CNN —

As the National Book Awards came to a close on Wednesday, finalists for the prestigious literary prizes took the stage in New York to speak about the Israel-Hamas war, with others at the ceremony also choosing to address banned books.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    How sad that it’s come to this. On the other hand, maybe if Mr. Rogers was still around, we’d have someone to talk to Republicans about kindness.

    • Omega@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Republicans have tried demonizing him as woke trying to indoctrinate our children. So unfortunately unlikely.

        • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Fred Rogers is the guy this particular thread of the post is referring to. He would have made an interesting casting choice for Kunta Kinte.

          • Algaroth@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Though it could be argued Mr. Rogers was woke. That would, however, make it hard to argue woke is a bad thing.

            • Lem Jukes@lemm.ee
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              1 year ago

              that’s because “wokeism” has become a right wing dogwhistle for basically ‘anything that forces us to confront our shitty and outdated ideas’.

              • Algaroth@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                They did the same thing with “social justice” before that and “political correctness” before that. Words don’t mean the same thing to conservatives.

            • Omega@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Whether woke is good or bad depends entirely on how it’s defined. I generally see it as an antithesis to ignorance. So a combination of both educated and rational thinking.

              Sometimes it describes things that are educated and irrational thinking, which is ironically what the right does a lot. Basically fear mongering.

              Then you just use the two interchangeably to make it sound like rational observations are radical.

              • Algaroth@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                Well, your first definition is the original one. The second one is the disingenuous one conservatives use. They did the same thing with “social justice” and “political correctness”. Conservatives never come up with anything or good, they just ruin shit.

                • Omega@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Oh I know. But even then they’re intentionally inconsistent so the good and bad gets mixed in together.

                  • Algaroth@lemmy.world
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                    1 year ago

                    “some people suck”. That is the unfortunate truth of any society. But all my examples started as good things. Shitty people stirred shit into them. It has to be said that people who actively fight progressive movements are assholes. Any history book can tell you that, if they don’t burn it first.