Attention Marines: Stop Masturbating!
Regulating the sexuality of soldiers has always been a tricky task, with issues of health, morale, and discipline (not to mention institutional or social morality) intersecting in complex and sometimes painful ways. Honestly, I’m not unsympathetic to the view that our marines ought to be able to take a shit without getting slimed with somebody else’s stale jizz. But this notice (which might be fake, given that Business Insider sources it as “an image making the rounds on FaceBook” which is not exactly confirmation of authenticity) appears to rely on false medical scare tactics. Supposedly “it’s a notice posted in a port-a-potty on Camp Leatherneck in Helmand province, Afghanistan”:
The BI reporter shared my skepticism about the claim that “there have been several reports…of illness caused by bodily fluids discharge in these facilities” so the reporter:
…reached out to the Navy Corpsman who was my medic when I was deployed to Helmand province in 2011. He called malarkey.
“Unless they’re getting semen in an open wound, there’s no way,” said Petty Officer 2nd Class Eric Dodson, a Corpsman with 2nd Marine Division in Camp Lejeune, N.C. “There’s no transdermal infection passable through semen, at least to my knowledge.”
Malarkey, indeed!
Similar Sex Blogging:
Shorter URL for sharing: http://www.erosblog.com/?p=10707
I am happy to believe the notices appeared in WC’s being used by marines, but as to who put the notices there, well that’s whole different question! ;-)
The acronym FOUO, seen at the top and bottom of the notice, is an information security designation ( http://en.wikip...ology ), which stands for “for official use only”, and means that its dissemination (no awkward pun intended…), is restricted.
You never know what kind of notice you’re going to find posted on restroom walls. I once came upon a bona fide M.S.D.S. sheet* posted beside the soap dispenser…
*Material Safety Data Sheet (required to be provided by chemical manufacturers & shippers to potential handlers & users of the products)
By the way, I couldn’t help but chuckle to myself at the terminology “caught masturbating” as I tried to picture how this happens. In America, where you are presumably innocent until proven guilty, is there atrial where someone is under oath saying “there I was, on my hands and knees on the urine soaked floor, peeking under the door of the stall, when I noticed my fellow marine rubbing one out while sitting on the commode…”