A good number of us were shocked into numbness and dismayed by the outcome of Tuesday night’s election. America elected a demagogue instead of our first female president, and it’s devastating. Many of Hollywood’s leaders have come forward with inspiring words of advice, encouragement, and calls to take action. Take a look at some of the reactions below:
Jennifer Lawrence:
Lawrence took to Broadly to vent her frustrations.
“We’re all allowed to be sad that the present isn’t what we thought it was. But we mustn’t be defeated. We will keep educating ourselves and working twice as hard as the man next to us because we know now that it is not fair. It is not fair in the workplace, so you make it impossible to fail. And like Hillary, it might not work.
But like Hillary, you can still be an inspiration and get important things done. Do not let this defeat you — let this enrage you! Let it motivate you! Let this be the fire you didn’t have before. If you are an immigrant, if you are a person of color, if you are LGBTQ+, if you are a woman — don’t be afraid, be loud!”
J.K. Rowling:
The author and screenwriter told young girls to stay motivated.
Harry Potter author @JK_Rowling has a message for young women after Hillary Clinton's defeat in the election https://t.co/Wc1pyS74pd
— @variety
Leslie Knope:
The “Parks and Recreation” character penned a letter in the vein of the popular series.
“I acknowledge that Donald Trump is the President. I understand, intellectually, that he won the election. But I do not accept that our country has descended into the hatred-swirled slop pile that he lives in. I reject out of hand the notion that we have thrown up our hands and succumbed to racism, xenophobia, misogyny, and crypto-fascism. I do not accept that. I reject that. I fight that. Today, and tomorrow, and every day until the next election, I reject and fight that story. I work hard and I form ideas and I meet and talk to other people who feel like me, and we sit down and drink hot chocolate (I have plenty) and we plan. We plan like mofos. We figure out how to fight back, and do good in this infuriating world that constantly wants to bend toward the bad. And we will be kind to each other, and supportive of each other’s ideas, and we will do literally anything but accept this as our fate.
And let me say something to the young girls who are reading this. Hi, girls. On behalf of the grown-ups of America who care about you and your futures, I am awfully sorry about how miserably we screwed this up. We elected a giant farting T. rex who does not like you, or care about you, or think about you, unless he is scanning your bodies with his creepy T. rex eyes, or trying to physically grab you like a toy his daddy got him (or would have, if his daddy had loved him). (Sorry, that was a low blow.) (Actually, not sorry, I’m pissed, and I’m on a roll, so zip it, super-ego!) Our President-Elect is everything you should abhor, and fear, in a male role model. He has spent his life telling you, and girls and women like you, that your lives are valueless except as sexual objects. He has demeaned you, and belittled you, and put you in a little box to be looked at and not heard. It is your job, and the job of girls and women like you, to bust out.”
Kerry Washington:
Washington took to Twitter to address the lack of voters this year.
Almost HALF of eligible voters in this country did not vote. WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?! THIS. MUST. CHANGE.
“Jane the Virgin” star Ivonne Coll:
Latina stars attending Eva Longoria’s Foundation dinner Thursday night were on edge.
“This has been like a nightmare for me,” Coll told BuzzFeed News.“It’s been a hard two days.” She then suggested that Latinas, “Root yourself in your traditions and honor them and don’t let anyone tell you that is not the American way. That is the American way because America is founded on immigrants. Do not give up. We must go forward.”
Lena Dunham:
Dunham penned her own letter for her website, LennyLetter.
“Wednesday was a day of mourning. Thursday, too. Hell, I’m giving us till Sunday. But then we fight. Now, more than ever, our power is in numbers and in our refusal to accept the idea that our leaders intrinsically know what’s best for us, better than the people we meet every day. In the last few days I have watched a little girl cry, wondering if her mother would be deported. I have listened to a black man ask how to explain this to his sons. ‘You tell them, over and over again, not to be a bully or a bigot, to respect women, to be kind, that’s how you get ahead. And now a bully is the president. How do you explain that?’ I see two teenage girls, one Latina, one white, in belly shirts holding hands as they pretend to go the wrong way on an escalator. They’re laughing and smiling and I wonder if they know that together they’re a tiny revolution.”
Aaron Sorkin:
The writer wrote a letter to his daughters via Vanity Fair.
“So what do we do? First of all, we remember that we’re not alone. A hundred million people in America and a billion more around the world feel exactly the same way we do. Second, we get out of bed. The Trumpsters want to see people like us (Jewish, ‘coastal elites,’ educated, socially progressive, Hollywood…) sobbing and wailing and talking about moving to Canada. I won’t give them that and neither will you. Here’s what we’ll do…we’ll fucking fight. (Roxy, there’s a time for this kind of language and it’s now.) We’re not powerless and we’re not voiceless. We get involved. We do what we can to fight injustice anywhere we see it — whether it’s writing a check or rolling up our sleeves. Our family is fairly insulated from the effects of a Trump presidency so we fight for the families that aren’t. We fight for a woman to keep her right to choose. We fight for the First Amendment and we fight mostly for equality — not for a guarantee of equal outcomes but for equal opportunities. We stand up.”
