I’ve been involved with civil liberties advocacy for over 20 years. I actually started in a limited manner while on active duty, when I wrote my Congressional delegation in my own name to protest military persecution of gay and lesbian troops and asked that the ban on serving openly be lifted entirely. That was 1993. Obviously, that took a few more decades. Still, I am glad to have been on the right side of history on that issue, even if I stood mostly alone at the time and ended up getting some extra negative scrutiny as a result.
I was even accused then of leaking information to the media with regard to Headquarters Marine Corps using taxpayer money to distribute homophobic documents and ridiculous myths from sources such as the Family Research Council and American Family Association as part of an illegal lobbying campaign on behalf of the Commandant. It was not me who made the leak, but I’m pretty sure I know which one of my fellow Marines at HQMC did do that. He or she can choose to shed that light themselves. I won’t be the one busting them. I had no problem with it. 🙂
Anyway, I was reminded of that early bout with advocacy when I saw a fellow MST survivor and advocate commenting on a mutual friend’s page. This person had attempted to silence and dissuade me from being involved in MST issues a few years ago by claiming simple, polite disagreement with her on an important point meant that I was not cut out for advocacy work and then resorted to mockery and trivialization of a fellow military survivor and advocate to silence even minor dissent. Nevermind the fact that I’ve been doing advocacy work for decades now and she has been working at it a mere fraction of that time.
Over the years, I’ve served on many civil liberties coalitions and campaigns covering issues as wide-ranging as interracial marriage, multiracial self-identification, domestic surveillance, illegal detentions, opposition to pre-emptive wars, broken promises by the DoD and VA, violations of attorney-client privilege, police brutality, and in recent years – sexual violence specializing in male survivors and female predators. I’ve even been involved in a lawsuit that went all the way to the Supreme Court. My work is a matter of public record and cited in many publications and books and has been for nearly 20 years.
Recently, my own sexual violence advocacy work was cited by the Committee to Protect Journalists and even the Marine Corps has used my own experience to shape their bystander intervention training program. Now, I’ve been given an opportunity to help train SARCs and VAs for the Marine Corps.
Sometimes, I have to remind myself that I don’t have jack shit to prove to anyone anymore. Seeing someone I’ve purposely avoided reminded me of that. I’ve worked hard and I’ve taken my lumps over DECADES. I’ve earned my seat at the table and I’m done asking for permission or being nice to arrogant assholes simply because they are fellow veterans and survivors.