What women fear
Casual sexism got a shining endorsement the day a 'groper-in-chief' won the US presidency
Comment
My Singaporean friend in the US thinks the end of the world is coming.
She is studying in New York City and knows of an Asian-American woman who was sexually harassed in the aftermath of the elections.
Although the harassment of women and minorities is nothing new everywhere, my friend fears that Mr Donald's Trump presidential win has legitimised hatred towards these groups.
The news over the weekend seems to bear this out. According to media outlets such as The New York Times and Huffington Post, there have been numerous reports of attacks on minorities in the last week.
A 12-year-old Muslim boy in Florida was accused by his schoolmates of being part of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
At another Florida school, some students put up signs to differentiate "white" and "coloured" water coolers.
Then there are the heartbreaking stories of women in hijab being physically attacked in the US. One woman said she was choked after her hijab was yanked backwards by a man in San Jose, California.
Did Mr Trump on his own turn parts of the population into bigots?
No, of course not.
Did he, with his rhetoric against Muslims and Hispanics, make it okay for some of his supporters to act on their bigotry?
And will he, with his sexual objectification of women, embolden men everywhere to act like him?
Perhaps.
Why is this scary for women, both in the US and elsewhere?
In a world where women are still paid less than men - yes, including in Singapore - a female president would have shown our daughters, nieces and ourselves what they can achieve with ambition and hard work.
Now, we fear what our sons, nephews, uncles, co-workers will see in President Trump.
SEXISM
The casual sexism that most women encounter at home or in the office - throwaway comments about thighs, looks, dressing - now has an ambassador.
This is a man who got elected despite boasting that his celebrity status made it okay for him to grab women in a certain, vulgar, way.
This is a man who has judged women on a number scale, fat-shamed a Miss Universe winner, and made fun of the looks of the women who accused him of sexual assault. He flippantly called the comments "locker room talk".
But in January, a "groper-in-chief" will take his seat in the White House.
As Commander-in-Chief, he may make good on his promises to limit US women's reproductive rights, and to defund Planned Parenthood, a network of clinics in the US that offers health checks and birth control for free or at low cost.
It is no wonder that my friend's aunt, who lives in California, is worried about what the future holds for her daughters.
"I have two daughters and the last thing I wanted was a president who has very little respect for women," said Madam Helen Dhanaraj, 42, a Singaporean who has lived in the US for 18 years and is married to a US citizen.
"Now that Mr Trump is President-elect, I can't help but feel a little vulnerable in terms of our overall safety and dignity."
But there is a silver lining.
Madam Dhanaraj pointed out that on the day that Mr Trump was elected, so was Ms Ilhan Omar, a former refugee, who made history by becoming the first Somali-American legislator in the US.
So was Ms Pramila Jayapal, the first Indian-American woman elected to the House of Representatives in the US Congress.
Ms Kamala Harris became the second African-American woman and the first Indian-American (her mother was Indian) elected to the Senate, and there is already talk that she could run for the White House in 2020.
These are women, and minorities, who are fighting on.
You should, too.
Share your views with Juliana at julrasul@sph.com.sg
JLaw urges women to work hard, 'be loud'
In The Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen kicks butt as part of the uprising against a despotic regime in a dystopian future.
Her real-life alter ego, Jennifer Lawrence, is also not taking Donald Trump's presidential victory lying down.
The 26-year-old Oscar-winning actress, who once said that Mr Trump's election might just be "the end of the world", has posted an open letter on online magazine VICE's feminist channel, Broadly.
In it, she urges those who are anti-Trump to stop rioting and to instead channel their rage and fear into hope and positive action.
Is this the stark reality?
It doesn't matter how hard you work or how qualified you are, at the end of the day, if you're not a man?
Is that what we just learnt?
This country was founded on immigration and today, the only people that feel safe, that their rights are recognised and respected, are white men.
I want to be positive; I want to support our democracy, but what can we take away from this?
It's a genuine question that we all need to ask ourselves.
We shouldn't blame anyone, we shouldn't riot in the streets.
We should think strongly and clearly about what to do next because we cannot change the past.
If you're worried about the health of our planet, find out everything you can about how to protect it.
If you're worried about racial violence, love your neighbour more than you've ever tried to before - no matter what they believe or who they voted for.
If you're afraid of a wall putting us all into another recession, then organise and stand against it.
If you're a woman and you're worried that no matter how hard you work or how much you learn, there will always be a glass ceiling, then I don't really know what to say.
I don't know what I would tell my daughter if I were you. Except to have hope. To work for the future.
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 colour, if you are LGBTQ+, if you are a woman - don't be afraid, be loud!
Clinton blames loss on FBI's 'baseless' probe
Mrs Hillary Clinton has blamed FBI director James Comey for her loss in the US presidential race, claiming that re-opening the probe into her e-mail use broke the momentum towards victory.
"There are lots of reasons why an election like this is not successful," Mrs Clinton told her national finance committee on Saturday, reported AFP.
"But our analysis is that Jim Comey's letter raising doubts that were groundless (and) baseless - and proven to be - stopped our momentum."
On Oct 28 - less than two weeks before Election Day - Mr Comey dropped a bombshell by informing Congress that the FBI was looking once more into Mrs Clinton's controversial e-mail practices as secretary of state after new messages were uncovered.
His second letter, on Nov 6, stated that the FBI's review had uncovered no wrongdoing.
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