As a first year student at Mount Holyoke College and a first time voter, the prospect of electing Hillary Clinton the first female President of the United States was moving. Despite the fact that I had already sent in my absentee ballot weeks before, I woke up on the morning of the election full of excitement, wearing white in honor of the suffragettes. I walked to my first class with my neighbor, an international student from Malaysia, who shared with me that she was anxious about what the election would mean for her.
We talked about a recent email sent out by our Dean of Students promoting a campus-wide watch party, an election free zone to hang out in during the day, and the availability of extra counseling services the day after the election. I laughed at the idea of counseling, certain (like many forecasters) that Clinton would win. That's when my professor informed me that international students were worried about not being able to study in the States should Trump be elected. I laughed it off then but now I am grieving.
I am fortunate to attend a liberal, historically women's college after being raised by Democratic parents in a very red part of a blue state. I spent my high school years afraid to speak my mind about my political views and driving by houses with Confederate flags. I felt uncomfortable talking to people about the modernity of my extended family for fear of judgment, even though I've been interested in politics and social justice issues for years.
Obama's election eight years ago inspired a love of politics and policy in me. As a fifth grader, staying up until 11:00 to hear the results was a big deal, and my excitement was hard to contain. My high school friends still remember me jumping up and down at the school's screening of his first inauguration. I am now a prospective International Relations and Journalism double major, shocked and horrified by the current state of affairs and how they will affect the future.
Clinton provoked a sense of excitement similar to Obama among my peers and me for her campaign. We proudly bought her t-shirts and continue to display her stickers on our laptops and water bottles and her campaign posters on the doors to our dorm rooms. We took day trips to watch her speak and spent afternoons call banking on her behalf. We loved the idea of electing the first female U.S. president, an alum of fellow Seven Sister Wellesley College, while attending the first women's college founded in the U.S. (on our own Founder's Day, no less!).
My World Politics professor told my class the day before the election to "not take the results of the election personally." I am still having trouble with this. I am aware of all the students around me who genuinely fear for their livelihood and wellbeing, and I fear for them.
As someone who has struggled with anxiety and depression, I find the election results terrifying and full of hopelessness. I am fortunate enough to identify as a white, straight, cis young woman, and yet I am still afraid. There is a heaviness almost like death on my campus. I have not experienced this level of despair, disappointment, sadness or fear since I unexpectedly lost a close friend at the age 14 in a house explosion.
I am not necessarily upset about the fact that a Republican won the presidency. I am concerned that Trump is now able to do so many of the things he promised in his campaign due to the overwhelming Republican majority in Congress. Trump appealed to voters because of his fear of those he deemed "other," which is now reason for the fear he has created in individuals he outed around the nation. Never before has the word "great" elicited such anxiety.
I started election night off studying for an exam before getting distracted and obsessively checking online forecasts and polling stations. By that point, I was still hugely optimistic, keeping in mind all of the polls that had been reported on over the past few months and all the people I knew who had voted for Hillary. I then joined fellow students at a campus wide watch party, feeling sick to my stomach while watching the results. I don't think I've ever sworn as much as I did that night. This is not the America I recognize or stand for.
Never before have I felt victimized by a man. On election night I felt afraid while walking back to my dorm at 2:00 am, too emotionally exhausted to have Trump's presidency confirmed before succumbing to sleep. The news was not easy to wake up to, and I now fear for my access to health care, reproduction rights, and my chances at equal pay upon graduating from college in four years.
I walked into my 8:35 am class five minutes late the morning after the election to a silent room. My usually calm, upbeat and well dressed professor stood crying in the front of the lecture hall wearing a t-shirt that said "LOVE," looking just as pained and disheveled as the rest of us. She shared with us that she had never before felt like her government wasn't looking out for her best interest.
In the wake of the results, I am moved by the community I am a part of at Mount Holyoke. I have bared witness to lots of hugs and tears and shouts since the results came in. According to a staff member, the atmosphere on my campus is similar to how it was in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. We are protesting and mobilizing in an effort to preserve all of the rights we have tried so hard to gain.
One of my professors told us not to despair or let the results take away our laughter. We must act like citizens and respect the office of president, but this does not mean that we have to respect the president himself. Our generation has proved itself to be quite liberal. Now is the time to work even harder despite the forthcoming setbacks in the hopes of a brighter future. We voted in six historic "firsts" for women to Congress this time around. We cannot despair.
Nasty women (and men) don't quit. Here's to tomorrow and not giving up. We truly are stronger together.
