“It’s not a problem if you don’t look up” a line spoken by Jyn Erso in the new Star Wars film: Rogue One.

A line believed by many people in the world today. If you don’t look up, you don’t see the wrong in the world.

You don’t see the effects of sexism on the victims of rape; where the male rape victims can’t be ‘actual victims’ because they’re men and female victims should have ‘covered up more’ or shouldn’t have ‘acted as if they wanted it’ so the rapist wouldn’t have thought that having sex with them was okay.

You don’t see the effects of white privilege when the “black lives matter” movement is ridiculed and likened to terrorism just because people are rightly angered by the murder of black men, women and children by the very people who are supposed to serve and protect them. Or when native American protesters are hosed down by authorities for wanting to protect their sacred land that was going to get destroyed because the white suburb that the pipeline was going to get placed in protested due to the health risks that the pipeline posed.

You don’t see the pain that an entire LGBT community feels when someone who disagrees with their sexuality and gender due to their religion or hatred of anyone who’s different comes and shoots people in a nightclub for the sole reason that gay people were in there.

Looking down means you don’t see the pain of the Syrian people who are living in a war zone and fleeing for their lives only to be turned away by bigotry and racism by leaders of countries that had a hand in the havoc and war that is happening in their home land.

Rogue One, whether consciously or subconsciously, has highlighted a viewpoint that has become the norm for a high amount of people today. People don’t care about issues that are surrounding them unless it personally effects them or occurs in the place they live.

This mindset is why the British people have put themselves in a situation where leaving the EU will put the entire nation into an uncertain future.

This mindset is why a man who thinks that “grabbing women by the pussy”, demonising an entire religion and building a wall to keep out anyone who is different from his ideal is now set to be the next president of the United States; setting fear into the hearts of all POC’s, women and members of the LGBT community.

This is a mindset that needs to be changed as ironically, the people who believe the elite who impose this ideal are the ones who are most at risk to end up suffering at the hands of the people they voted for. I hope that the people who are affected now by this mindset can try and educate the masses so they can think differently and that would make the world a better place. As Jyn says to the alliance before they go off to fight the Empire, “rebellions are built on hope”.