You say we already have equal pay for all, but I don't know if you understand what equality really means.
Equality is getting paid for all the work I did at the same rate as someone who worked next to me for the same amount of time, but gets paid more by nickels and dimes because of something I didn't choose to be.
Equality is when minorities who work day and night get jobs they deserve instead of getting set aside because of melanin in their skin; it is not when women darker than me get their wages cut even more because employing a woman of color is a chore.
Equality is not those with disabilities daily fighting a harder fight than you could ever believe against powers that be because no one gives them their credit or dignity.
Equality is not a wage gap, and it isn't the stair-stepping trap that those in power continue to enact.
You huffed when we marched for our identity, but I don't think you comprehend what being told to do no matter what you intend is like.
Identity is not getting told birth control is only for sluts when in fact it's actually for women whose bodies fight back and tear at their guts.
Identity is not telling us that male politicians should decide on what can be done to and given to women instead of licensed clinicians.
Identity is not little girls hearing that their bodies are too scandalous to behold, that it's their own fault andnot the fault of whoever noticed and told.
You laugh when we cry out that this is the land of the free, but I don't think you know what your presence on the ground of the U.S. means.
Free is the fact that the only people who can say their family didn't immigrate to whatever state you live in are living on reserves.
Free is seeing that we are a country of people who come from runaways but found our place in a nation with welcome on their foreheads.
Free is remembering that some of the best men and women in our history would never have been there if immigration weren't a thing.
You scoff when we cry for an end to the unnecessary, but I don't think you see what that really comes to be.
Unnecessary is having to remember the faces of little kids who died because of what someone with the mindset and the option did.
Unnecessary is being able to buy a gun that shoots faster than I can count as easy as I can adopt a dog, and it might cost the same amount.
Unnecessary is having cabinets stocked full of guns and ammunition where children play, and children can gain admission.
You roll your eyes when someone asks to be taken seriously, but I don't think you know what it means to face injustice.
Equal pay is not a demand for an unjustified raise. It is the call that wages should be blind to color, gender or anything but what kind of work was done on paid time.
Gender equality is not the hateful scream of feminists and hatred of man-kind. It is the cry from mothers and daughters saying that my body is mine and only my doctor and I should define the terms and conditions of what is to go on inside.
Gun control is not burning every gun until there will never be another one. It is making it harder to purchase them, and limiting some, so that people can't harm others in bullets per second of any kind.
This is not whining and liberalism. This is our concern for the future, ours and our children's.
I don't think you know what this concern is, but you haven't been a victim of one of the nightmares we still fight even if it seems like no one with influence cares.
This is trying to find the path to a better, brighter us. This is trying to expose and dispose of the atrocities we face today so no one else will have to sacrifice parts of themselves or deal with this fuss.
