It was a gray morning when I checked the results. I didn’t know how to feel. Sad? Angry?Devastated? Ashamed for being optimistic? Fearful? Nothing. I was so numb. That day I felt as if the anvil that had been sitting precariously on my shoulders for the past year had finally released its full weight, and I was slowly being suffocated.
Where did we go from here?
What was I supposed to say to my sisters – "It’s ok," "No one will notice the brown tint of your skin," "No one will say things about your hijab?"
What do I say to the immigrant who came here to make a new life, the survivor of sexual assault whose attacker is now seemingly validated, the Muslim woman rethinking stepping out of her home with her hijab on, the people of color who’ve been born here and are still told to leave their own nation, the members of the LGBTQ+ community whose rights as human beings hang suspended in the air, the minority groups around the country whose spirits have been so crushed by the election of Donald Trump as President of the United States?
Days after November 9th, 2016, I come to you all and say this: Give yourself time to grieve. Do not let anyone tell you that your fear, that your devastation, that your anger is invalid.
However, do not let yourself drown in it.
Please, I beg that you never allow those feelings to push you away from being part of this social revolution. His election has revealed an invisible ugliness of the national psyche, that we must cleanse with equality, justice and love. It cannot erase the approximately 1.8 million lead that Hillary Clinton has from the people. The PEOPLE. We the People.
His supporters cannot undermine your identity as a human, as a citizen of the United States of America: The Land of Opportunity, The Melting Pot, The Home of the Brave and of the Free.
This election doesn’t change what we fight for, it just pushes us to be louder about what we fight for. Black Lives will always matter. It’s her body, so it’s her goddamn choice. Love will forever trump hate. You can be undocumented and remain unafraid. I will look in the mirror and put on my hijab and carry my religion on my shoulders like a torch.
We are the Kamala Harrises, the Ilhan Omars, the Mazie Hironos, the Tammy Duckworths, the Catherine Cortez Mastos, the Michelle Obamas of the future and then some. We are the huddled masses yearning to breathe free and, by God, we will breathe free. We will organize, and protest and hope that our futures will be shaped by the sacrifices of today and the generations we influence tomorrow. We will remain steadfast my friends, and we will remain unwavering and unrelenting in our quest for justice and love and acceptance. We will hold each other by the hand and yell to all that will hear us until our throats are sore, our fingers are cold, our tears dry up that –
HE IS NOT OUR PRESIDENT.
Then we will forge a golden future with the natural rights bestowed upon us by God – of the people, by the people, and for the people.
