On Wednesday morning, Devon Blow, an illustrator and writer from Los Angeles, posted a quote on Instagram: “I will never surrender myself to hopelessness and despair. As long as I got you, and you got me, we will be free.”
Leading up to the results of Tuesday’s election, she also posted affirmations like “We are better together” and “No matter the challenges, I find purpose in the work we do together.”
Ms. Blow, 40, had anticipated that people might feel anxious and stressed about the election. “I wanted to encourage people to know that regardless of what the outcome is, we can still survive together, and we can still get stuff done together,” she said.
Ms. Blow’s messages about seeking solace in community is resonating with people who feel disillusioned with the establishment. In the aftermath of the election, as some were quick to celebrate — or mourn — the outcome, and others went about business as usual, many young people on social media have, instead, been campaigning for grass-roots organizing and mutual aid.
Juliette Todd, a 19-year-old living in Ann Arbor, Mich., voted for the first time on Tuesday, though she wasn’t satisfied with either candidate for president. But that only made it more important for her to turn to her community for support.
“When you have no trust in the system, it only leaves you with yourself and people around you,” Ms. Todd said. “I feel like I have to look out for the people around me because no one else is going to swoop in and do it.
“Community,” she added, “is a mutual investment. It doesn’t have to be huge or change the world.”
After the election, she began planning a karaoke night with friends, as well as an event for people to gather and talk. These actions, she said, “add up.”
Ayesha Tarek, an archaeologist from Atlanta, also reminded her friends in a post on Instagram on Wednesday to “lean into community,” particularly because of the increasing polarization over the last few election cycles.
“I get the feeling that people do not feel like they’re being taken care of by the federal government,” said Ms. Tarek, 39. “If people feel like they’re not being taken care of, then they isolate.”
For Jean-Sebastien Surena, a 27-year-old living in Queens, focusing on microspheres of influence can sometimes be overlooked.
“I think everything that happens at the larger scale is so sensationalized, it’s easy to get swept up in it,” he said.
On Wednesday night, he performed at a poetry event in the Bronx hosted by Nicco Diaz. Mr. Surena, who focuses on messages of freedom in his poetry, shared a poem about how, at times, he questions the impact of his writing when he looks around and sees the work that has yet to be done. But, he said, he knows he’s reaching people “on the individual level, and the hope is that it’ll propagate eventually outwardly.”
On Wednesday morning, he shared a quote on his Instagram story: “I don’t know that we’re going to save the planet, or abortion rights, or L.G.B.T.Q. rights, or the people of Palestine or Lebanon, or my home country, Haiti. But I know that we still have community. Nothing about today can erase that.”
He said that one person responded to his story about how they had felt encouraged after reading the quote. To Mr. Surena, “it all starts with that one person.”
“Life goes on, and I think the best way to remind yourself of that is by just being around the people close to you and noticing how everyone is still breathing and existing,” Mr. Surena said. “At the end of the day, that’s who’s going to be around, so if you pour into that, then you create this space of protection for others and this space of protection for yourself.”
Some young people on social media have also shared posts about participating in local organizations and elections. Tim Biondo, a 24-year-old digital communications manager at Code Pink, an antiwar organization, urged people who are upset with the election outcome to join a political organization.
After the police killing of George Floyd in 2020, a movement for mutual aid and community fridges flourished, said Biondo, who lives in Chicago and uses they/them pronouns. They have encouraged more people to participate.
“I think with these huge structures, we feel pretty powerless to change the federal government,” Biondo said. “The more local we can get, the more impact we can have over our day-to-day conditions and the conditions of our neighbors.”
In New York, for example, Proposition 1, a ballot measure known by some as the Equal Rights Amendment, was designed to safeguard protections for abortion and for those most vulnerable to discrimination. It passed overwhelmingly on Tuesday.
Natasha Pickowicz, a chef in Brooklyn, said she felt more invested in voting for the proposition than voting for who would become the next president.
“I haven’t felt a truly liberal spirit in the Democratic Party or faith in the electoral process in a long time,” Ms. Pickowicz, 40, shared in an Instagram story on Wednesday. “The only thing I know to do, when faced with that familiar, drowning feeling of fear and anger, is to double down on community, mutual aid, nature, animals and art making.”
Since the 2016 presidential election, she has been recruiting fellow pastry chefs and small businesses in her Greenpoint neighborhood to mobilize and bake goods to raise money for reproductive rights and other causes.
“Repair happens in that more micro, smaller level,” she said. “That process of thinking smaller has actually helped me not feel so anxious about the things that feel big and out my control.”
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