Tag: freedom

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A Quick Dose of Inspiration

The hits just keep on coming, don’t they? Most days I wake up and check my standard list of news organizations for the morning status report. Inevitably I get an overwhelming feeling of doom. BUT, I do my best to squish that feeling and decide which topic to focus on just for the day. Where are my efforts best applied?

The ongoing Muslim Ban, the reinstated global gag rule, the re-initiation of work on the Keystone pipeline, the continued fight to keep cartoon super villains out of the Cabinet, and now the nomination Neil Gorusch to be a Supreme Court Justice…it all makes my head spin. Thank goodness for the comedic stylings and wise words of Jon Stewart. Jon visited Stephen Colbert last night and did a dead-on impression of the 45th president reading a few of his upcoming executive orders. And there in the midst of the ridiculous costume, the jokes about narcissism, and off-script banter, came the words that settled me. Jon was speaking in the third person as DJT, so I cleaned up a few of the pronouns to make it easier to understand. Here is what he said:

It is going to take relentless stamina, vigilance, and every check and balance this great country can muster to keep DJT from going full Palpatine… We have never faced this before – purposeful, vindictive chaos. But perhaps therein lies the saving grace of [Trump’s] presidency. No one action will be adequate. All actions will be necessary. And if we do not allow DJT to exhaust our fight and somehow come through this presidency calamity-less and Constitutionally partially intact, then [Trump] will have demonstrated the greatness of America…just not the way [he] thought he was going to.

Yes, we have a really hard road ahead. Yes, it is going to be exhausting. But when you think about these words, and when you watch people from all walks of life coming together in protest, and when you see the support of organizations all across the country and around the globe…you can use that warm and fuzzy feeling as fuel to keep pushing forward. Keep resisting!!

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#WhyWeMarch

I mentioned in my post yesterday that my sister and I will be traveling to Washington, DC on Saturday to participate in the Women’s March on Washington.  We got together recently to put into our own words why it is important for us to be there.  This is #WhyWeMarch:

Too long have we stood by and kept silent, too long have we whispered behind doors but lived life as if we weren’t affected. We have been awakened. We will rise up. We will find a way to conquer hate. And she and I will do it together, among millions of others who refuse to watch hate toward other humans become the norm. 

We will share stories of kindness and love and support.  We will finally begin to take action, in a way we have kept closely guarded in the backs of our minds. I can’t answer why we have sat on the sidelines until now, but that is no longer an option. Every generation has found a way to fight and make a difference.  This country had to fight to convince others to end slavery, to allow women to vote, to let all Americans choose to love any gender.  And now it is our turn to stand tall and proud and fight for all of those rights and more. 

We will not be ignored.

We will not be marginalized.

We will not stand idly by.

WE WILL NOT FADE AWAY.

We march for love and kindness. We march for her daughters and my nieces. We march for equal pay for women. We march for Planned Parenthood and the incredible work they do saving lives everyday. We march for peace. We march for our LBGTQ friends. We march for freedom for ALL. We march for immigrants and their rights. We march for religious freedom. We march for the ownership of our OWN bodies. We march for you. We march for each other. And we march for the future. 

We will be a powerful voice against hate and those who threaten the progress we have made and the great strides yet to come. 

Millions of women, one voice.