I woke up this morning with a lot of hope for the day. My alarm went off at eight a.m., and I got myself ready for camp counselor orientation. Then I checked Facebook. At the time, only 20 people had been declared dead and 42 injured in the shooting at the popular Orlando club Pulse. I felt several emotions at once: shock, horror, fear, and sickness. Just last year, I spent five months working in Orlando, and often heard about Pulse. It's a popular club in the LGBTQA community and is usually frequented by Disney and Universal cast members alike. It's supposed to be a place where people can let loose, have fun, and be themselves. Now it stands as a symbol of the deadliest mass shooting in the United States of America.
As I sat there staring at my phone screen trying to figure out as many details as possible, one thought raced through my head: are my friends okay? Even though I don't live in Florida anymore, I still know many people who decided to stay after their Disney College Programs ended, and I know that several of them frequent the clubs in Orlando pretty often. Being eight in the morning on a Sunday, not many people were on Facebook, so there was no way of me knowing if anyone I know was involved in the attack. I had to leave, but for the entire drive to my camp, the images from outside the club were still in my mind. Every time I blinked, I saw the rising death total.
I spent the next few hours looking at my phone as much as possible to see if anyone posted an update on their safety. I never thought that I would see people from my friends list, people who I got to know while living in Florida, checking in with the "I'm safe" button on Facebook. As of four p.m. on Sunday June 12th, I am still unsure of the well-being of several people. But this isn't about me or my worries, this is about the victims, their families, and those who will be forever effected by this.
Right now, the exact motivations for this attack are unknown, but what I do know is that over 100 innocent people are either dead or injured. People are lining up around several blocks to donate blood. People are reaching out to one another to ensure that they are okay physically and emotionally. The motive of this attack is important to understanding why it happened, but the fact of the matter is that over 100 human beings are either dead or injured. I don't care what race or religion you are, you need to care about these people. I don't care if you "disagree with that lifestyle." Those are human beings who have hopes and aspirations that do not deserve to die because people disagree with who they are as people. As far as I know, my friends are okay physically, but they do not deserve to live their lives in fear that they'll be killed by someone who hates everything they stand for. My friends deserve to live peaceful lives, loving who they love; they deserve to go out to a club to have a good time and have no problems besides their drink being a little too weak and the music being too loud. They are human beings who deserve respect. The people in that club did not deserve to have their lives ended early for any reason.
In the coming weeks, this will be a highly politicized issue, but in the midst of these arguments, I hope that we can all agree on one thing: these people did not deserve this. We can create change, we can do something to make sure this doesn't happen again. We can love our neighbor for who they are, for better or for worse, because they are human beings and they do not deserve to be gunned down in a nightclub...or a school...or a movie theater...or a mall...or a concert...We can take the neccesary precautions for the greater good, because we're all human beings with hopes and dreams and aspirations, and we deserve the right to feel safe above all else. In the coming days, I really hope we're able to come together to mourn, and then do whatever we can to end this violence.
