I’ve been anti-military my entire life. My dad served in Iraq and he was always an example on what I didn’t want to be.

I remember being super young and asking him if he killed anybody and he dodged the question. I’ve known my father was a murderer virtually my entire life and was always confused about why people take pride in murdering people overseas.

I remember in elementary school, the entire school doing the pledge of allegiance to a massive flag and felt an innate sense of discomfort. In middle school I began identifying as a pacifist, instinctively rejecting American values. I became an anarchist the first election cycle I was able to vote, and a communist not long after that.

There is not a single fucking moment that I have been proud of my country. I knew what kind people fought for it, after all.