"What do you have to lose?"

Dear Massa Trump, 

There's something I need you to understand. Your generalizations of races and religions will do nothing in "winning the vote." I need you to understand that your impression of "the Blacks", that we are all poor, uneducated, violent beings, is wrong. It's offensive. It's demeaning. It affirms that all of my efforts have been for naught. My strive for academic success and global understanding is useless, because all I'm seen as is a poor, uneducated, angry black woman. 

You keep saying, "what do [we] have to lose?" regarding the African-American population voting for you. I need you to understand how that pushes me away, deters me from considering you as a presidential candidate. By saying this, you're implying that we have lost everything. You're implying that we have no hope to change our "fate" and to thrive as minorities in this country. It makes me feel threatened and set back, as if society isn't already doing that enough.

So please stop. Stop generalizing my race and painting us as a hopeless, weak, "backwards" people. Stop acting as if the only way we can exist is as drug dealers, prostitutes, murderers, and single inner-city families living off of government handouts. Stop treating the issue of poverty as something filthy, as if it, and all its components (aka people) should be thrown out with the trash. We are not all the top 1%, but we are all still living.

Please acknowledge my aspirations as valid. Please remind me that my education is worth something. Please show me, somehow, in some way, that my life matters. I'm only asking that you regard and treat me, and my people, like we're human (shouldn't be too hard, considering we are).

So you ask: "what do you have to lose?"

I have everything to lose. I have my livelihood to lose. I have my dignity to lose. I have my strength to lose. I have a solidarity and understanding in my culture that allows me to keep moving forward on the most difficult days to lose. Frankly, I have my humanity to lose.

Stop treating me like my life doesn't matter more than just as a vote in your favor. I am not voting in this election simply to satisfy your ego. I'm voting for my future and my safety, as well as for my country's future and safety. More than that, I'm voting for progress, solidarity, and change.

I will not throw away a vote on someone who would not stop to give me the time of day, simply because I am black. I will not throw away my vote on someone who continues to perpetuate marginalization in our society. I will not vote for someone who defiles the image of an entire people simply for political gain. 

I will not vote for someone whose views on the social aspect of our society are moving backwards, back to the age of discrimination and segregation, back to the days when diversity was no more than a myth. 

I will not vote for that, because my life is a constant battle against those very things.

I guess you could say I have a fight to lose, in voting for you. 

I am not going to lose this fight.

Identity.

I've recently become more aware of my identity as a Black American. Ironically, this increased awareness presents itself in the form of confusion, blurred lines, and more questions than answers. But I love that. I'm redefining myself, and I don't know how this will all end up. Below is the accumulation of some of the thoughts I've been processing recently as I embrace this transformation. It might not make much sense, but it's honestly where I am:

I have an inherent, unshakable feeling of failure.

That I have been failed by a society that dilutes my history,

That I have failed my ancestors by rejecting my identity,

That I have failed, time and time again, to embrace my black skin;

That I have considered my pain and burdens to be greater than theirs,

That I have forgotten the tears and blood shed on the path they took to get me here—

              perhaps this is the greatest failure of them all.

I have been taught that I Stand on the Shoulders of Giants.

I did not learn this from the pages of selective history fed to me in school,

Which paint my people as weak and broken, tired and savage.

No, I learned this from my own blood, from the stories passed by word of mouth.

I learned from a language that others cannot comprehend

Because it is our story, for our people, preserved so that we can remember our roots

Our stories penetrate the soul, running so deep that they are undeniable;

Setting a fire within, bringing out immense pride, strength, dignity, and beauty—

              this is not something you learn from a book.

They told me that my identity is rooted in fear and anger, betrayal and desperation and confusion, pain and tears;

But these factors are minuscule compared to the strength, resilience, and pride that run deeper in my veins than blood.

There was no exaggeration, nor any hesitation, when voices cried out saying,
     "we have come over a way that with tears has been watered; we have come treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered.”

my ancestors have carried me a mighty long way;

And yet, I have failed them.

I allowed myself to partake in a false sense of security.

I believed that the system was on my side, that the fight was over and we could now rest.

i was wrong.

I can no longer sit back and say that there is not a problem

I can no longer sit back and wait for others to find a solution

I can no longer leave my brothers and sisters to carry the fight for me;

i must join them.

The blood that runs through my veins carries a DNA that has survived hell.

It carries a fight that was started centuries ago when they were stripped of humanity.

It carries no story of self-pity, nor weakness, nor fear.

My blood only carries a story of perseverance, strength, strong will, unity and hope.

My actions must reflect that which lies within me.

So I must fight.

For the tears shed, lives lost, and injustices witnessed by my people, I must fight today.

I must continue to rebuild the humanity that was stripped of my ancestors, I must redefine our identity.

If you ever feel the need to ask why I have joined this fight,

Just know it is because

                                         I am ready to shake this feeling of failure.

                                         I am ready to take back our identity.