Donald Trump’s anti-trans agenda has already led to a spike in crisis hotline calls. Here’s how you can help the trans youth in your community

I’m going to spare you the exact hallucinatory drivel that has spilled out of Donald Trump‘s mouth regarding transgender people. You can read about it here if you please, but if you’re somehow still unaware of the falsehood-backed stance that Trump and his posse have on the existence of trans people, then you probably don’t care enough about the precedence that his claims set anyway.

Except, maybe you do. Maybe in whatever pre- and post-election haze exists in your body, there is a part of you, however big or small, that cares about queer youth; not just whether they live or die, but also in regard to the joy that they’re capable of. If this sounds like you, consider the following steps as you strive to create whatever pockets of safety you can in an increasingly unsafe world.

The first and most obvious step is to call them what they want to be called, including their name and their pronouns. This isn’t even a behavior that’s exclusive to showing respect to trans people; it’s a sweeping act of respect for another human being. If someone asks to be referred to a certain way, then refer to them that way; to do otherwise would be no different than me constantly referring to you as Crumpy Tangmouth, and then continuing to do so despite your requests to stop.

Perhaps the most important step, however, is to listen what they have to say without judgement. You don’t need to give them any sort of advice; all you have to do is allow them space to show up as themselves. Show by example that love and acceptance needn’t be a scarcity in this world; if you can make that clear to them and allow them that space to breathe, they can develop a far healthier relationship with their own queerness to the point where they themselves become a self-sufficient source of that love and acceptance, not just for themselves, but for others around them.

Because here’s the regular truth of the matter; bigotry is not going away any time soon. There are a lot of very insecure and miserable people in this world who will insist on tearing down others to make themselves feel better about their own lives and existence, and the vulnerability of trans people on of the misinformation surrounding our lives and experiences makes us prime targets for that bigotry.

That is precisely why queer adults and allies have a responsibility to love, so that queer youth (and all youth, really) have a place to flourish, and can prepare to carry that radical love, acceptance, and joy into their futures. Indeed, bigotry won’t go away any time soon, but love is pretty stubborn, too, and it’s imperative that we don’t ignore the power of that nuance as Trump’s incoming presidency sparks heinous bravery in the bigotry of the world.

The third step you can take, then, is expanding your community. Encourage your friends to not worry about understanding everything, to swallow their doubts (that are almost certainly the result of misinformation anyway), and to focus on the one thing that matters most in this great big equation we call humanity; love. In doing so, one space can become two, two can become four, queer youth can become who they were meant to be, and everyone who ever needed a space to well-and-truly show up as they are, will have that. If you can call on your representatives to address trans rights and protections (such as building more gender-neutral washrooms in schools and public places or expanding accessibility for counseling services), that’s even better.

You can also take the time to educate yourself on the trans experience and what it’s like for us to navigate the world. That will better equip you to spot any bulls*** you hear in the news and allow you to more readily understand the pain that queer youth feel.

But really, anyone, no matter how educated they are, is capable of being a light in a world that seems ready to forsake queer youth. This is because we were all born with the ability to love and trust one another, and so by simply trusting the experience that queer youth are having and allowing it to safely exist, love is created within everyone involved. That’s our power as human beings, and we really need to be using it right now.