I didn’t know Sana Yousaf. But when I saw her name, not in a graduation post, not in a birthday selfie, not in a future she should’ve had but as a hashtag, I felt the air leave my lungs.
#JusticeForSanaYousaf.
At first I scrolled past. Like we all do, sometimes, when grief feels too big to hold. But then I saw her face. That bright, open smile, the kind that makes you feel like you’ve known her forever.
And I couldn’t look away.
Sana was seventeen. A medical student. A girl with millions who adored her online, and who still had so much life to live offline. A girl with dreams like mine. Like yours.
And in that moment, all I could think was: This could have been me.
This could have been any of us.
She wasn’t killed by love. She was killed by ownership denied.
Her cousin didn’t love her. He wanted to own her.
When she said no. Not once, not twice, but again and again, he didn’t see it as a boundary. He saw it as defiance. As an insult.
And on her seventeenth birthday when she should’ve been blowing out candles and making wishes. he made sure there was nothing left to wish for.
He broke in. He shot her. Point blank. In front of her aunt.
He didn’t lose her, he executed her.
He wasn’t heartbroken, he was entitled. And he was armed.
We tell girls to be brave and then we bury them for it.
Sana was everything we tell girls to be. She was smart. She was strong. She was clear. She said no.
But no didn’t save her.
Because we don’t teach boys that no is the end of a conversation. We teach them that no is a challenge.
We hand girls the script for survival and hand boys the weapons to kill them anyway.
Sana didn’t die because she said no. She died because he thought no meant try harder, take more, destroy.
And that’s what keeps me up at night. Because if her courage wasn’t enough what will ever be?
Sana’s light didn’t fade. It was stolen.
This wasn’t a crime of passion. This wasn’t a tragedy of love gone wrong.
This was patriarchy, pulling the trigger.
This was male ego, loaded and fired.
Sana didn’t just lose her life. We lost the doctor she would’ve become. The lives she would’ve saved. The future she should’ve had.
Every time I see her face, I see the girls I know. The friends I love. The reflection in my own mirror.
And I wonder: if she wasn’t safe, who is?
I’m tired of hashtags where birthday cakes should be.
I don’t want to chant their names anymore. I want to know them. I want to see them grow old.
No should be the end of a conversation, not the end of a life.
But until that’s the world we build,
we’ll keep adding names to the list.
we’ll keep lighting candles that should’ve been on birthday cakes.
we’ll keep fearing that the next hashtag will be one of us.
#JusticeForSana