Last year was filled with a lot of controversy. From the presidency, to the protests, to the #MeToo movement, it seemed like it would be the year no one forgot.

But 2018 has set the bar even higher with just one award show.

As a college student, award shows really aren’t that important anymore. It’s just a bunch of celebrities getting together and getting dressed up to accept an award that, really, do they deserve?

Is Jennifer Lawrence really that great in every movie she’s ever been in? I don’t think so.

And honestly, a little shade thrown at the leaders of the country and a bunch of long speeches that get played off by music. Not my cup of tea.

But the Golden Globes was different this year.

The Golden Globes is the first award show of the year, meaning, everyone is a little curious to see what new scandal will arise from them. Who’s going to fall? Who’s going to give the best speech? Is the host going to say something offensive?

For the first time in a long time, I sat down and watched an award show that  I really and truly didn’t care about. This time though, I did care about the message they were spreading.

No one was carrying a sign, or yelling about anything, but what they were wearing was the message.

The celebrities still walked down a red carpet and were still decked out in their usual glitz and glamour. But this Golden Globes, not many were dressed in colors. Most were dressed in the color black.

It sounds stupid…a dress making a statement, but they dressed like this for a reason.

The Time’s Up movement targets sexual abuse, assault and harassment in the workplace. It’s the sister movement to #MeToo. The final stand of saying, “We know what is happening, now the time is up. It stops here.”

For once, an award show wasn’t plagued with “who looks better” or “who are you wearing.” It was about what was being said without really saying it.

Though most celebrities made it a point to talk about why they were wearing black, whether it was in an interview or in a post on social media. Some even spoke about it in their speeches, like Oprah Winfrey, who made it a point to give her personal feelings on what is going on in the world.

I’m going to pull the “as a woman in today’s society” card, but I’m not wrong, in today’s society it’s mostly women that are victims and women that are coming out and being verbal about these things.

I’m not saying it doesn’t happen to men. Because it does. It can happen to anyone.

It can happen to a good friend of yours, or even just a random person you see on the street one day, and no one says anything because people are most likely not going to believe them or are hiding their own sexual abuse.

It’s a hard concept to wrap your head around. But think about it, if these celebrities took an award show, that they knew would be televised nationally, to put this message of Time’s Up out there and really talk about it, shouldn’t colleges be doing something?

Shouldn’t there be a workshop or a seminar or even just a guest speaker talking about these movements, these protests?

College students are the ones that always have the most to say about things. We’re always the most opinionated, so why aren’t we talking about this more?

It’s a real thing, as scary as it is. And there’s really nothing about it on campus.

And I get a bunch of you are like, “So a bunch of celebrities wore black to an award show, nothing is going to change, is it? The world is going to keep spinning. Sexual harassment is going to keep happening, right?”

Wrong.

The Golden Globes were just one of many ways to get the word out. All of those celebrities with their big social platforms banned together and stood in unity for something they truly believes needs to be stopped.

It does stop now.

The Time’s Up movement got the message out there. It opened people’s eyes.

Changes are happening whether they’re big or small.

CEOs and news anchors are being fired; politicians are stepping down.

A change is happening.

It sparked a fire within the nation. Now a lot of people are googling and reading up on the movement and about the people that are involved.

It should spark a fire in some of you, those of you who know someone or have been abused yourself, or just get angry at the thought.

Things like this shouldn’t be overlooked.

The time of sexual abuse, assault and harassment in the workplace stops now.

Time’s Up.