They stood at the busy corner of State Street and Woodrow Wilson Avenue, in Jackson, Miss., waving to evening commuters on their way home from work. They held signs that read, “Love Thy Trans, Undocumented, Palestinian, Queer and Muslim Neighbor,” while others pleaded to “Keep Fighting for Love and Justice in MS,” and to “Love Mississippi, Love One Another.” Still more signs proclaimed “Vulva, Vagina, and Abortion are Not Dirty Words,” along with other calls to arms familiar to grandmothers who fought hard for these same rights decades ago. Only now these rights are stolen by a court molded by a president freshly returned to the White House by a new generation of white women who are nothing like their grandmothers.
"We don’t want people to forget that we still love each other, and we still support each other."
Mississippi in Action Executive Director Valencia Robinson said the Trump election roused anxiety among diverse groups. The U.S. has only been an authentic democracy for the last 60 years with the passage of the Voting Rights Act, but Trump’s Supreme Court is thrilled to dismantle it and put at risk the rights only recently made real. Others fear the nation’s recent march toward acceptance and tolerance is at an end with a majority of voters leaping behind a president whose most coherent statements were divisive.
“The election yesterday caused a lot of sadness, but we don’t want to focus on that part,” said Robinson. “We want to talk about love and support and freedom. We don’t want people to forget that we still love each other, and we still support each other.”
Paloma Wu, deputy director of a litigation initiative at the Mississippi Center for Justice (MCJ), said now is the time to remind society that people are not alone, despite the president-elect’s crusade to demonize Americans and spread fear to win an election.
“It’s important to stand together in a time that is scary,” said Wu, who was not participating in the demonstration under the auspices of MCJ. “There are a lot of communities that have been threatened by the person just elected, but today is a statement that we are not going anywhere, that we—as a nation—are more than the most hateful things a politician can say.”
Mississippi in Action Outreach Coordinator Darius “D” Nelson said Americans desperately need to know they still have the support and love of their fellow Americans, despite whatever hate spews from the White House over the next four years.
“I want to break the fear across the nation that we don’t have any other options,” said Nelson, a queer, Black trans person reared in Mississippi. “I was born in Jackson, and I have never had a relationship with my government where I can rely on policies or any kind of benevolence. Instead, I’ve always had to rely on my community. That’s been the way for me and for my ancestors, because that’s just Mississippi. We’ve never relied on the government. We’ve always had to rely on each other, and people need to be reminded of that.”
Nelson, who uses they/them pronouns, said they’re clinging to a message of compassion, despite not being entirely sure American democracy can survive a second Trump onslaught. It was a mere four year ago the president-elect attempted a federal coup akin to similar coups in the nation’s past, including the deadly Colfax Massacre, where white terrorist forces slaughtered upwards of 150 lawfully elected people and Black Louisiana residents. Other coup attempts include a Reconstruction-era slaughter a mere 10 miles away from demonstrators, in the nearby town of Clinton. Records prove the U.S. is historically fond of massacring democratically elected leaders, so Trump’s attempt in 2021 was just par for the course.
But now the accused conspirator is back in the White House, and Nelson fears the president elect will be hard to extract, even after the completion of his second term, thanks to GOP allies who are willing to undermine democracy to impose permanent one-party rule akin to communist-era Soviet Union.
“I’m not sure we’re going to see another real election,” said Nelson. “… You can call me bleak, but you’re a person from a generation that has navigated a world that has always been consistent. I’m from a generation that’s seen big changes (with the pandemic and climactic upheaval.) For you, my attitude may sound grim, but for me this is just the next stage. This is what I get to wake up to.”
Like Nelson, Robinson does not wear rose-colored glasses, and she is fully aware of the nation’s faults. She claims she entered Election Night fully expecting Trump to win.
“I’m a realist. I know what America has been for most of its existence, and I know what it still is. And when you’re out in the community, you hear people talk, young people talking about how they’re so disillusioned when it comes to voting, that they’re not going to vote, and men saying ‘a woman shouldn’t run,’ but many of them didn’t say that with Hillary. It was all about Harris being a Black woman.”
Robinson said it doesn’t help that “this is how many men view women,” particularly Black women.
“Men and Black women are not in a good relationship, but Black women always do the right thing. They expect us to save the world, but they don’t want us to be president.”
But a loving community, they assure, will endure, regardless of assault. Jackson resident Leslie Heosginelli suggested people weather the next four years by continuing to care for and protect others and support everyone in their community, including their rights and their freedoms—but start small.
“For myself, starting small and doing good in my own backyard is the best way to begin,” said Heosginelli. “Everything can be overwhelming right now, so just start small and build from there, just loving people and helping people.”
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