Wokeness seems to be taking over the Western world. Everywhere you look, from Disney to Budweiser, liberals are in competition about who can say and do the most deranged progressive things. Fully-grown adults subscribe to obvious nonsense and the left shamelessly pushes fake truths in the public square.
How did we get to this point? On paper, the West is the richest and most successful it has ever been. Where is this bonkers woke influence coming from? Why are so many people, especially younger folk, lurching towards liberal nonsense, which some call the ‘woke mind virus’?
The answer might be simpler than we think.
An underrated factor in the woke tsunami sweeping through today’s youth is their change in diet. Because they are all desperate to be seen doing their bit to save the planet, they love green virtue-signaling. That means they go vegan – more than 19 million Americans are on a “plant-based diet” – and, crucially, avoid eating meat or drinking milk. They look down on the rest of us who dare to eat a steak or make a coffee with dairy creamer as nature-killing bigots.
That means they must find product substitutes for meat and milk in their diets. These substitutes generally taste terrible – such is the sacrifice of a young liberal. Instead of meat, they often eat synthetic patties made of various questionable chemicals. And instead of milk, they drink all kinds of other things which often hurt the planet even more than cows – and don’t make a nice coffee.
One ingredient crops up several times in the diet of a woke young vegan: soy.
Soy is used to make fake steaks and is a primary ingredient in other meat substitutes like tofu and tempeh. It is also one of the most popular milk substitutes. That means the young vegans also eat soy cheese, butter, cream, and so on. These days, you can even buy soy nuts to eat out of a bag. The woke generation relies on soy for almost everything. It is their sustenance.
Soy is significant because the science around it is profoundly worrying. It is favored by the left, but some research suggests it might have unintended health consequences.
You might have heard the term ‘soy boy.’ It refers to this type of person – the young, green virtue-signaler – who carries unusual characteristics, such as inflated femininity, which some allege is down to low testosterone levels.
The science suggests soy might have something to do with that. Soybeans contain a chemical called phytoestrogen isoflavone, which has led some to claim that soy products are feminizing men who consume them in real time – and lowering their sperm count in the process. You are what you eat, after all.
Could this be the explanation for the woke mind virus? Could this be why an entire generation seems to have gone politically nuts?
The red flags around soy are plentiful. China, a country famed for its attempts to control its population’s behavior through authoritarian policies like social credit systems, consumes more soybean oil than any other country. They got through a whopping 17.8 million metric tons in 2022 alone. Second place goes to the United States, where 11.6 million metric tons are consumed per year.
All this soy is not good for the environment either, which is ironic given how much ‘soy boys’ love to virtue-signal about how green they are. Soy production fuels deforestation at a terrifying pace, particularly in the Amazon rainforest, which destroys biodiversity. It emits greenhouse gasses, causes water shortages and soil erosion, uses pesticides and fertilizers which the woke profess to hate, and produces waste which pollutes the surrounding environment.
All those miserable meat- and dairy-free meals – and their possible health consequences – were for nothing if they didn’t even help save the planet.
Steer clear of both soy and ‘soy boys’ and perhaps the woke mind virus will abate. But for as long as today’s youth continue their obsession with green virtue-signaling and soy-based food substitutes, they will continue down this slippery slope of woke madness.
Jason Reed is a writer on politics, policy, and culture for a wide range of outlets on both sides of the Atlantic. He tweets @JasonReed624.
