The twilight of the “Great Awokening”

Sometime in the late 2000s or early 2010s, an ambient mood set in among many American elites that commenters would later call the “Great Awokening.” Like its name that parodied the great religious revivals, the Great Awokening was fervent, evangelistic, and preachy. And one of its chief doctrines was the unconditional election of progressive Democrats by ethnic minorities. Black and brown skin meant intersectionality, and intersectionality meant socially and economically left policy. The proper response from decent-minded white people, according to this mindset, was to shut up, listen, and understand that one can either be pro-minority or pro-Republican but not both.

Donald Trump’s electoral landslide on Nov. 5 will be studied for years to come, but some conclusions don’t need to wait that long. The election was as clearly and as forcefully a rejection of racial identity politics as anything Americans have seen in the past decade.

Trump’s domination of swing states—a victory so comprehensive that few supporters even predicted it—was made possible by large increases in support from black and Latino voters. The BBC estimates that Trump’s Latino vote increased by a staggering 14% nationally, while black voters supported him at about 13%—a significant bump from the 8% who voted for him in 2016. Journalist Ryan Girdusky supplied one of election night’s most stunning facts on X, noting that Trump won Starr County, Texas, which has a population that is 97% Hispanic, by 16 points. Girdusky added that it was the first time the county was carried by a Republican presidential candidate since 1892.

Well, that wasn’t supposed to happen.

Democrats and progressives will spend much time now in post-mortems, once again trying to understand What Happened. But some of this energy will be unnecessary. Those who weren’t born again in the Great Awokening know what happened: Identity politics told a lie. Intersectional theory, that great seller of books and corporate Zoom sessions, made promises it didn’t and couldn’t keep.

Whether Donald Trump has ever said racially offensive things is one question (and I think he has). But whether black and Latino voters have any material interests beyond racial rhetoric is another. The Great Awokening’s identity politics have left progressives unprepared for electoral reality, not because ethnic minorities are indifferent toward race, but because they also care about other things.

At the heart of the progressive failure is a myopic obsession with difference and a blindness toward sameness. Indeed, black, white, Latino, Asian, Jewish, and other voters care about racially inflected issues. But gas and grocery prices, housing scarcity, unchecked immigration, ideological public schools, and the disintegration of family life are not “white” concerns. They are American concerns.

Nor is “racial minority” a code word for “socially leftist.” Intersectional theory has bound progressives to a mirage of a package deal, where they assume voters who care about race and criminal justice also want to see minors given gender transition services without parental consent. This isn’t just unwarranted; it’s actually backward. Minority communities tend to be significantly more conservative on this issue than white voters.

As smoothly as the Great Awokening spirit might go down in left-wing media outlets and Ivy League classrooms, it alienates many ordinary, working-class people. And there is a limit to how many times a political ideology can ask for support from people who aren’t allowed to ask questions back. As Douglas Murray wrote of the gender revolution in his book The Madness of Crowds, “All the rage—including the wild, destructive misandry, the double-think, and the self-delusion—stem from this fact: that we are being not just asked, but expected, to radically alter our lives and societies on the basis of claims that our instincts all tell us cannot possibly be true.”

People with nonwhite skin do not leave their consciences or their concerns at the door when they go to vote. This is a lesson the Democratic Party has learned the hard way. But it’s a lesson that Christians should take to heart, as well. There have been times in evangelical life when the progressive myopia has found its way into Christian media and leadership. There have been times when preachers and teachers have spoken as if nonwhite Christians need to be protected from conservative theology. But this is a dead end. It’s not just incorrect, it’s ineffective. Reality always wins in the end.

The Great Awokening may not be finished. Like all religious revivals, it will be diffuse and resilient. But revivals that aren’t rooted in truth tend to peter out, leaving churchgoers wondering if brunch would be a better option. If the results of Nov. 5 are any indication, the revival is winding down. The only question now is, what will take its place?