If you are in favor of being kind whenever kindness is a viable option, you are already well on your way to being a world-class wokester, and you should feel good about that!
People don’t hate wokeness so much as they hate being told by someone else that they personally are not woke (enough) and are therefore the cause of the problem. No one likes being told they are the bad guys, especially when they feel like in their own way they are already trying (or even struggling) to be the good guys taking care of the people they feel personally responsible for.
There is a line of research indicating that most of us behave as what is known as “homo recipricans.” We aren’t automatically selfish or selfless, but we do either consciously or unconsciously constantly assess how others are treating us. We do unto others as they have done unto us in the past or as we imagine they will do unto us in the future.
Unfortunately, many of us also feel like we are constantly caught in the vice of needing to balance the imperative of taking action to care and provide for ourselves (and those we feel responsible for) versus the ideal of taking actions to enable everyone (or at least more people) to take care of themselves and those they feel responsible for).
That said, the vice that pits self-interest against the interest of others is often an illusion. There is plenty of evidence that there are times when we can do both. Taking care of people beyond the narrow circle of those we feel personally responsible for is often in our “enlightened” self-interest.
That may be why the Almighty (or evolution) has endowed us with that annoying thing known as a “conscience” and a chemical rewards system that makes us feel good when we do something nice for someone else instead of for ourselves…
All wokeness is really about is embracing that natural instinct to be kind whenever it is a viable option to be kind. At its root, wokeness is mostly about slowing down long enough to consider how what you are about to do or say might impact someone else – including someone you don’t know much about or have never met personally. Since we are all human and therefore working with an imperfect, incomplete perspective, even when we have good intentions toward others, we sometimes get it wrong and do unintentional harm.
So, as it says at the top…
If you are in favor of being kind whenever kindness is a viable option, you are already well on your way to being a world-class wokester, and you should feel good about that:)
Homo recipricans is open to a more cooperative future. Can homo communicus lead us to one?
© Dana Cogan, 2025, all rights reserved.