Army Gen. Mark Milley pushed back on claims from Republicans that the military is “woke” and as a result not prepared to take on modern threats, saying he’s “not even sure what that word truly means.”
“What I see is a military that’s exceptionally strong. It’s powerful; it’s ready. In fact, our readiness rates, the way we measure readiness, is better now than they’ve been in years,” Milley said in a CNN interview Sunday.
Republican politicians and candidates have blasted the Pentagon for so-called woke policies, pointing to efforts to recruit a diverse group of military service members and be inclusive to transgender soldiers.
Those claims have also headlined efforts to reduce military spending.
No one knows what the word woke means. Even people who use it can’t define it. It’s just a boogeyman word for things people don’t like or want, and even they can’t agree on it.
Last December, a Federal judge asked DeSantis’s general counsel to define “woke,” and he did, thusly:
He answered woke is "the belief there are systemic injustices in American society and the need to address them.”
fascinating…
No the problem is that woke does have a meaning, and most people know what that meaning is. The problem is that if republicans actually defined it out loud they’d have to admit what they actually take issue with and what they’re actually fighting, and doing so would basically be admitting that they’re the baddies. It’d be saying the quiet part out loud. By avoiding acknowledging the actual meaning of the word they get to pretend that wokeness is a nebulous Bad Thing that should be fought against.
It still means what it always meant. Being aware of society’s injustices to the poor, downtrodden, or minority population and wanting to do something about it. They can’t fucking stand that.
Being against being “woke” truly reveals who they are. That they just want to sweep it all under a rug and forget about it.
Woke is when I don’t like it.
“Woke is now defined in this dictionary as “aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues (especially issues of racial and social justice),” and identified as U.S. slang. It originated in African American English and gained more widespread use beginning in 2014 as part of the Black Lives Matter movement.”
Based General for not even entertaining the idea of knowing what the W word even means.
It’s too bad all our journalists are sold out to corpos otherwise they should respond to anyone wanting woke with “what is that? Idk what you are talking about please elaborate”.
Not that “based” makes sense here either, but yes, exactly: “woke” means whatever the speaker wants it to mean at the time, like “cromulent”.
Jesus Christ, we all have the goddamn internet:
Dictionary Definitions from Oxford Languages · Learn more woke verb past of wake1.
This isn’t hard!
The first few times I heard “woke” used, it was in the context of people who don’t follow the sheep because they aren’t asleep. Hence, they have woke up.
Yes, and now the sheep are using it as an insult.
Woke is rights for minorities, women, the LGBTQ community, non Christians, and workers.
It a code word for hateful bigots.
Military understands morale is their most valuable asset.
People are extremely motivated to fight to defend their rights and freedoms, and the rights and freedoms of the people they care about.
Can you imagine going through everything it takes to become a high ranking officer to then have to answer to these asshats?
Just look at this guy’s career. 44 years with his nose to the grindstone and boots on the ground just to have chickenhawks scream at you about “wokeness.”
How’s not being woke working out for the slowly imploding Russian military?
You mean the one only staffed by minority serfs and white male convicts?
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Army Gen. Mark Milley pushed back on claims from Republicans that the military is “woke” and as a result not prepared to take on modern threats, saying he’s “not even sure what that word truly means.”
Republican politicians and candidates have blasted the Pentagon for so-called woke policies, pointing to efforts to recruit a diverse group of military service members and be inclusive to transgender soldiers.
Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who announced he will retire at the end of this month, said the U.S. military is actually in better shape now than in years past.
And the thing that we also need to focus on is the modernization for the future character of war that I see fundamentally changing,” Milley said.
Ron DeSantis ® argued that the military is being ordered around by a civilian “political ideology” and is “being infected by the woke mind virus.”
Those criticisms from Republicans have created “a real crisis” of confidence in military institutions, according to defense analysts.
The original article contains 393 words, the summary contains 169 words. Saved 57%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
How can a military be “woke”? They literally tour the world killing brown poor people.
The word has no meaning any more, and likely never did.
Authoritarianism requires the support of the military and a military that’s full of LGBT people won’t support authoritarians that wants to execute LGBT people.
It’s got nothing to do with the actual quality of readiness of the military. It’s theatrics to let minorities know they’re not welcome, using the currently fashionable trigger word.
Most accurate headline ever, on both counts 😂
Look, his job is to project strength.
The US military is holding officers a year after their contracts expire. It’s calling expired contracts begging them to reenlist. It’s calling in national guard members to active duty. It’s weaker than it’s been in years.
Does that have to do with woke stuff? I don’t know. But if he’s saying its stronger and more ready than its been in years he’s lying. The US military is a fucking jobs program.
Recruitment is low, but a large reason for that is their standards are kind of high relative to our youth. Less than 1 in 4 aged 17-24 are expected to be able to qualify.
Visible tattoos? Sorry. ADHD medication in the past six months? Need a waiver. Test positive for weed? Sorry. Not many can even pass the fitness tests anymore.
That being said, recruitment isn’t the only measure for a strong military. You could very well be correct in your conclusion, but I wouldn’t base it solely on that.
If he doesn’t know what it means, how does he know the military isn’t it?
Definition of woke please.
Well, it depends on the definition of what “it” is.
Look, Faith no More defined “it” back in 89 with their song Epic.
I used to be with ‘it’, but then they changed what ‘it’ was. Now what I’m with isn’t ‘it’ anymore and what’s ‘it’ seems weird and scary. It’ll happen to you!
