November 8^th, what a day. A day for grief. For fear. For some, happiness. What Trump's presidency means to me is fear. As a person of color, I simply fear my life, even more so than I did before. Being black is not easy, and it especially won’t be an easier now. Trump is going to do all he can to get people of color out of the United States.

This means I fear every move he makes because that move might be towards me. I am afraid of racists in my city, my county, my area. I am afraid of a potential hate crime against me, every day of my life. If someone looks at me weird, I get nervous because they could be the one delivering the hate crime towards me. Not only towards me, but the community that I am surrounded by – the LGBTQ+ community, the Muslim community, the Mexican community. They are my community. They are also going to be susceptible to torment for no reason; as if they could change the way they were born.

This means we must fear our life, and for what reason? Because a racist misogynist is now president. Someone who wants to commit hate crimes for his own satisfaction to people who deserve to be here. We elected him president, which means we now know where everyone else stands. Racism is going to be the new norm; hate crimes are becoming something that people just do. We are going to slowly have to adapt to hate crimes and racism because it will be the norm. I don’t want to adapt to that. That should not be my norm.

This president, if anything, wants people to be racist and perform hate crimes. The moment Trump became president, the hates crimes started. And no one has stopped them. It has been one hell of a week for everyone, and I can hope we can stand together. But what is so messed up about all of this is we are going to be more divided than ever. This is going to result in everyone choosing a side, as if it is supposed to be that way. Hate crimes should never be okay. People of color need to stand together more than ever right now, and we need to focus on where we are and how to help each other out.

The world will change on January 20^th. I still don’t know how I feel about this; my emotions are running wild. I cannot stress this enough: we need to stand together. We need this unity now more than ever. Racism, hate crimes, and bigotry will not break us down – not now and not ever. We got this. We got this.

Cover Image via LA Times