Personally, I am stepping away from the fight over TCAVA and the Major Richard Star Act.
I have reached the point where adding my voice to either side will not help resolve the disagreement. It will consume time and energy I need for the advocacy work I can still move forward.
I care about the people affected by these decisions. That is part of what makes watching this unfold so difficult.
The Conversation Has Become Too Personal
There are legitimate reasons to examine legislation closely. People should ask what a bill does, whom it helps, how it is funded, and what consequences may follow. They should be able to support some provisions and oppose others without having their character put on trial.
But the conversations I am seeing have gone well beyond disagreement over legislative language.
Veterans are at one another’s throats. Survivors are saying things to fellow survivors that cannot be taken back. Arguments about policy have become accusations about loyalty, motives, and who supposedly cares enough about whom.
Watching that happen within a community already carrying so much is exhausting.
We can disagree about a bill. We can challenge an organization’s position. We can ask elected officials difficult questions.
We should also be able to recognize when the way we are fighting is creating damage of its own.
Accountability Requires More Than Disagreement
The talk of investigating nonprofits over the positions they have taken adds another layer of concern for me.
Nonprofits should be accountable for their conduct. Their positions should be open to scrutiny, and people have every right to question their reasoning.
But disagreement with a legislative position, by itself, should not be treated as evidence of wrongdoing.
If there is evidence of misconduct, address the evidence. If the dispute is about policy, address the policy.
Advocacy requires room to take a position, explain it, and answer criticism. That becomes much harder when everyone is worried that choosing the wrong side of an argument will make them a target. And cost them in Legal Fees that could be used for the programs.
The Damage Will Outlast the Vote
Eventually, there will be an outcome.
The people involved will still have to live with what was said along the way.
A vote does not automatically repair a relationship. A bill signing does not erase the cruel remarks. The defeat of legislation does not restore trust between people who spent months questioning one another’s integrity.
The same advocates and organizations may need to work together on the next issue. The same survivors may find themselves sitting across from one another at a meeting or reaching for support during a difficult season.
We should be thinking about what will remain when this fight is over.
I worry that some of the fallout will last far longer than anyone currently wants to acknowledge.
I Get to Decide Where My Energy Goes
I cannot settle every dispute within the military community. I cannot repair every conversation that has turned ugly. And I cannot make people hear one another when they have already decided what the other person’s motives must be.
I can decide where I put my own time.
Advocacy takes research, preparation, follow-up, and relationships. It also takes enough emotional capacity to keep doing those things when progress is slow.
That capacity has limits.
I do not need to participate in every argument to prove that I care. Neither does anyone else.
Sometimes the responsible decision is to recognize that your participation has stopped being productive and step back before frustration starts writing your responses for you.
Frustration is a remarkably fast typist. Its judgment is less impressive.
My Focus Is on Surviving Spouses
My focus moving forward is on securing meaningful support for surviving spouses, including the effort to raise Dependency and Indemnity Compensation, or DIC, to 55% of the compensation paid to a veteran rated 100% disabled.
That work needs people willing to read proposals, explain the need, build relationships, and keep showing up.
My hope is that the military community will bring its energy and persistence to that effort. Survivors need support that continues beyond a sympathetic comment or a remembrance ceremony.
They need people willing to stand beside them when it is time to ask Congress to act.
The Senate will make its decisions. I will make mine about where my voice can be useful.
For now, that means stepping away from this fight and putting my effort into the work ahead.
I still believe this community can accomplish more together. I want to help make that possible.
