I’ve been searching through the language used to describe the train wreck of a presidential debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump. These are the two words that leapt out at me: ‘malarkey’ and ‘addled’. One commentator said that both candidates spoke a lot of ‘malarkey’. (Don’t ask me which commentator – I am drowning in post-debate analysis, and the claims and counter-claims are blurring together in my head, like spilled paint that runs together until it turns into a brown sludge. Anyway, one of them used this word.)

‘Malarkey’ means ‘humbug, bunkum, nonsense’. It’s recorded from 1923. Where does it come from? No one is sure, but the Oxford points out there is an Irish surname Mullarkey – and the Irish are famous for having the gift of the gab, the ability to talk ‘blarney’ very persuasively. By the way, ‘blarney’ is the art of flattering talk, and it comes from the name of a village near Cork. The Oxford explains that in the castle there is an inscribed stone in a position difficult to access. The popular saying is that anyone who kisses this ‘Blarney stone’ will ever after have ‘a cajoling tongue and the art of flattery or of telling lies with unblushing effrontery’. Should we be surprised that two professional politicians talked a lot of ‘malarkey’? No, you don’t look very surprised.

Then another commentator said that Joe Biden’s debate was a disaster because he looked and sounded ‘addled’.’This means: ‘muddled; unsound; having lost the ability to think clearly or rationally’. The word is recorded with this meaning from 1599. Earlier (from 1275) ‘addled’ meant a putrid or rotten egg. I suppose the metaphorical extension came from the notion that your head is (roughly) egg shaped, and if the contents of your brain are rotten, you are ‘addled’.

I still get requests to say more about the word ‘woke’ and why it matters. As for what it means – that’s not a puzzle. ‘Woke’ came out of black American slang meaning ‘alert’ or ‘aware of what’s really going on’. It was then adopted by the politically correct wider population with the same meaning. It was used (somewhat arrogantly, if you like) to mean that they (and they alone) were ‘awake’ to what really matters, while the rest of us are just dozing through life, unaware. But why do people still use ‘woke’ to label those who want to change society? I think I have finally worked out the answer. The people who think of themselves as ‘woke’ are the enemies of freedom.

The sort of freedom I am talking about is what Os Guiness calls ‘soul freedom’ (in his book The Global Public Square, IVP Books, 2013). By ‘soul freedom’ he means, ‘freedom of thought, freedom of conscience, and freedom of belief’. Do you think the angry protestors at the pro-Palestinian rallies want the rest of us to have those freedoms? Do the trans-activists want us to have those freedoms? Do those people who push  ‘cancel culture’ to drive people out of the public square really want everyone to have those freedoms? Of course not! The ‘woke’ are people who believe they should have ‘freedom of thought, freedom of conscience, freedom of belief’ – but that you should not. Because they are right, and you are wrong. More importantly, they think you are morally wrong. You are morally inferior to them. Which means that you have no right to freedom of thought, or freedom of conscience, or freedom of belief. Instead, your freedoms should be taken away, and you should be guided by them. That is why this now tired word ‘woke’ still matters.