Am I Safe?

So many times I try to be very unpolitical in public, however now that I'm slightly more grown I have seen that I can't be quiet anymore.  I have to say something; because right now that's the only thing I can do.

A few days ago, on January 20, 2017, Donald J. Trump became the 45th president of the United States.  For me, this was not a happy day.  I didn't celebrate, I didn't congratulate him, I don't feel that he could ever be my president.  (I know that being a US citizen legally makes him my president, but I'm talking emotionally and mentally he's not).  This is because, all that Trump stands for, all that he has spoken about and pledged to do once in office, does nothing to help me.  It could actually hurt me.

I know that being a cisgender, white, female makes me lower on the list of those to be hurt by Trump.  But maybe, if I speak my voice, others will understand my story, and be more apt to understand the stories of all POCs and other LGBT community members who are also scared about what the next four years will bring.

As a female, Trump has scared me so much.  He is planning to possibly cut funding to Violence Against Women grants and programs, and so much more.  I'm scared because the defunding of Planned Parenthood (whose major focus isn't abortion like everyone thinks it is).   It helps with so much more as the chart on the right shows.  Their main focus is helping with STD testing and contraception.  Ways to keep everyone safe. PP is not just for women too.  Men can go and get helpful services there.  They are funded so that those with little or no money can go in and get free health care.  What will happen to all those that won't get free health care now that PPs defunded?  Many people will die, or become very sick.  How can a man (or many people that is) not understand that people's lives are more important than the fact that only 3% of PPs services revolves around abortion?  Not even 10%!!!

I'm in college, and things that Trump has said about college, though seeming great, doesn't help my scared heart.  This is because of Devos.  She, at least to me, doesn't understand what it takes to be secretary of Education.  She does not have the interest of public or state schools in mind.  She thinks teachers are overpaid and that public schools should be funded less.  This could be bad for my school as I am in a state university.  And what about my alma mater?  It's a public school, terribly underfunded already.  My AM can't afford to not get any more money and the teachers deserve MORE money in my opinion.  Education is something very important to me and the woman that Trump feels is the best fit for the job, is not.  I do not think she will ever be someone I can trust to handle the safety of education in America.

As a bisexual woman, I am fearing for the future.  This is also where Mike Pence, the new VP, becomes somewhat scarier than Trump.  For Pence believes in conversion therapy to reverse or 'correct' homosexuality.  What will come of the future for me and my siblings within the LGBT community?  Will I be able to marry the woman of my dreams (if I ever meet her bc im a hermit)?  Will I be strapped down and forced to change my sexuality?  I'm not hurting anyone being Bisexual, but apparently, I am.  Don't know how me liking both males and females ruins your dinner across the country, but please let me have my own rights.  I came out just under a month before the elections.  While writing this I had to stop and listen to some music.  The song that I listened to that gave me more strength to write this and get my feelings out was a beautiful cover of 'RISE' by Superfruit (Scott Hoying and Mitch Grassi), Mary Lambert, Brian Justin, and Mario Jose (originally Katy Perry).  

My heart sank in my chest while I watched the live poll results with my roommate early in the morning on the 9th of November.  All the fear I had ever felt: for being a woman, for being bi, for being around many who felt that they could just 'grab me by the pussy' because the now president-elect said it was okay.  I feared for my whole life.  I was more nervous walking home from all my night classes than I ever should have been.  I had never been scared to walk home alone on my campus before.  But my many neighbors who had Trump signs in their windows caused me caution as I walked.

Nothing Trump has ever said regarding his policies, foreign and domestic, don't give me comfort.  Many times it is because he does not fully state what he is going to do.  He just repeats that he 'has a plan, and it's a good plan and we should have a good plan and this plan he has is good' which gives no damn clarity.  Also with the new president's twitter-happy fingers, I fear that he could set our country into some deep trouble if he becomes easily angered at another country or something of that sort, and decides to voice his opinion on Twitter; and it would be even worse if he did this all from the president Twitter.

And the fact that not even twelve hours after Trump swore in, the pages for climate change and LGBT were gone from the white house website.  I was outraged like anyone.  Then I saw a wonderful twitter thread describing that all those pages were just archived at this site.  This makes me feel better that the progress we made did not just disappear from the world.  It's still here, and we must fight to keep it that way.  We can't sit still and let things go down.   Like the Women's March on January 21, 2017.  A total of around 1 million people marched in just the USA, many others marched in other countries, to tell the world that we will not be silent and that we will fight for our rights no matter how hard.  The marches were peaceful (at least that I've heard) and no one was hurt.  Seeing something like the Women's March fills my heart with happiness because it shows that the country will stay strong, and we have other countries standing with us.

So a finishing question, like the title asks: Am I safe?  Will I be safe when I leave my apartment?  Will I not fear my life walking home from classes at night?  Will I be able to marry the one I love when it comes time to do so?  Only time will tell, but I hope that the answer to all of these will be 'YES'.  Yes, I am safe.  Yes, I will be safe when I leave.  Yes, I will not fear my life walking home from class.  Yes, I will be able to marry the love of my life.  Just yes.

Stay safe everyone, and never be silent.

À bientôt!

Les glaneurs dans L'Etats Unis???

Last semester, I watched a documentary in my French film class.  It was called Les glaneurs et la glanuese (The gleaners and I), by Angès Varda.  After watching the documentary, talking about it in class, and then going through the holiday season, I got to thinking about something.  Would gleaning in the US be bad and why?  And why is it almost normal to glean in France (and other places) but not in the US?

Gleaning is the act of gathering leftover crops after the harvest.  It can also expand to a bit more to the gathering items.  It is usually associated with an over-consumption and a large waste of food or just items that can be used by others.

In the movie, Angès (pictured above) traveled around France to show different types of gleaning with a hand-held camera.  Some were gleaning potatoes after the harvest, where Angès found heart-shaped potatoes (pictured right).  She talked to many of those who were gleaning in the fields and one man who was homeless and gleaned potatoes so he could have something to eat.  In France, it is legal for those to glean on a crop field only after the harvest has passed.

Another man gleaned old dolls around France and created pillars outside his home to represent the waste of items in the country.  There was an episode within the documentary where a man gleaned appliances, had a friend fix them up, and possibly sell them or keep them for later.  These were two instances where people were gleaning something other than food but for a special purpose.  One man gleaned food after the local market had gone through and then spent the night teaching the men in his apartment building.  He gleaned to eat, and taught the other men for no price, just because he wanted them to get an education.

Within the movie, Angès was also very into paintings and other art concerning.  She begins the movie talking about a piece of art and finds others through out.  One she finds with her sister as a surprise while they were walking through a thrift store.  She said in the film that it was luck and the painting was calling to her.  She just had to have it and bought it on the spot.  The main painting by Jean-Francois Millet is what the movie is inspired by.  The painting (pictured left) shows three women gleaning wheat in a field.  Many of the other paintings in the movie show large groups gleaning in the same field, but one she liked was one of a lone woman, with a large bushel of wheat on her shoulder.

Now, after that, driving around with my mother, I realized something.  Why is it, that if we were to see someone going through the leftover bins from a farmer's market, we'd be disgusted or yell at them to get a job (I've seen this happen)?  Why is it that we considered gleaning to be so bad?  It's taking food that is somewhat undesirable, and feeding someone who does not have the money to get the food themselves somewhere else.  Why is that so bad?  Why is it that in this country we associate someone trying their hardest to find food to feed themselves, and even going into the trash to do so, is seen as bad and disgusting and our immediate reaction is to say that them having a job will help them?  I just can't understand it, and I once use to think like that.

Is it illegal in the US?  From what I've found it's not illegal in most states, but from the Good Samaritan Act, places that make a surplus of food are to bring it to shelter and centers for those who live there.  Sadly, I don't feel this happens all to often in our country.  Maybe we should fight for it to start up again.  That way we can be part of our country never being hungry.  I know that's something I want.

I found that two years later she came out with a second movie 'Deux ans après' (Two years later).  The cover is two the potatoes Angès had gleaned in the field, sprouting out and wrinkly.  After writing this, I think I'll go ahead and watch this second documentary, see what it's all about and what Angès talks about here.  Maybe things have changed since the first film, and gleaning is looked at differently.  Those vineyards that deliberately ruined the unwanted crops to stop gleaners stopped, and allowed gleaners to come on and get some food.  I'll just have to wait and see when I watch Deux ans après.

Let me know how you feel about gleaning.  Should it be viewed differently in the US?  Should we encourage it?  Should we stop looking at activities like this as being a bad thing?  I want to know how you all feel.

À bientôt!