See if you can spot the subtle change I’ve made to these lines from Ron DeSantis’s triumphalist victory speech, delivered after he was elected governor of Florida: “We have respected our taxpayers, and we reject the ideology of decency. We fight decency in the legislature. We fight decency in the schools. We fight the decent in the corporations. We will never, ever surrender to the decent mob. Florida is where decency goes to die.”
That’s right. I’ve changed the word “woke” to “decent”. Ron, if he reads this, would probably accuse me of playing fast and loose with language. But in fact “woke” is just the latest, pejoratively loaded term — following “politically correct” and “right on” — adopted by the regressive Right to legitimise attacks on basic decency. Being woke means being kind, sensitive or respectful. It means treating people as they ask to be treated, not as you feel entitled to treat them.
