When I was in the sixth grade, I started paying attention to the 2008 election between Barack Obama and John McCain. And everyday, I would walk to school and talk about it with my friend. I was and still am liberal and a Democrat, and she grew up conservative and Republican. However, we still managed to debate politics on the way to school because there was mutual respect between us, a respect reflected in the election's candidates.
Respect.
When you have respect for someone, you listen to them. Give what they have to say a chance to be said. Try to understand something you don't agree with.
Trump doesn't listen, give people a chance, or try to understand. Trump lacks respect.
Trump says he respect women.
That can't possibly be. That contradicts so many things that he has said.
Trump has called the winner of the Miss Universe pageant Alicia Machado a "fat pig". Now Alicia Machado is not, and never has been, a pig. She is, in fact, a human being, a fact that Trump may have overlooked in all the time his head has been shoved up his ass.
Recently, Trump made some private comments about women that have gone extremely public. Does the fact he said this in the privacy of a television show bus mean it's okay? No. No, it does not. If he said these things in the privacy of his own home, it would not be okay. It wouldn't be okay in a locker room, either. Trump's words are not "boy talk", they're the words of someone who thinks about or has sexually assaulted someone. My university defines sexual assault as physical sexual activity is engaged without the consent of the other person or when the other person is unable to consent to the activity. Trump's exact words are "Just kiss. I don't even wait. And when you're a star they let you do it. You can do anything ... Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything." When you kiss without waiting or grab another person's genitalia, that's sexual assault.
A lot of Republican politicians are now saying that this is too much, that because of they're daughters and wives, that Trump has now said too much. I'm offended. Not only as a woman but as a person. No human being should be okay with the sexual assault of another human being. You shouldn't have to have a female relative to feel offended and denounce Trump.
Now I'm not mad that Trump didn't already understand everything about abortions. I'm mad that he heard it was an issue, and then didn't find it important enough to do research. Not even a briefing on the special circumstances that usually surround late-term abortion.
A late-term abortion usually happens about half way through a pregnancy, after about 20 or 21 weeks. Birth is usually what happens at almost nine months of pregnancy. Whether its by contractions or surgical removal, most of us were born by being ripped from the womb. I'm sure most mothers wouldn't say that it was a gentle shake that got that baby out, and surely even Trump was ripped from the womb, natural or not.
Besides the fact that Trump doesn't understand how people are made, criminalizing late-term abortions is a bad idea. Only one percent of abortions are done after 20 weeks and usually for unimaginable reasons. If continuing the pregnancy would endanger the mother's life. Or if the baby is determined to have a health condition that makes living impossible. Sometimes mother's have to make heart-wrenching decisions, decisions that should be no one's but the mothers.
Another thing that happened recently was the Twitter hashtag, #RepealThe19th. Now this might be one of the most offensive and sexist things to come out of this election. Repealing the 19th Amendment, because without women voting Trump would win. That should tell you a lot about who Trump appeals to. Trump appeals to people who are okay going back to before the 20s. Before women's suffrage. Before the Civil Rights Movement. Before America was accepting enough to support a Black man for president and a woman as a major party candidate.
And even worse, Trump doesn't seem to understand how important peaceful transitions of power are in America. How lucky we are that we don't have parties literally fighting for power. He even said in a recent rally that he would accept the results of the election--if he wins. As an unpredictable candidate, who knows how Trump will react when he loses.
Let me clarify something. I do respect opinions contrary to my own. But when someone's opinion denies me the right of sovereignty over my own body, my fundamental right to vote in a country where I have citizenship, rights I have as a US citizen and human being, that's when opinions become dangerous. It's no longer two divergent policies with a common goal, disagreement over legislature. It's a fundamentally opposing view to my tenets that women matter just as much as men because we are all human beings. I shouldn't have my rights as a person threatened because of one bigoted, racist person.
Words are important. Words can rally people behind a cause. Words can hurt people. Words can even marry people, convince juries, or teach something completely new.
Trump's words are all over the news, being heard by everyone, including children. Impressionable children who will grow up in a society determined by who is elected in two weeks. Young men might grow up thinking that what Trump says is how they should act, and young women might grow up believing that they have no right to their own bodies or voices.
I will not support a candidate for the highest position in our nation who believes that he can assault women, doesn't care enough about half the population to do a little research, and the disenfranchisement of citizens. Trump makes this election different because I have never feared for my future. Never before have I thought that one outcome of an election could mean the end of America as the free nation for all people (or at least a nation that's becoming freer for more people).
