Because Of Woke

About

Because Of Woke is an ironic catchphrase that was popularized on Twitter / X in the early 2020s. After a resurgence of interest in the term "woke," jokes about wokeness causing various aspects of cultural decline began making the rounds online. This joking sentiment is sometimes expressed using the grammatically incorrect addendum, "because of woke."

Origin

On August 27th, 2022, X^[1] user @_pem_pem posted the earliest known post using the phrase "because of woke," writing, "u couldn’t make breaking bad these days. because of woke. the meth would have to be gay." The post gathered over 2,000 likes in two years (seen below).

Spread

In late 2023, some X users made jokes about things one does not see as often today, or practices that have gone out of style, blaming their loss on "woke." October 4th, 2023, X^[4] user @Joseph_O_Earp wrote, "You don’t see skeletons playing their ribs like xylophones much these days. Because of woke," gathering over 23,000 likes in six months (seen below, top).

On November 2nd, X^[5] user @Brainmage made a post that read, "Used to be a mouse could eat an entire block of cheese and his body would become perfectly triangular with two ears and a nose sticking out. Can't any more, because of woke." The post gathered over 26,000 likes in six months (seen below, bottom).

The phrase saw a resurgence in 2024, as seen in a post by X^[2] user @JamieJenkinz20 about an elephant in a pub that read, "don’t see this anymore. because of woke." The post gathered over 75,000 likes since it was posted on February 26th, 2024 (seen below, left).

On April 4th, X^[3] user @ellawebs posted an image from an airport, writing, "Ummm Theyre saying U can’t have swag anymore (because of woke)." The post gathered over 29,000 likes in a month (seen below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

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External References