This was a really happy and grateful girl. In that moment, she had never been more proud of her county. She had never been more proud to be an American. She forced her mom to take a picture because she assumed that the first election she was eligible to participate in would result in the first female U.S. president. She hoped to one day show her children this picture and proudly tell them that 96 years after countless women devoted and sacrificed their lives in efforts to obtain their fundamental right to vote, a woman was finally elected president. She thought that anything was possible. She thought that the stagnant world we live in was finally changing. She had no idea that she’d ultimately be too mortified to show future generations this photograph. A picture of a 2016 girl who was unaware that this historic election would be determined by white supremacists. A girl who thought she was a part of history, but soon learned that unfortunately she wouldn’t want to be associated with this historical moment. The election was the result of ingrained and systematic racism. It was the result of complete misogyny and sexism. It was the result of xenophobia. It was the result of islamophobia. It was the result of ignorance. It was the result of hatred. And, it resulted in the demise of American exceptionalism. We are no longer the moral compass of the world. We are just the land of the angry white man or, for the next four years, the angry orange man.