Woke as Virtue‑Signaling Religion

Although on a different side of the spectrum, the essay’s claim that liberalism persists more as a spiritual or moral principle than as coherent political philosophy parallels the idea that modern ideological movements function like religious systems (virtue signaling, ritualized belief) — it supplies another example of political movements operating as moral/spiritual grammars.

Bray explicitly deploys Helen Andrews’s claim that ‘wokeness’ is a set of status‑and‑virtue practices tied to ‘feminine’ group dynamics; that maps closely onto the existing idea that contemporary 'woke' norms function primarily as performative virtue‑signaling and identity‑anchored religion‑like practices. The article uses protest videos and status‑signalling anecdotes as evidence, connecting an incident (ICE protest footage, Renee Good aftermath) to the broader claim about cultural mechanics.

The discussion about moralizing group identities and the status functions of 'woke' language connects to the idea that contemporary progressive signaling operates like a religious/status system; Yglesias’s critique implies the same social‑signaling dynamics that the existing note diagnoses as virtue‑signaling and status enforcement.

The article critiques identity‑politics as performative and status‑inflected; that overlaps with the prior idea that 'woke' functions like a signaling religion among elites rather than a purely epistemic or redistributive project.

The existing idea treats modern ideological movements as operating like religions via signaling; the article describes astrology functioning similarly on the right (rituals, moral framing, identity signalling), suggesting the same analytical frame (belief as status signal) applies to this emergent phenomenon.

The piece treats parts of the inclusion movement as a moral‑status program that sometimes overrides empirical constraints; that maps to the idea that certain progressive norms operate like virtue‑signalling religion, producing institutional incentives that can distort professional standards and public policy.

The post treats a set of moralized political commitments (collectivist rhetoric) as ritualized, identity‑marking behavior that can repel attention from material consequences — an analysis that maps onto the existing framing of 'woke' as a status‑performance religion; Dreher adds concrete testimonial and historical connections to that framing.

Woods contests a religious/heretical framing of wokeism; his refutation directly engages the claim captured by the existing idea that woke functions like a religion or virtue‑signalling system. He names conservative actors (Feser, Barron, Lindsay) who use the Gnostic metaphor — the same phenomenon the 'virtue‑signaling religion' idea diagnoses.

Dalrymple and Doyle describe wokeism as a clustered creed that functions like a moral religion—ritualized language, doctrinal certainty, and institutional enforcement—which closely matches the existing idea that 'woke' operates as a religion‑like signaling system; the review even calls universities 'foci of infection' and compares the phenomenon to an epidemic among the educated.

Graham’s core claim — that wokeness is performative priggishness enforcing a shifting moral code — closely parallels the existing entry that treats woke behavior as virtue‑signalling that functions like a religious apparatus; the article supplies a historical mechanism (1980s faculty cohort) that explicates how those religious‑style rituals became institutionalized.

The article describes moral performance and public embrace of equality as a primary reputational test—i.e., judging people by how publicly they adopt the creed—which matches the 'virtue‑signalling/religion' framing that treats Wokeness as a status and ritual system rather than purely propositional politics.

The article emphasizes symmetry of motives and status dynamics between 'woke' and 'anti‑woke' actors — a sociological claim that aligns with the idea that woke functions as a signaling system (religion‑like virtue signalling) and that political behavior is often driven by status economies rather than pure policy disagreement.

The article’s claim that woke functions to sanctify elite status via moral language overlaps the existing idea that woke operates like a religion or costly virtue signaling; Aporia supplies a political‑realist genealogy (Pareto/Burnham) tying that symbolic function to class and administrative control.

The author (via Paul Graham) frames wokeness as ritualized moral enforcement with arcane rules and rule‑memorization rather than principled argument—this parallels the existing framing of 'woke' practices as a religion‑like virtue‑signalling system.

The article makes the same sociological claim captured by this idea: academia’s left‑leaning, virtue‑signalling practices (DEI bureaucracies, politicized hiring/teaching) have produced moral distance and delegitimation that enable political retaliation—Jussim explicitly argues that ideological signalling by academics helped provoke Republican policy responses.

The article frames anti‑stereotype norms as a moral rule set enforced with double standards and ritualized signaling — matching the idea that 'woke' operates like a virtue‑signalling religion that enforces conformity rather than evidence‑based judgment.

Tabarrok’s post challenges the inward‑looking representational model that reduces stories to identity mirrors; that critique connects to the existing idea that contemporary 'woke' practices often function as reputational signaling rituals—both diagnose cultural dynamics where signaling displaces broader narrative or institutional aims.

The essay targets DEI, 'everyone gets a trophy' culture and frames collective rituals as status‑signalling moral performance—this aligns with the existing idea that woke practices often function as virtue‑signalling religion rather than substantive policy, and it shows how that framing is being used to delegitimate those institutions.

The article criticizes identity moralizing as a form of ritualized, non‑evidentiary moral performance (demanding belief on faith), which tracks the existing idea that 'woke' functions like a virtue‑signaling religion and explains why dissent is punished rather than debated.

Yglesias argues that CRT/identity left practices function less as policy or analytic tools and more as ritualized, status‑based signaling that substitutes moral posture for argument — a claim that maps closely to the existing idea that 'woke' operates like a virtue‑signaling religion and persists via reputational incentives.

The article treats land acknowledgments as ritualized virtue signaling that functions politically (concession to activists) rather than as substantive policy — matching the existing framing that 'woke' operates like a signaling religion shaping elite behavior.

The article explicitly locates Burns’s failure in the era of the 'Great Awokening' and argues his liberal, reverent stance now reads as an ‘amorphous sentiment’—a description that maps onto the existing idea that woke functions like a ritualized virtue system that reorganizes cultural authority and shapes which historical claims are admissible.

Sailer treats the social‑constructionist account as an elite intellectual posture with moral performance (denouncing 'racist' Eurocentrism while asserting universalizing claims), which connects to the idea that some contemporary ideological positions function more as status signalling than as neutral scholarship.

TLDR claims that Hanson’s Elephant in the Brain and Trivers’ self‑deception explain woke’s spread and resistance to reason/policy pullbacks.