The Question

Dear Survivor Community,

As I look back on everything that happened over the past several years, I find myself thinking less about the conflict and more about the lessons. Time has a way of changing perspective. What once felt like a series of battles now feels like a series of hard-earned reminders about leadership, trust, and the responsibility that comes with building something bigger than ourselves.

When we started this movement, we were united by a common purpose. We wanted to expose abuse, support survivors, and create meaningful reform. Like many grassroots movements, we were fueled by passion, urgency, and a shared belief that change was possible. What we lacked was the wisdom to recognize that good intentions alone are not enough to sustain an organization through growth, disagreement, and success.

One of the most important lessons I learned is that you have to be thoughtful about who you build with. Shared passion does not always mean shared values. And agreement on a mission does not guarantee agreement on ethics, leadership, or decision-making. Those differences may not appear in the beginning, but they inevitably emerge when difficult decisions must be made and conflicts arise.

I also learned that movements need structure long before they think they need it. Roles must be clearly defined. Authority must be clearly understood. Processes for resolving disputes must exist before disputes occur. Expectations must be transparent, and the direction of the organization must be established in a way that does not depend on any single individual. Without those foundations, organizations become vulnerable to confusion, power struggles, and fractured relationships.

I did not understand all of that when we started. I made mistakes. I trusted too quickly. I assumed everyone was working from the same set of principles. I believed that a shared mission would be enough to carry us through conflict. Looking back, I can see where stronger boundaries, clearer governance, and better planning could have prevented some of the challenges that followed.

Those lessons were difficult and expensive, but they were valuable.

What concerns me most is not what happened in the past. What concerns me is whether we learn from it. Every survivor movement, advocacy organization, nonprofit, and grassroots campaign will eventually face disagreement. Conflict is not the true test of an organization. How people respond to conflict is.

If there is one question I hope our community continues to ask, it is this: who benefits when we lose sight of our mission?

It is never the survivors. It is never the families seeking answers. It is never the children who still need protection. When movements become consumed by internal battles, attention shifts away from the systems causing harm and toward the people trying to stop it. The work slows. Trust erodes. Opportunities for reform are lost. Meanwhile, the institutions we sought to challenge continue operating with far less scrutiny than they deserve.

That is why I am sharing this story. Not to relive old conflicts, assign blame, or ask anyone to take sides. I am sharing it because I believe future advocates deserve the benefit of the lessons we learned, often the hard way. If our mistakes can help another organization build stronger safeguards, create healthier leadership structures, or avoid repeating the same patterns, then there is value in telling the story honestly.

My hope for the future is not that we agree on everything. My hope is that we build movements grounded in transparency, accountability, and shared purpose. My hope is that we create organizations where leadership is clear, ethics are non-negotiable, and disagreement can exist without destroying the mission. Most of all, my hope is that we remember why we started this work in the first place.

The children still need advocates. Survivors still need to be heard. Reform is still needed. The work remains bigger than any organization, any leader, or any conflict.

If there is a call to action in all of this, it is to build wisely. Build with people whose values have been tested, not just their passion. Create structures that can withstand disagreement. Put ethics before loyalty, principles before personalities, and mission before ego. Learn from those who came before you, including our mistakes, and use those lessons to build something stronger than we did.

That is how movements endure. That is how real change happens. And that is how we honor every survivor who trusted us with their story.

With hope,

Jenna Bulis