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This is a historic election, with the highest rate of voter turnout seen in 120 years. While the election feels never-ending, it would have had a different outcome if specific demographics didn’t vote on a record-breaking scale. Black women specifically did the heavy lifting, with 91% voting for former Vice President Joe Biden, according to exit polls.

All over the country, people of color did their part. Black youth in Georgia supplied Biden’s run to flip the state at a staggering rate of 90%, while the same white liberals — specifically women who spent the last six months shouting liberal ideologies and making aesthetic infographics for Instagram about the Black Lives Matter movement and immigrant children in detention  — voted for President Donald Trump at a higher rate than they did in 2016.

Indigenous voters also helped to flip the swing states of Arizona and Wisconsin, though their voting rights have been systemically suppressed in the United States for generations as well.

On the flip side, this year was no different from 2016. Most white Americans favored and voted for Trump, even after his disastrous handling of an ongoing pandemic that has left over 200,000 people dead. Trump has continued to show disrespect toward the military community and has even allowed nepotism in his administration. As this election rolled around, we basically gave white voters a pass to support his racist and intolerant mission — twice.

How do we move on with a country that’s still divided, with one half shouting to keep their racist and imprudent ideologies and president? I have no answer. I gave up trying to relate to the other half long ago. However, I do have advice for those willing to listen.

Unfortunately, I see little hope in this newly elected administration pursuing legislation that would benefit the same demographics who worked to appoint it. The work and needs of people of color will once again be swept under the rug until our votes are needed again in 2024. That’s why I find it laughable when news outlets rejoice because the U.S. is going back to “normal.”

The man we’ve elected is like the president before him. Biden has advocated for cutting social security for the past 40 years, worked with two segregationist senators to oppose desegregation policies of the U.S. Department of Education and supported the infamous 1994 Crime Bill. 

Knowing all this, I can gloomily say I voted for this man because that was the only option available for a Black person in the U.S. Because this election is for the Black women who organized and campaigned to protect themselves and their children from the danger of Trump and his administration.

Because, as Black Voters Matter Fund co-founder LaTosha Brown stated perfectly, “The fact that we have caught up with white voters, white women in particular, who have historically reaped all the benefits of voting, and even any slight level of political engagement… to me says that we are extraordinary. The fact that we have matched and topped white voter participation and done that while going through voter suppression in new and old forms every year, we are extraordinary.”

This is what I say to the young white liberals who love using marginalized groups’ social issues to live out their Hunger Games fantasies: Use your privilege and hold this man and his administration accountable. I want you to scrutinize Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris the same way you did Trump.

Don’t forget the millions who rallied to make this new normal happen. We have to turn these hashtags, tweets and TikTok videos into legislation, budgets and policies that benefit people of color. We don’t only want small reforms that make our issues palatable to a small mass and ease your guilt.

Don’t start backpedaling because you feel safe again under Biden and Harris. Additionally, don’t congratulate Harris for being the first-anything vice president — Black, Asian American, woman — until she does the work to show that she’s represented these groups. She’ll be able to hide behind the “girl boss” movement while upholding the same principles she sanctioned during her tenure as San Francisco’s district attorney.

I may be just another pessimist, but despite this election, nothing has changed. We now shift from overt racism and propaganda back to Barack Obama’s era of covert racists and children in rainbow-colored cages. All I propose is that you learn from the past four years, because we never forgot.

Hamere Debebe is a freshman political science major. Her column appears bi-weekly. She can be reached at hedebebe@syr.edu.

Published on November 11, 2020 at 10:59 pm