By Anne Kehl, Managing Editor
On Monday, Nov. 14, Vashon High School staged a walkout. Around 60 students left class at 1:30 p.m. and met at the front of the school. Seniors Jack Kelly and Aria Garrett read letters addressed to Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders respectively, which students then signed and mailed.
The students, wielding signs with a variety of quotes including “Love Trumps Hate,” and “This [expletive] Grabs Back,” then marched the two miles to the intersection in town.
Participants stated that they understand that Vashon Island is a small place, and the protest probably won’t make a large change on a national scale. However, the walk out at VHS was part of a greater movement. According to the Seattle Times, over 1000 students walked out of school on the same day at the same time across the region.
There have been riots all across the country condemning Donald Trump for his words and actions, and not accepting him as their president. Places like Portland, San Francisco, and New York have held riots, peaceful and otherwise. Even some Seattle Public Schools, like Garfield and Roosevelt have produced rallies criticizing Trump and everything he stands for.
Many students felt strongly on either side of the argument. I can’t speak for all of them, but I believe they walked out mostly to have a voice, especially in politics.
More than three-quarters of the school couldn’t vote in the general election, leaving many with a sense of helplessness and vulnerability. We didn’t elect this president, or this Senate or House or whoever Trump appoints to the Supreme Court, yet our lives are adversely affected by the decisions they make.
This walkout rewarded the voiceless with a voice. It allowed them to say, “this isn’t my president.” We, as minors, did not elect this sexist, bigoted, misogynist, racist, homophobic, polarizing, inexperienced politician. That wasn’t us, and we don’t have to accept the consequences.
These actions also represented standing behind the minorities affected by this election. Many marginalized groups feel threatened by this presidency, and need a safe space. This walkout illustrated that we, as a community, reject the peripheralization of these groups, and we are here to defend them if and when necessary.
This event also sent a message to the community to unite against the hate of Trump’s campaign. We don’t and won’t accept four years of the discourse and rhetoric embodied by Donald Trump and his supporters.
We are seeing this kind of hate affect people across the country. CNN has documented graffiti spray painted on a baseball dugout reading “Make America White Again,” surrounding a swastika in Wellsville, New York. Another piece of graffiti was found in Durham, North Carolina that reads, “Black lives don’t matter and neither does your vote.”
A Muslim student in Ann Arbor, Michigan was threatened with a lighter; the man told her he would light her on fire if she didn’t remove her hijab. This was directly caused by Trump’s hate speech, and it is not a safe place for our youth to mature.
We are seeing hate spread throughout even our school. An African American boy at VHS was told to “go back to Africa” the day after the election. I was called “ignorant” and “uneducated” for posting a picture of the details of the walkout on my Snapchat story, because I was promoting a “stupid ass riot.” A boy from O’Dea posted a picture on his story advertising that people who participated in a walkout should be tested for “Down’s.”
The walkout denounced these people, along with their hate, and told them that our opinions are valid as well, and deserve an open mind. We need to unify, because that’s the only way we can get through this: united, as one.