This makes sense when you understand that "the woke" use language to separate the in-group from the out-group. "Folks" is not a new word, but an old one that has been reclaimed by social justice, queer and academic communities. Many other words that have been redefined or repurposed now form a sub-language of English used to distinguish "the woke" from "the non-woke".

This distinction is often unconscious and absorbed through immersion in social justice circles, similar to how luxury beliefs (such as "defund the police," "trans women are women," etc https://nypost.com/2019/08/17/luxury-beliefs-are-the-latest-...) are absorbed.

You have to use that kind of language to signal your belonging to the "elites", and the HR departments that usually write job ads or staff Twitter accounts are full of those type of people. From that it's just propagated everywhere else.

Edit: Congratulation HN on your brilliant policy that prevents me from responding to any of the comments under my post (looks like I got throttled, so editing the post is the only thing I can now do).