As a veteran, I was trained to stay calm under pressure, to assess situations instead of reacting emotionally, and to carry discipline even when chaos unfolds around me. That training never really leaves you. But there are moments when the headlines hit harder than any field exercise or deployment memory ever could. Watching hate crimes continue to rise across this country, watching people targeted because of their religion, race, identity, or simply the community they belong to, chips away at the idea of the American Dream many of us were taught to believe in growing up. 🇺🇸
Today, hearing about another shooting connected to an Islamic Center in San Diego left a weight on my chest that is difficult to explain. Not just anger. Not just sadness. Exhaustion. The kind that settles into the soul when humanity keeps repeating the same lessons in bloodstained ink. You start asking yourself where all this fear comes from. Why compassion has become so difficult for some people to practice. Why faith, culture, or identity can still make someone a target in a country that constantly speaks about freedom and liberty.
This hits home deeply within the LGBTQ community as well. We have lived through our own chapters of targeted violence and hate crimes simply for existing openly and authentically. The Orlando Pulse nightclub shooting in 2016 still echoes through many hearts like a siren that never fully stopped ringing. Forty-nine lives were stolen in what should have been a safe space filled with music, laughter, identity, and belonging. For many LGBTQ individuals, Pulse was not just a nightclub. It represented sanctuary. Community. Freedom from judgment for a few hours beneath neon lights and dance floors. Losing that sense of safety changed people forever. 🌈
Moments like Orlando and the continued violence we see today force difficult conversations about the direction of this country and the reality of stricter gun policies. That discussion makes many Americans uncomfortable, especially in communities tied strongly to constitutional rights, military culture, or personal protection. I understand those perspectives as a veteran. But I also believe we have reached a point where protecting human life has to matter just as much as protecting ideology. There has to be room for responsible ownership while also acknowledging the devastating patterns repeatedly unfolding across schools, religious centers, concerts, clubs, and public spaces.
The reality is this: fear spreads faster than understanding when people stop seeing one another as human beings first. We are watching division become profitable, hatred become louder, and empathy become treated like weakness. That should concern every American regardless of political party, religion, military status, gender identity, or background. Because once violence becomes normalized against one group, history has shown it never stops there. Hate rarely stays contained. It grows like wildfire through silence, denial, and unchecked rhetoric.
As someone who served, I never believed the purpose of defending this country was so people could live in fear of praying in a mosque, walking into a synagogue, attending church, dancing in a nightclub, loving openly, or existing authentically. The dream was supposed to be bigger than that. Safer than that. More united than that.
Still, somewhere beneath the noise, I have to believe there are more people who want peace than destruction. More people willing to protect each other than tear each other apart. Maybe that belief is the stubborn part of me that survived military life, loss, heartbreak, and watching society stumble through its growing pains over and over again. But I refuse to let hatred completely poison my ability to hope.
Because if we lose that, then the American Dream does not collapse from the outside. It collapses from within.