When I boarded the short lunchtime flight from Sydney to Melbourne on Wednesday, Hillary Clinton was forecast to be the next President of the United States. The New York Times had her at an 85 per cent chance of winning, their infographic speedometer pointer poking towards 'likely'. It was a reassuring end to a testing campaign in which Clinton's opponent had managed, it seemed, to egregiously offend everyone bar the predominantly white male demographic that appeared to make up the bulk of his support base.
And although Clinton had been plagued by ridiculous allegations about deleted emails, dishonesty and (in the most bizarre of assertions) claims that she was an actual robot, she appeared set to rise above all that and take the White House. For who, aside from the most virulent of racist, misogynist bigots, would consider voting for someone who had not only openly admitted to the enthusiastic sexual assault of women but who had also been so successful in gleefully fanning the flames of racism that he had been officially endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan?
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Protests against racism outside the White House
Carrying signs calling for bans on racism, protesters gather outside the White House as Donald Trump becomes President-elect.
Three hours later, I sat in a pub and watched, dumbfounded, as Donald Trump's electoral college votes rose higher and higher. My three American companions began crying, and wept on and off for the next six hours. As queer women of colour, this result wasn't just galling for them. It also represented an attack on their humanity and ability to remain safe in a country whose colonialist heartland - made up of men and women from varying economic and educational backgrounds but united in their singular belief in their own white supremacy - had just resoundingly indicated that the time of 'politically correct, leftist tolerance bullshit' was over.
Trump's campaign slogan promised to 'Make America Great Again', and the sentiment has been dutifully adopted by our own Australian Trump-sucks, including renowned racists Cory Bernardi and Pauline Hanson. Because, of course, what he has always meant is, 'Make America White Again' and by proxy return it to the white imperialist rule that has given those of us with white skin legislated dominion over all others and gifted the greatest amount of that power to white men.
![Clair Sheehan takes part in a protest against the election of President-elect Donald Trump in Seattle.](/web/20170113204424im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/s/m/m/z/y/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gsml95.png/1478805813319.jpg)
I am not perplexed by news that white women accounted for Trump's second highest voting block, because the whiteness in that equation is undoubtedly what makes the difference regardless of class or background. While more non-tertiary educated white women voted for him than didn't, almost half of those white women with a college education gave him their support.
What I feel is angry and sad. Angry because I am infuriated by the kind of selfish bigotry that leads white people, a group that already experiences more power than anyone else, to use violence and abuse to solidify our supremacy above the people we fear taking (unearned and certainly undeserved) power from us. And sad because what it makes clear is that in a supposedly "post-racial" America, racism remains so paramount that a majority of women will rally against their own gendered interests in order to maintain the security they get not only from white supremacy but from the men most empowered by it.
This legitimising of hatred has already begun in Australia, whose dregs have been thrashing against the audacity of codified politeness for some time now. As Trump's victory was being announced, young white men attending a function at Sydney University began chanting, "Grab 'em by the pussy! That's how we do it!" I know these men, or at least the archetype of them. They are the ones who flock to feminist pages to declare our hysteria, who call us angry (and sometimes suggest it is because we are unrapeable), who mock and taunt with 'jokes' about sexual assault and domestic violence. They are the ones who do these things and then insist, angrily, that women are too sensitive. That we criminalise male behaviour and tar all men with the brush that's painted the bad ones. They are the ones who hate women both publicly and privately, and yet assert that feminism's greatest crime is that we hate men.
By the time I crawled out of bed this morning, they had already begun flooding my Facebook page crowing about how Trump's election would bring an end to "feminazis". For them, Trump's victory has sent a clear message: you can do and say whatever you like to harm whomever you want, because you're the boss. Grab 'em by the pussy. They'll let you do it, and even if they don't no one will make you accountable to it.
![Protesters rally outside the Trump International Hotel and Tower.](/web/20170113204424im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/s/m/7/5/r/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gsml95.png/1478762867149.jpg)
I think about the those young white men celebrating the reassurance of their birthright power in Sydney and I wonder about the smiling white women flanking them - the same kinds of women who gleefully shaded a circle next to Trump's name in voting booths across America. Do they realise that they will never be considered equal by the men they've curried favour with by promising, however symbolically, not to threaten their enforced superiority? Or is this knowledge of their compromise what is mitigated by their racism - the belief that it's better for them to throw their lot in with the oppressor because it still gives them a room in the castle from where they can look down on everyone else, even if that room has no locks and no clear rules as to who can enter at will?
I hated watching Clinton lose. I have felt bitterly frustrated thinking of how it must felt for the most qualified candidate in history to graciously (and it would have been gracious) concede defeat to a man so incompetent and cartoonish that he is living satire. I am rageful over the fact that Clinton has dedicated her life to public service amassing decades of experience and yet still has her flaws held against her in a way a man would not. It is galling to know that endless waffling will now ensue incorrectly asserting that if she just stepped aside for Bernie Sanders like a good little girl, this nightmare could have been avoided.
![High school and college students protest the presidential election of Donald Trump.](/web/20170113204424im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/s/m/4/i/2/image.related.articleLeadNarrow.300x0.gsml95.png/1478762867149.jpg)
But the racism brought into sharp focus by this electoral result says otherwise. I am a white woman living in Australia who can afford to be most aggrieved by the fact another white woman has lost because racism (especially that which thrives in a country that also clings so fiercely to its guns) is theoretical for me.
The tears my friends shed in the pub that day tell a different story. It's one in which their lives have been declared inferior not just because they're women but, pointedly, because they are not white.
This the story we need to listen to first and foremost. And then we need to keep listening as we get to work. There are dark days ahead and despite what Trump's acolytes might think, the fight has only just begun.