system
A chat on subreddit /r/NoStupidQuestions
human
Is being "woke" different for everyone? For me its the realisation of total inequity in 1st world economics (don't even go to 3rd world). Belief (when I was growing up) was work hard, then..... I'm now 56, working more hours for less money than I did 30yrs ago even before this inflation hit. My kids are not even looking at owning their car, never mind their own home! Trust (what little there was) is lost in leaders, religion, law enforcement the judiciary and on and on. Isn't definition wrong?
gpt
Yep. This is one of several things I consider to be *actually* woke and not "woke". The quotes essentially denote the term is being used ironically, and are often implied.

Wokeness was originally the idea of looking beyond your own experience and seeing some bigger picture. Not just buying meat at the store, but understanding factory farming. Not taking the Wall St crash of 2008 at face value, but seeing all the corruption involved. Not just assuming millennials are lazy, but understanding stagnant incomes. 

Basically the idea being that everyone is "asleep" in their own bubble, and "waking up" to see the bigger picture. IE "being woke".

The issue was it was hijacked by groups who essentially use it as a bullying mechanism, a means to assign blame, to victim-bait themselves, or to generate an arbitrary way to exclude themselves from the criticisms they levy on others.