A Letter To My Future Self: Civil Rights Activist And Aspiring Astronaut Amanda Nguyen

I knew all those years ago that, if she could endure in pursuit of freedom, then I could take on the United States Congress, driven by the very same goal. If my first law, the federal Survivors’ Bill of Rights, could speak, it would scream a blood-curdling scream of the pain, betrayal and sacrifice it came from. But, with time, with each passing law that pushes progress for survivors, I like to imagine the bills now chant a chorus of justice. In doing this work, I think back to the suffragists, to Harriet Tubman, to Fred Korematsu: those heroes who are now lauded were branded and stigmatized during their time. This, at least, gives me solace that history will be on our side.

I write knowing that, as you read this, our activism will not be done. Activists need to be ahead of their time, pushing the moral arc of the universe forward. We have always found a way to bend time, to break the countdown clock that dictates our justice. My rape kit was destroyed after six months because there was no standardized process to keep the evidence, and my justice was lost; so I changed the law. I was told that the UN would never pass my resolution, because that was not how the system worked; so I fought for six years and passed it, unanimously codifying survivors’ justice for the first time in the General Assembly. While I dream that the future holds a smoother path to justice, I know that we will always work to pave our own.

As an Asian American woman, our mere existence poses a threat to the status quo. Therefore, we exist. To exist is to be strong. It takes incredible bravery to wake up and face a world that shows you in a million ways that it isn’t for you. In moments of stress, close your eyes. If I listen hard, the wind carries a song for us. Do you hear it? It is the steady beat of the thousands of footsteps for centuries of change to come – a path, a new reality, made possible because we existed.

Love,

Amanda