WHY WE GO ON
Excerpt from Lily Zheng
Jan 22, 2025
LinkedIn
I was working in higher education in 2016, when Trump first took office. One morning a colleague came to work, saw me at my desk, and asked, "how are you remaining calm??" The answer that I gave then is the same answer I'd give now.
The systems we are working every day to undo and remake have endured for ten, twenty, a hundred years. And for as long as these systems have existed, there have been people looking to build, change, resist, and remake a harmful and unjust world into something better. During every swing of the pendulum throughout history, those doing the good work have endured. They've adapted their tactics. They've stayed closely connected with each other in community. They've used every tool at their disposal to stay safe and protect their impact at the same time.
We have to be able to do the same. Over the last 24 hours, we've seen a glimpse of what might become a common occurrence over the next several years. A rolling back of protections. Dog whistle attacks on the most marginalized. A naked embrace of fascist and authoritarian rhetoric and politics. And then an uncontrolled bleed of grief, pain, outrage, and fear magnified and amplified to unbearable levels on every social media platform.
Our grief, pain, anger, and fear are real. But we cannot, CANNOT let our actions and emotions be manipulated by algorithms that want us unbalanced, rather than well. We cannot let our fear drive us to burnout, however righteous it might feel. We cannot let our anger drive us to consider our communities as disposable, however frustrated we might be. It's hard but essential for us to make space for these feelings, process them however we need to, and reground ourselves so we can continue this work.
The work happens in community.
Not through social media likes and comments, but through deep conversations with those willing to act, build, resist, remake, and change the world around them. Not through passive doomscrolling, but through active work with leaders, organizations, and communities working together to sustain functional institutions, healthy norms, and robust protections for us all. When it all gets to be too much, remember that being informed is not the same as being flooded. If we are genuinely working to build a better world in the face of overwhelming harm, we have the urgent and enduring responsibility to use the tools at our disposal to be grounded, to be well, and to be in community.
May we all achieve that, together.