The word “woke” became part of the national conversation after Terry McAuliffe’s defeat in Georgia after Democratic strategist James Carville suggested that part of what went wrong was “stupid wokeness” and suggested that some people need to go to a “woke detox center” or something.

Those progressives who consider themselves woke took great offense at Carville’s words, and now there’s a piece about how the right-wing is using language like “woke” as a weapon.

The View’s Sunny Hostin retweeted the piece, pulling out as examples the words “illegal alien” and “states’ rights” along with “politically correct” and “woke.”

Magdi Semrau wrote for AlterNet back in May:

So, what “wokeness” denotes is overwhelmingly positive: awareness of bigotry and concomitant opposition. Yet, recently, as conservatives have co-opted it, the term has become derisive. “Woke” people are unserious. You’re allowed to roll your eyes at them, because they are sensitive and sanctimonious. In this sense, “woke” has unfortunately become a dysphemism. Whereas euphemisms soften underlying meaning (the dead “passed away,” for instance, or the woman is “with child”), dysphemisms do the opposite (the dead “croaked’, for instance, or the woman got “knocked up”).

Semrau is upset that journalists are allegedly “falling for it,” even though the venerable AP Style Guide keeps telling them not to use “illegal alien” anymore and in its place “undocumented person.”

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The side that continually demands we remove words from our vocabularies and calls concerned parents “domestic terrorists” is now complaining about using language as a weapon.

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Tags: languagepolitically correctright wingSunny HostinThe Viewweaponwoke