Peddling Morality

My beloved Corner had a discussion today on explicit* adult material being sold in the base exchange. It began with Andrew Stuttaford rightfully decrying the effort, but soon enough had Kathryn Lopez rallying against the idea of adults in the military being.. well adults, capable of making their own decisions. Kathryn asked for military members to weigh in, so I sent her this missive:

Klo:

As a former enlisted service member, I find the idea of banning pornographic material from the base exchange a demeaning practice. It's true that service members willingly forgo many of the freedoms that are enjoyed in civilian life. This makes them no less citizens, and the few freedoms left to them are all the more cherished for their scarcity. Why should we be able to dictate what these men and women view in their off time?
The counter that it is readily available off base holds little water with me. That is disproportionately unfair to the young and unmarried enlisted members. When you are forced to live in barracks, the base exchange is your primary source of any and all amenities. Even if you are lucky enough to possess a car, getting on and off base is a hassle. Similarly, soldiers posted overseas have few if any opportunities to enjoy the materials of their preference. The base exchange is the only reliable touchstone they have to American culture and goods.
There's a wide gulf between the sale of Playboy, a magazine readily available in most bookstores, and the ridiculous allusions to destroyed cohesion and morale in the emails you posted. Courage, discipline, and teamwork do not require saintly morals. We trust these men and women to make adult life and death decisions on a daily basis in combat zones, but we can not entrust them to make an adult decision about whether they can view explicit material? Sheer nonsense. There is clearly an interest, so lets give our boys and girls in uniform a little bit of a break.

I don't think it will get posted, my emails have yet to make an appearance there, but the concept is bothersome to me. We ask enough of these men and women who still serve without having to dictate their off time to them.

*Explicit in this case being Playboys, as anything more extreme has been banned for at least a decade.