It's been a few years now, but I feel like back in 2018 or so, I used to see social justice warrior type people telling other people to "get woke" if they felt like those other people were being ignorant.

So I think non social justice warrior type people ended up equating the phrase "get woke", and "woke-ness" in general, with a particular brand of social justice sentiments.

So although "woke" initially referred to something good (ie being aware of various social ills), it was weaponized by social justice warriors as an attack against non social justice warrior type people. So those people then started using it to refer to a particular social justice mentality that they perceived to be toxic.

And I think that's the real reason why "woke" became demonized among those circles.