My blog Film Guy Reviews is meant to cover all things film. But now, I want to take this opportunity to share my thoughts on the recent election because my thoughts are too big to put into 140 characters or a Facebook status.
When I woke up to find that Donald Trump had officially won the Presidential Election, I suddenly began to, and still do have a stone cold feeling running through my body. I could not help but feel heart broken over the fact that our country chose a man who has divided us as the man who will run the Oval Office and has someone just as hateful as his Vice President.
If there is anything that Trump winning this election has taught me, it's about the power of privilege. You can get away with anything or get yourself into anything that you choose as long as you have enough wealth and privilege and I find that incredibly frustrating. It took me four years to get a two-year Associate's Degree and right now, I am about to graduate with a Bachelor's that I have worked for since I officially started college back in 2010. I plan to become a professional film critic which will be difficult for me at first yet is something that I have been passionate about for all my life. Yet Donald Trump who has absolutely no political experience whatsoever gets to run for and become President of the United States. So think about it. It might take me years to finally fulfill my goals yet one day, Trump suddenly decides to run for President despite not being associated with that field.
Another thing this election taught me is the nature of hypocrisy. We, as Americans, like to think of ourselves as progressive and moving forward. But by electing a man whose campaign has been built on misogyny, homophobia, racism, and bullying, it moves us a few huge steps backwards and it makes it seem like the rights of women, POC, immigrants, and the LGBTQ+ community don't matter as much. But guess what, all the groups I just mentioned, we are all human beings just like those of you who voted for Trump who have rights just like you do. But I fear that the rights of women, POC, and gay people will start to be taken away because we not only have a Republican President but a very Republican Senate and House of Representatives. That frightens me because their views will likely be in sync with the President's.
I am trying my best to stay positive and hold out hope for a better day. But it's hard. It's hard to do that knowing how backward our country has gotten and how we were on the verge of making history with having the first female President, showing that we really have gotten more progressive. But I do hope that those of us who didn't vote for Trump and do want to see change happen in our country will not only continue to show kindness towards other human beings but encourage our future generations to do the same and remind them never to let hate bring them down. We may have felt defeated after this election but at the end of the day, we're still here and we're still going to show that love does trump hate. As a gay man, I may still get a feeling that people don't care about my rights. But I'm not going to stop loving who I am and I'm going to remember that love is love. Whether it's between two men, two women, or a woman of color and a white man, it doesn't matter. Love. Is. Love.
To my fellow members of the LGBTQ+ community and to anyone that is reading this, whether you're gay, a woman, a person of color, a veteran, disabled, an immigrant, or somebody who supports all these groups of people that has a lot of compassion in your heart and wants our nation to move forward, keep spreading goodwill and always embrace what makes you YOU. Like Hillary Clinton says, we are #StrongerTogether.
Warm regards,
Matt St.Clair
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