L ike so many others, I woke up several days after the election hoping I was still only trapped in a horrible nightmare. I was scared to walk outside — not only because of the tangible fear of living in this country with Donald Trump as president, but because doing so felt like I was starting to accept that this is my country, regardless of how foreign it feels. I cried just twice before noon — an improvement from the days before — and went to class for the first time in a week. The gravity of what will come of our next presidential administration is still unknown, but as I continue to talk to people around me, I hear more and more of us saying we are ready to fight. Last night, I stood in a room with more than 100 people from just Washtenaw County, all of us having volunteered our time to Hillary Clinton’s campaign. On my left was a middle-aged, gay, white man, and on my right was an elderly Black woman. When one of the organizers, a young Muslim man, got up to speak, he said what I was thinking: Our volunteers look like America. The thing about elections is that they’re all about numbers, and the numbers say nothing about our intensity, our love and our fervor. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, which means that more people in this country voted for the most qualified presidential candidate this country has ever seen over someone who only had to tap into hatred that has existed for centuries. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, which means that more people in this country are ready to fight than to hate. Many higher-educated and higher-income people voted for Clinton, which means that our fight will have more funding, more strategy and more experience. There are too many people of color, women, queer folks and people with hearts who will not give up over the next four years, just as Clinton hasn’t given up for the past 30. The numbers don’t show that our team is stacked. If you voted for Donald Trump or Gary Johnson or Jill Stein or wrote in Bernie Sanders, I challenge you to think about how the people of color, LGBTQ folks, undocumented people, people with disabilities, woman- identifying people or any other marginalized person you have ever met will be affected by a Trump presidency. And then I challenge you to think about how you will be affected by a Trump presidency. If that disparity makes you sad, angry or uncomfortable, then I want you on our team, because this dangerous embarrassment is your America now, too. Our presidential election has made me fear for my safety and the safety of those around me. But if we are going to wake up every morning terrified, then those of us who are ready to fight must force ourselves to understand why fear won this election. Whether it was the fear of a challenge to whiteness or the fear of losing more jobs, the sentiments that captivated so many people in this country are valid. Rather than radicalizing people who were motivated by that fear, we should work to address it alongside the fear that systemically marginalized people have felt throughout this country’s history. Donald Trump is our president, and this is our country, and denial is only the first stage of grief. But if we want change, we can never tolerate the final stage as acceptance. This cannot be like another mass shooting or episode of police violence, during which the pain wanes over time. Perhaps we let go of that pain because our society is quick to absolve a usually white shooter of blame, and to accept police violence against Blacks as nothing extraordinary or needing special attention. This pain is not new to marginalized communities, and we should look to them as examples and leaders in this fight. As time goes on, may we never settle into this — may we always be uncomfortable with the hatred and resentment that people in this country have accepted as normal or even desirable. We will learn new coping mechanisms and agents of change as time goes on, but we must never forget how we felt on Nov. 9. That pain will stay with us every day, and we will counter it with the knowledge that change only happens when we show up more than once every four years on Election Day. On Feb. 1, 2016, I stood in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and watched the first woman in history win a presidential caucus. That was one of many cracks in a glass ceiling thicker than we thought it was. I have no doubt that we will throw everything we have until it shatters all over anyone who doubts the resilience of our communities. As a woman, as a queer person, as a Jew, I will continue to wake up terrified. But as someone who has worked relentlessly on Clinton’s campaign for the past 15 months, I will believe in the passions of people who will never quit working to keep the dream of progress, safety and humanity alive. Opinion The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com 4A — Wednesday, November 16, 2016 MOLLY ARONSON May we never settle into this IN CHAN LEE | CONTACT IN CHAN AT TOKG@UMICH.EDU Refusing those who want to help DANIEL ANTHONY | OP-ED D ear Vice President Harper, Last week, I received an email from you reminding students of the 35th annual Blood Battle with Ohio State. In your email, you encouraged students to sign up to donate blood, helping “us win and … save lives.” I’m responding to you now to say that even though I am a healthy, able-bodied young man, I will not be donating blood. I will not because I cannot, and this is because I am a gay student at the University of Michigan. In your letter, you informed me that throughout the drive’s existence, the University of Michigan has collected enough blood to save the lives of more than 644,000 people. This grand accomplishment is something we should be proud of: These are lives that matter. Yet, I can’t help but feel that we can improve the manner in which we conduct this meaningful public health initiative. As you are probably aware, under the current FDA regulations the Red Cross cannot legally accept blood from a “man who has had sex with another man during the past 12 months.” Gay men are not alone in these regulations. They also apply to any “female who has had sex during the past 12 months with a man who has had sex with another man in the past 12 months.” Consequently, the FDA requires blood from these groups of people to be deferred unless a person of this group abstains from sex for 12 consecutive months. This directly “defers” the donations of all sexually active gay men, bisexual men and any heterosexual or bisexual women who have had sex with gay or bisexual men. I am aware that donating blood saves lives. I am aware that HIV disqualifies any infected individual from donating blood. I am aware that the majority of newly diagnosed HIV cases are within the gay demographic. I am aware that “window periods” make detecting the disease less certain. I am aware that the FDA and the Red Cross take the health of the people receiving blood donations very seriously and consider their treatment of policy very thoughtfully and conservatively. But I am also aware of research that suggests that an individual sexual risk assessment is just as effective as the prohibitory and generalizing policy that the FDA has adopted; that HIV can be prevented through the use of safe sex and even medication; and that it is mandated for health care professionals to screen donated blood for HIV prior to transfusion. I would like to contextualize the FDA’s policy within our own University’s policy on non-discrimination. We, as a University community, claim: “The University of Michigan is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all persons and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, disability, religion, height, weight, or veteran status in employment, educational programs and activities, and admissions.” Yet, because of my sexual orientation, I am not offered the same opportunity to help my school or my community through participation of this historic blood drive. Instead I am “differed.” Yes, I am “differed” along with those who, according to the Red Cross, “have ever used needles to take drugs … not prescribed by (their) doctor … have ever taken money, drugs or other payment for sex … (or) in the last 12 months have been in juvenile detention, lockup, jail, or prison for more than 72 hours.” This bears the offensive implication that, because of my sexual orientation, I am inherently hazardous to my community. In other words, my health, my lifestyle and my merit are questioned primarily on the basis that I am gay. Therefore, it seems to me that as a healthy, monogamous and responsible person, I am being unfairly and unnecessarily “differed” from one of the cornerstones of my University’s history. This annual Blood Battle presents me with two choices: For 12 consecutive months, I can rebuke a part of my identity in order to donate blood, or I can live freely while accepting the systematic discrimination that the University perpetuates annually. Neither of these options are ideal. So, perhaps, the 35th annual Blood Battle presents our University community with an opportunity to follow up on our self-attributed “Leaders and the Best” character. Perhaps, we can speak out against this implicit discrimination. Perhaps, we can unite to change our tradition into a wholly inclusive process. Your email reminds me of this. Sincerely, Daniel Anthony LAURA SCHINAGLE Managing Editor 420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109 tothedaily@michigandaily.com Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890. SHOHAM GEVA Editor in Chief CLAIRE BRYAN and REGAN DETWILER Editorial Page Editors Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily’s Editorial Board. All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors. Carolyn Ayaub Claire Bryan Regan Detwiler Brett Graham Caitlin Heenan Jeremy Kaplan Ben Keller Minsoo Kim Madeline Nowicki Anna Polumbo-Levy Jason Rowland Ali Safawi Kevin Sweitzer Rebecca Tarnopol Ashley Tjhung Stephanie Trierweiler EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS Daniel Anthony is a School of Music, Theatre & Dance senior. MOLLY ARONSON | OP-ED Molly Aronson is a public policy junior. DANIEL ANTHONY ISAIAH ZEAVIN-MOSS | COLUMN Collaborative disruption O ver the past week, the most uplifting words I’ve heard came from a classmate of mine: She said she has never felt more terrified of the future, and, simultaneously, she has never felt more immediately aware of her responsibility to help and to look out for other people, particularly people who are targeted by xenophobia, white supremacy and all that Donald Trump embodies. Trump is the living, breathing manifestation of white supremacy. And he has just been given the keys to the most powerful position in the world. White supremacists, of course, have always been here, and the consequences of their ideologies have been made manifestly visible. We as a nation have barely been able to suppress the fact that we largely operate in a way that normalizes white supremacy (think of the habitual way in which we as a culture respond to murders of young Black men by police — outrage, “this cannot happen,” move on to the next story, repeat). But Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2016, served as a coming-out party for white supremacy. No need to suppress it anymore. It is the definition of mainstream America. For the most part, I have been really pleased with the outpouring of love from our University of Michigan community. People are talking about fundamentally changing their lives in response to this election — myself included. I am not going abroad next semester because I need to stay here and help. And I am not alone. But I have also felt shocked at the silence in some of my classes. Interestingly enough, this silence pervades classes taught by white men and with students who are almost all white. In these classes, there is no mention of what is happening, of the hate crimes on our campus and in our nation. No mention of the fact that millions of people today fear for their lives. One professor ended a class of mine early, but stayed in the classroom, saying he feared for his life if he were to go outside. And this ability to be silent demonstrates white privilege in practice. We can only be silent because none of these policies directly target our lives. We do not have to address Trump, we do not have to adjust our syllabi. Why would we? Instead, we will talk about it once, for 30 minutes, and move on. Relatively speaking, this is the same way in which we (speaking specifically to white people) digest the murders of young Black men by police. And so the response might be: But if it doesn’t affect you, why would the professor have to talk about it? Because the professor’s job is to help educate us, the students, on the most pressing, urgent questions of our day. And these are not questions about the ways in which some dead white poet uses metaphor when talking about blackbirds or forests or snowy evenings. Instead, let’s talk about white privilege. Let’s talk about the fact that none of us apparently feel compelled to speak about what is happening in this country. Why is that? Since the election, I have had classes that could have taken place in any time throughout history at this university. This is unacceptable. We need to be engaging with the questions of our time. We need to be reading and considering voices that grappled with these similar questions. Because, of course, these questions have always been relevant — white supremacy has always reigned in this country. So people have been responding to it every day, forever. But times have fundamentally changed. We are now dealing with a man, our president, who has 20 sexual assault allegations against him and who openly mocked a disabled reporter. We are dealing with a chief strategist who once told his wife that he didn’t want to send his kids to a certain school because he didn’t want his kids to be learning with Jews. This is our world. Teachers, administrators: It is your job to prepare us for this world, to demand that we engage with what is going on. If this means having conversations with which you are uncomfortable, that is a good thing because that discomfort means, most likely, that you need this conversation just as we do. So why don’t we, students and teachers, if only for a moment, operate on some sort of a level playing field, in which we are all learning from one another about these icky terrifying issues? Do not fear this sort of collaborative learning. Just as my peer told me last week, now, more than ever, we need to rely upon one another, to look out for one another, to help one another learn and be safe and continue to grow despite this monumental force of division that has been rewarded with the highest office in the world. Silence, on the other hand, favors this force. It is what it wants. Do not obey. Do not give in. Fight. Collaboratively disrupt. ISAIAH ZEAVIN-MOSS Isaiah Zeavin-Moss can be reached at izeavinm@umich.edu We need to be engaging with the questions of our time. CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONVERSATION Readers are encouraged to submit letters to the editor and op-eds. Letters should be fewer than 300 words while op-eds should be 550 to 850 words. Send the writer’s full name and University affiliation to tothedaily@michigandaily.com.