On Protests, Grief and Showing Up for Each Other: (Plus 63 photos from SF’s Emergency March in the Castro for Trans Rights)

Jamie Thrower
Jul 28, 2017 · 5 min read

It’s been almost 9 months since the election, an evening where many of us sat glued to our televison screens in disbelief, as if we were actually watching the world dissolve around us in real time. I remember sitting and feeling like the walls were caving in, unable to take my gaze away from the results on the screen. The following day I noticed how many of my of my friends, family, and community fell heavy into a deep grief. I feel like we have all been grieving for 9 months.

In these past 9 months, our lives have been shook up in unimaginable ways. Sometimes with as little as stroke of his fingers and 140 characters, Donald Trump has instilled fear, shock, disbelief, hopelessness and deep sadness in so many of us, while simultaneously boosting his own followers through a rhetoric of hatred, misogyny, racism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia and islamophobia, just to name a few. He has given permission for people to unveil their darkest, ugliest sides, and through his example, given them power to behave as carelessly and as hate-filled as he does.

Meanwhile, the rest of us sit in our grief, wondering how we got to this place, how we can survive this, and how we can fight back. It seems that almost every week there’s a new horrifying headline, and a lot of us feel like pulling the covers over our heads and just hoping it will all be over soon.

But then there are protests. Sometimes methodical and planned for months, and other times organized together in a matter of hours. Protests matter. They are so much more than just outrage and being angry. To me, they are about community. It’s about collective gathering for a cause, and to remind ourselves that we don’t walk alone. It’s about showing up for the people we know and love, and the people we don’t know and wholeheartedly support simply because we are all human.

During some of my deepest, foggiest times of grief, I will always remember who showed up for me — in big ways and in little ways. I’ll remember my best friend showing up to my door after my mom passed away and holding my hand as the coroner took her away. I’ll remember the huge ammount of people who showed up for her funeral. I’ll remember the friends who helped me unpack my moving truck of my parent’s stuff after we sold our childhood home. I’ll remember the cupcakes my roommates made for me the day that I buried both of my parents. I’ll remember all these moments of people showing up and showing their support in my grief, willing to stand next to me, no matter how uncomfortable it felt at the time.

You want to know how protests impact community? Ask Sorren, who through tears, got up on the mic the other night and said, “Today is the first day I came out as Trans. Today is my first day living as a guy”. Ask him how he felt when crowd erupted into applause and cheers. When we asked him his name and began to chant it for him. When we yelled words of love and affirmation.

Ask the woman who also got up to speak and said “I’m the mother of an 8 year old trans kid. And I love my son”, and was met with hugs and reminders that we loved him too.

Ask the trans teenagers and kids and folks who couldn’t make it to the march, but watched through videos and photographs and were reminded that they were valid and loved and needed in this world.

Ask the community who stood together and promised to protect each other better, to work with, instead of against each other, and who were reminded of the importance and power in numbers.

Ask the allys who gained insight and education, who learned how to be better and how to show up every day, not just at protests.

Ask the person who hadn’t been hugged all day and were met with consentual hugs and hand squeezes of affirmation and support.

Deep grief is met best with showing up. And there are so many ways to show up for the people in our lives who need it the most. It’s not just about attending a protest, it’s about showing up every day in our lives for each other. It’s calling people out when they use harmful language, or make an insensitive joke. It’s challenging those who can’t see their own priveledge. It’s checking in on our friends and family members who are directly affected by these bans and hateful words. It’s learning ways to truly be an ally. It’s volunteering, it’s being kind, it’s extending a hand to a stranger. It’s showing up to a rally and also doing radical self care, and everything in-between. This is where the resistence is — in being the best, most loving humans we can. This is how we show up. This is how we heal our grief.

I challenge everyone in the following weeks to think about how they can show up for someone in a way that they haven’t thought of before. Even if it’s as simple as checking in on a neighbor, or reaching out to a friend. Our impact is so strong, our community is unwavering, and love and human kindness will always come out on top.

All photos ©Jamie Thrower, 2017

Written by

Queer femme photographer with a witchy soul and a wild heart.

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