I saw the movie Selma two nights ago and I’ve been thinking about it ever since. I’ve been thinking about Eric Garner and Michael Brown and all of the other senseless killings that have happened and will happen since people marched in Selma, Alabama.

2014 has been a year of awakening for me and those around me in the world of feminism and racism and bigotry. It’s always been there – that we know. Every year there are senseless acts of violence all around us that have to do with all kinds of isms that make me feel so dispirited about the human condition. But this year, I know I stood up more and said, “No you don’t know what it’s like. Let me show you.”

I walked home from the movie theater at 10:00 pm after seeing Selma. I had my headphones on low because it was 10:00 pm, and I live in Hollywood, and I am a woman. Maybe if I was a man I’d do the same, I don’t know, but I only know my own experience: as a woman, I have to be looking out constantly for what’s around me. I check in front of me and behind me, side to side, I keep my head up and keep my eyes alert.

I know my own neighborhood, and I never felt unsafe on the fifteen minute walk home, but all women can attest that not only do you notice the faces around you (check out this post for a perfect explanation) because there could be danger anywhere, but also because of the little voice in the back of your head where you hear the questions people would ask if you were assaulted or worse: “Well, what was she wearing? Did she have headphones in? Why was she walking alone? Was she even looking around her? Did she have her phone out?”

I take this experience of walking home alone at 10:00 pm in a crowded city in yoga pants with headphones on, and I think about what it’d be like to be African-American, or any minority or anyone that looks different and think about the fact that they live with that every day. Every minute. Day or night, sunshine or not.

They think about what they look like. Who’s around them. What will be said if something happens to them. “Well what was he wearing, a hoodie? Who wears a hoodie? Were his pants on low? Did she defend herself with words? Did he reach at our around his waist or anywhere in his jacket or his shirt or in any way do a otherwise normal human action that would indicate that maybe he had a gun? Did she speak directly to the cop instead of getting on the ground immediately, hands up, despite not actually having done anything illegal?”

It’s tiring, you guys. It’s tiring to live in a world where the media tells women that they should be confident in a mini skirt but not too confident, because boys can’t help themselves, after all. It’s tiring to see another person pulled over because they look “off” to a police officer. It’s tiring to know that kids are getting shot for having fake guns (that we tell them it’s OK to own) and that they’re getting shot for having no guns at all. For walking in the street.

It’s tiring for people to blame it on the fact that they talked back to a cop (I mean, let’s be real, who hasn’t? Erin and Shane can back me up that cop in Meijer circa 2003 was being a jerk). It’s tiring to hear people blame it on the fact that maybe he had a little marijuana on him, or she was friends with drug dealers, or generally was a “bad seed.” Victim blaming is hateful, despicable, and ignorant.

We’re on the edge of 2015. Selma happened 50 years ago. 50 YEARS AGO. How are we still here? That’s not to say we haven’t made progress, because obviously we have. That President Barack Obama was elected is just one small testament to the fact that we’ve been fighting and working as a people to make changes. But we have so much further to go. Women deserve to be treated equally. Minorities deserve to be treated equally. EVERYONE deserves to be treated equally.

It’s easy to give up. It’s easy to say “Not me, I have a life and I’m doing that and ignoring the rest.” But as I heard on the radio this morning: to give up is a luxury. Because there are people who can’t ignore what’s going on, myself included. Because we live it, every day. I take the minuscule times a day I feel less than because I am a woman, and I can’t help but think enough is enough.

Enough is enough, you guys. Let’s make 2015 count. All (wo)men created equal. All men created equal. Let’s stand up in 2015. Let’s make changes. Let’s question authority and establishment, and status quo. Let’s finish what Jimmie Lee Jackson, and Martin Luther King, and Rosa Parks, and Viola Liuzzo started. #marchon