I'm not entirely sure what emotion is taking over right now. The result of the US Election has affected me in ways I couldn't have possibly envisioned - because as much as I know it's not my home - I feel physically sick inside when I read stories of women having their hijabs ripped from them, when people are assaulted for going on dates with their significant other, when black men and women are profiled by a community who suddenly feel it's okay to become verbally abusive, to physically attack people, to intimidate them because it's all in the name of 'Making America Great White Again'. I wake up in the morning and I'm just low - and I shouldn't be because I just finished my second year of uni and will be spending my summer doing a social entrepreneurship course before doing my first internship at a major business firm. I was excited just two months ago, because my life was finally moving in a direction I was okay with. This year has been the opposite for me than the world and I was still keeping myself in check - but nothing has really affected me quite as much as this result. It's forced me to reevaluate my identity - to figure out where I fit on this spectrum of hatred vs. mild disrespect.
And you know what? I know it's selfish. I know there is worse in the world - that there are people who are suffering far more than me - but this election has been a brutal reminder that maybe we haven't come as far as thought. I think I've struggled in the past with internalising others' hate and targeting myself. My confidence (or lack of) comes from my personality but it's because I've always taken things personally and every single horrific story is basically a sledgehammer through the wall of confidence I've been building, brick by brick. I was a work in progress, someone who wasn't fully confident or sure of herself but who was getting there - even if every few bricks built came with a couple of tumbles - but now I feel like rubble. I can't imagine how it would be to experience the US firsthand right now, because secondhand experiences have shattered so much of me.
So you know what, Trump supporters? Fuck your insistence that it's just liberals getting out of hand because they didn't get the result. For 18 months, so many communities were told they weren't enough, that they didn't belong, that they were second class. So many were told that they couldn't be any gender unless they were assigned it at birth, others were told they didn't have valid reasons for abortion. It's a wonder the protests are peaceful - that they're trying to prove your bullshit wrong without hate tactics. Fuck your bigotry, your racism, the insistence that you're 'not that bad' when you're not doing your best to understand or care about the people you share the world with.
And you know what? I know it's selfish. I know there is worse in the world - that there are people who are suffering far more than me - but this election has been a brutal reminder that maybe we haven't come as far as thought. I think I've struggled in the past with internalising others' hate and targeting myself. My confidence (or lack of) comes from my personality but it's because I've always taken things personally and every single horrific story is basically a sledgehammer through the wall of confidence I've been building, brick by brick. I was a work in progress, someone who wasn't fully confident or sure of herself but who was getting there - even if every few bricks built came with a couple of tumbles - but now I feel like rubble. I can't imagine how it would be to experience the US firsthand right now, because secondhand experiences have shattered so much of me.
So you know what, Trump supporters? Fuck your insistence that it's just liberals getting out of hand because they didn't get the result. For 18 months, so many communities were told they weren't enough, that they didn't belong, that they were second class. So many were told that they couldn't be any gender unless they were assigned it at birth, others were told they didn't have valid reasons for abortion. It's a wonder the protests are peaceful - that they're trying to prove your bullshit wrong without hate tactics. Fuck your bigotry, your racism, the insistence that you're 'not that bad' when you're not doing your best to understand or care about the people you share the world with.
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