Leave Veterans and Soldiers Out of the Anthem Debate

The American Conservative:

As the earth warms, storms surge, soldiers deploy, and bombs drop, America finds itself riven over…football.

The litany of arguments and absurd social media posts fervently attacking or lionizing Colin Kaepernick and other kneeling NFL players are simply exhausting. What is much more difficult to countenance is the recurring appropriation of American soldiers and their sacrifices to bolster their arguments: American soldiers fought and died for the right to protest the national anthem, or conversely, American soldiers fought and died for this country, so dishonoring the national anthem is dishonoring them.

We—the vets of Iraq and Afghanistan—are not simple tools in an argumentative arsenal. To use us this way is to reduce the service and deaths of a generation of soldiers to mere political instruments in an incredibly divisive dispute. Whether you are a self-styled “conservative,” “liberal,” or “patriot,” you don’t own—and should not simplify— the veteran experience. Period. Full stop.

Cont....