm no less (so,
in a perverse way, the Woke don’t have to feel sorry for her, as they
pretend to be anti-Wall Street), and essentially have her life ruined, with
no questions asked regarding the proportionality of her punishment
<https://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/Op-Ed/2020/06/01/Kyle-Smith-Central-Park-dog-Christian-Amy-Cooper-Covington-racism/stories/202006010003>—and
certainly not by “feminists” in the current context.

The red meat of BLM must be thoroughly grilled. This woman did not deserve
this. But this is what you get from Woke Corporate Human Resources culture
in the BLM era, along with all the “diversity training.” Within a few
years, we’ll move on to the next thing, with no improvement for the vast
majority of “black lives,” since the purpose of Woke neoliberalism is to
keep moving from one panic to another, while nothing about our economic
system changes, other than that it continues to get worse for the vast
majority of people of all racialized backgrounds.

************

Notwithstanding all this, some folks, like the progenitors of this missive,
can still cram in a little “sexism” and “patriarchy” so long as it stands
apart from black, BIPOC, and transgender issues. But as Nina Paley
<https://blog.ninapaley.com/category/terfy/page/3/> will tell you, you have
to be careful that your sectionals don’t get mixed up with other folks’
sectionals in a non-intersectional way in the wrong place and at the
historically wrong panic time. In that case, your radical feminism becomes
the object of a moral panic, and you are cancelled.

The currently fashionable and apparently acceptable “Karens
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_(pejorative)>” meme or epithet is
blatantly sexist and racist, which is to say *misogynist*, and is now
featured by black liberal Leonard Pitts, and perhaps others, in our local
newspaper, and more generally in Woke and twitter culture. It’s not the
least bit cute or funny; nor does it accurately describe female vs. male
“managerial” behavior (obviously). Who knows, maybe 1980s jokes about
Jewish-American princesses will also come back into fashion. Certainly,
some of those college women grew up to be “Karens,” in which case we can
combine misogyny and anti-Semitism for a neat intersectional twofer.
Perhaps Leonard Pitts and others would be a better target for bored local
self-styled feminists than the defunct local anti-war movement, especially
as its “partriarchal” and “sexist” men enter their dotages.
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