I am a woman living alone near Philadelphia with a cat, so I guess you could call me a “childless cat lady.” I never wanted children, so I never had any. Since I have dedicated my life to helping other people, for many years I subscribed to all of the social justice causes. That began to change when the neighborhood I live in became a hotbed of crime and leftist intolerance.

Recently, I witnessed a woman throw a large object at a man’s car, break the passenger window, and then casually walk across the street. The man got out of his car and ran across the street to attack her. He wrestled her to the ground but eventually let her go, getting back into his car and driving off. She kept walking, talking on her cell phone the entire time.

I was standing on my front stoop on my way to take out the trash. I stood there, stunned with horror. The man saw me. I did not call the police because I recognized him. He lives in this neighborhood, where one can expect retaliation. It didn’t look like the woman called the police either. She just kept walking.

Yesterday I stopped by a cafe for a bagel. I began frequenting this this locally owned cafe after walking past it one Sunday morning and seeing that all its storefront windows had been smashed. I went in and asked if everyone was OK. Apparently the vandalism had occurred in the predawn hours of the morning. Nothing was stolen—just windows smashed.

I later discovered that on the neighborhood Facebook group people were extoling the act as a way to fight gentrification! The cafe is not a chain and it employs residents of the neighborhood. But that didn’t stop commenters from suggesting that smashing out their windows, gunfire, and loud groups of youth are all good ways to ward off would-be gentrifiers.

About a month ago I heard five rapid-fire gunshots across the street from my apartment. The sirens came a bit later, along with police helicopters.

All of these kinds of things make it so that I am afraid to leave my apartment at night. When I have to, I make sure I am on the phone so at least someone can call the police if I am attacked.

Shortly after Oct. 7, 2023, I saw an explosion of white people wearing keffiyehs. I walked down the street to get to the trolley and heard people saying to each other in casual conversation, “I think Israel should be wiped off the map.”                 

There are “Ceasefire Now” signs everywhere, and not a single poster urging that the hostages be freed. I know if I put one up it would be ripped down. “Hamas” is carved into the sidewalk on the street I walk to get to the park. “Free Palestine” is graffitied everywhere. You can’t walk anywhere without seeing it spray painted. It used to be “Black Lives Matter” and “George Floyd Rest in Power.” Those are still there, but they are far outnumbered by exhortations to free a land that most of the graffiti writers had probably never even thought about before Hamas brutally attacked Israel.

I went to buy a plant at a neighborhood craft store last weekend and the young white woman at the counter was sporting a keffiyeh. The symbol of a terrorist organization is the “in” accessory in this part of town. A family of white people walked out of one of the nicer old Victorian houses with their children last weekend, and the mother was wearing a very fancy, embroidered keffiyeh. I wonder what that symbol means to her, but I am afraid to ask. Questions are often met with violence in this place.

I should have seen it coming. Two summers ago, I was taking my Sunday morning walk, chatting with a friend on the phone while I took pictures of summer flowers. I happened to be relaying the opinion of one of my friends who lives in Europe and is opposed to trans women (biological males) in women’s sports. While I was merely mentioning my friend’s opinion on an issue to which I’d never given any thought, in a private phone conversation, two large white people who looked like women started screaming, “F*ck you! F*ck you!” at me. I kept walking. I am a petite woman and I try to avoid danger. I was so shaken that for weeks I spoke in code about anything that might be controversial if I was in public. People no longer respectfully disagree. They shout you down in a way that threatens worse.

My neighborhood used to be beautiful in its diversity. It is an old predominantly black neighborhood that is close to a major university. It is home to a large Ethiopian community of hardworking immigrants who have built restaurants and shops. Professors and staff of the university have moved in as have a lot of young activists. Twenty-five years ago, when I was in my 20s, I hung out with the activists and supported many of their causes. Over time, I have seen the activists get overtaken by anarchists. They own houses that are not up to code, from which they commit all sorts of illegal acts, and for which they charge desperate people low rents to live in unsafe conditions. When a high-rise apartment building opened its doors a few weeks ago, someone spray painted “Fuck this shit” in red on their “for rent” sign. I suppose they want everyone to live in the squalor they enjoy.

Of course I want to move. I do not care if people don’t like me, but I fear violence. Violence is so well accepted in this neighborhood, as my experience noted above shows.

When I drove through central Pennsylvania a few weeks ago, I felt my blood pressure go down as I left the city and saw the trees. I was not bothered at all by the alternating Trump and Harris lawn signs. I would feel fine living next to people who voted however they voted, as long as they do not threaten violence against me (or my cat!).

The people I feel the worst for are the older people—like the grandmothers I used to attend yoga classes with at the YMCA. They have lived here their whole lives. They have raised families here and have seen way too many of their children gunned down and their sons and grandsons sent to prison. They can’t leave, and why should they? It is their neighborhood, now overtaken by gangs and anarchist white liberals who smash windows and spray graffiti. The gun violence is out of control, yet I rarely see a police car. What I do see is posters and graffiti that says, “F*ck the cops.”

A few months ago, there was a meme on Facebook that showed a white woman saying, “I don’t feel safe in my neighborhood,” and a man answered her, “You literally voted for this.” I now understand that my situation resembles this cartoon.

I have voted Democrat all my life. I supported soft-on-crime candidates because I didn’t want to see people go to prison and lose their chance at a better life. But now I see the ruin that we have to live with as a result of these policies. The white liberals in the suburbs do not live with the consequences of their votes. I do.

The prices of groceries have gone up, and I, unlike many of my liberal friends who hold positions at elite universities, law firms, and media outlets, have to worry about how to pay for food. When I see the liberals perform their meltdowns on social media over the election, I realize how far from them I have moved. I know that most of the swing voters who voted Republican were voting on the economy, crime, immigration, and ending wokeness.       

Like most people, I just want to be safe. I want to live in a place where I can leave my apartment without fear that the man who saw me watch him attack a woman will come back and attack me. I want to live in a place where I’m not risking verbal violence for engaging in private phone conversations while taking a walk.I want there to be police who are here to protect me and other innocent citizens who just want to do our jobs, buy affordable food, and go to the YMCA in peace.

Is that too much to ask? Democrats seem to think it is. Many of my liberal friends expressed horror that “Americans value their pocketbooks more than my human rights.” Apparently wanting to pay the rent and afford food and medications is something we should be ashamed of.

My entire life, I saw myself on the left. But now I understand that the left has left me. I am a childless cat lady for law and order. I want a government that will protect me and my cat, that cares about the price of food and doesn’t say people should be satisfied with a lot of new minimum wage jobs that will not allow them to support their families. I am tired of being told my safety doesn’t matter and that I’m racist for pointing out that there is crime on the streets of my neighborhood.

Kamala Harris urged women to vote for her in secret, to lie to their husbands about it. The irony is that a lot of women did vote in secret, but their husbands were not who they feared telling. Like me, these women voted Republican and not telling their friends and neighbors.

Perhaps I will lose friends. Perhaps I will face professional consequences. I do not care. The majority of America is with me. But this is also a warning to the Republicans. If they don’t deliver and if the Democrats manage to get the message and get their act together with a platform that addresses our needs, we swing voters will swing again.