Donald Trump & The Mean Reds (not a ska band, I wish)

It's been one week post-election, and man I'm still feeling so. blue. More than blue, I'm feeling what Holly Golighly in Breakfast at Tiffany's calls the "mean reds." She explains, "the blues are because you're getting fat and maybe it's been raining too long, you're just sad that's all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you're afraid and you don't know what you're afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling?" That's precisely how I've been feeling these past 7 days, with the only difference being that I know exactly what I'm afraid of. 
  • I'm afraid that the Marriage Equality Act is going to be repealed, taking away what I consider a basic human right for gay Americans and a lot of my closest friends. 
  • I'm afraid that Donald Trump is going to deport or incarcerate 3 million illegal immigrants, including children, (as he has promised) thus ripping apart families and ruining the lives of some of America's hardest workers and some of my best ESL students.
  • I'm afraid of the consequences of losing women's health programs such as Planned Parenthood (Did you know 97% of services are mammograms and preventative health??).
But most of all, I'm afraid to be living in a country so filled with fear and hate, racism and sexism, and with a leader who won because of that. I have friends and coworkers and family members who voted for Donald Trump (maybe you did too), and I don't think that they are all racist and sexist and full of hate, but I do think there is something seriously fucked up about the fact that they voted for someone who is. 

I am a heterosexual, educated, middle-class white woman, so the truth of the matter is, no matter how afraid I feel right now it pales in comparison to my brothers and sisters of different races, religions, and sexual orientations. And what's even more upsetting is that the fear I have felt for the past week isn't new to those who this administration is going to hurt the most. My fear just started but theirs just got worse. That is what it means to feel the "mean reds."


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