Watch This Powerful Response To Orlando

The LGBTQ community across the United States has been reeling since the mass shooting at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Fla. early Sunday morning. Like many LGBTQ public figures, YouTuber Hannah Hart's response to the Orlando shooting expresses shock, horror, and rage at the slaughter of 49 people at the hands of a single gunman. However, Hart goes beyond just mourning the community's loss: In a video posted on Tuesday, she emphasizes the difference between saying something and doing something in the wake of this tragedy.

News of the attack, which is classified as the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history, broke on Sunday morning, and in the aftermath, thousands of people have expressed their sympathy online and held vigils across the world in honor of the victims. While it's certainly heartening to see people support the LGBTQ community, social media posts don't necessarily effect change — and in a video stirringly titled "I'm Afraid of You," Hart voices her fear that most people will be satisfied with making a single Facebook post and moving on.

"I'm afraid that you've tricked yourself into thinking that you care, but you haven't done anything," Hart says. Later, she adds, "A lot of people are going to say that they're sad. ... And while prayers and thoughts are wonderful and important and good, it's not as important as taking action and aligning yourself with your thoughts and prayers."

She returns to the concept of fear throughout the video — not just fear of the hatred that leads someone to murder dozens of people, but fear of others feeling hopeless and numbing themselves to such violence. "I'm afraid for you because I think you're too scared to be scared," she says.

With that, she moves on to the ways people can take concrete action: Calling their political representatives, signing petitions banning assault rifles from civilian use, and so on. The list she compiled of states allowing civilians to own assault rifles seems to stretch on and on, and when she concludes that the Senators who voted in favor of such legislation are partially responsible for shootings like the Orlando massacre, it doesn't seem like much of a stretch.

"I’d like to pretend that there was a more delicate way of putting it, but I just don’t think there is," she says.

After the attack, a number of conservative politicians have avoided acknowledging the role of weak gun regulations in the shooting; for instance, Florida Senator Marco Rubio claimed it could have happened "anywhere in the world," despite the fact that the United States has the highest homicide-by-firearm rate of any developed nation and is home to nearly a third of the world's mass shootings. Furthermore, as Samantha Bee pointed out in a blistering segment of her late-night show Full Frontal, mass shootings are likely to keep happening if politicians continue to suggest prayer as the only response to massacres, rather than taking real action as well.

In short, it's more important than ever for everyone to make their voice heard, even if it might feel like it gets lost among the others; without the demand for change, what's going to stop another massacre from happening? As Hart succinctly puts it in her video, "There is much to be done. There is much you can do."

Check out the full video below. If you're interested in helping out, you can donate to Equality Florida's GoFundMe for families of the Orlando victims, consider donating blood, take actions to support gun control, or however else you're able to lend a hand.

Images: MyHarto/YouTube (2)