Navy, Marines Prohibit Sharing Nude Photos In Wake of a Facebook Scandal (fortune.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Fortune: The Navy and Marine Corps issued new regulations that ban members from sharing nude photographs following a scandal involving military personnel sharing intimate pictures of their female colleagues -- some of which were taken without their knowledge -- in a secret Facebook group. The new statute, which was signed Tuesday by Acting Navy Secretary Sean Stackley, went into effect immediately and will be made permanent when the next edition of the Navy's regulations is printed, according to Navy Times. Military courts will handle violations of the new rule. The crackdown comes after a Facebook group was uncovered featuring naked photos of female service members. The group was eventually shut down by Facebook after a request from the Marine Corps. The Center for Investigative Reporting found that some of the photographs posted on the Facebook group may have been taken consensually, but others may not have been.

Comments

Good luck with that!

[TWX]

Good luck with this policy. At best a few sailors or marines will be busted each year for their stupidity, but the vast majority of incidents will never see any enforcement.

I've never been in the armed services but I was under the impression that one of the most important rules for those in authority was do not give orders that one knows will not be followed. Issuing orders that won't be followed helps destroy one's own authority.

Re:Good luck with that!

[HornWumpus]

Simple solution. Required genital tattoos with identifying numbers.

Re: Good luck with that!

[Fire_Wraith]

I'm guessing you've never served in the Armed Forces.

Part of what it means to be in the military is that you're expected to look out for your buddies, whether male or female. You're supposed to be able to count on them to have your back, and you theirs. The military is expected to act as groups, not as a gaggle of individuals, and spends lots of time training to do exactly that..

Personally, I'd believe that this sort of conduct was already punishable under a number of UCMJ articles - certainly under Article 134, "Conduct Prejudicial to Good Order and Discipline." I'm not a military lawyer (or lawyer at all), but depending on circumstances there's a number of other Articles that such activity would likely be in violation of. Regardless of that, though, this kind of conduct is utterly toxic for any sort of unit, and I'm not in the least surprised that they're cracking down on it.

The price of "freedom"

[DeplorableCodeMonkey]

The Center for Investigative Reporting found that some of the photographs posted on the Facebook group may have been taken consensually, but others may not have been.

50 years ago, all of those photos would have been classified as obscene materials and no one would have voluntarily taken them except between some husbands and wives. The single most overlooked practical value that the "old norms" had was simplifying things to the point that someone with a 80 IQ could merrily engage with the opposite sex and know with 99% certainty what was permissible and what wasn't.

The issue also applies to rape as well, outside of clearly forcible rape. Legal fornication acts as static against the signal as far as law enforcement goes. They must now prove purely a state of mind and cannot rely on circumstantial evidence like "normal girls don't ever have one night stands with men they just met."

In many respects, it is not at all obvious that we are freer today than we were when social and legal conventions were simpler and tighter. Now, if anything, the degree of subjectivity is enormously empowering to bureaucrats and law enforcement. Hell, our own former Vice President said that literally all drunken sex involves a female rape victim. That means if you are married, and your wife happily has drunken sex with you, you are open to being accused of rape between the legal acceptance of marital rape and various other statutes like the ones regulating intoxication (and that the state does not need the "victim's" permission to prosecute).

I'll go pop a soma now. It'll take the edge off of our brave new world.

Re:The price of "freedom"

[Cederic]

Drunken sex is not necessarily rape. Drunk people are accountable for their decision to drive a motor vehicle and are frequently accountable for their choice whether to have sex.

Personally I prefer to avoid drunk women. They're just not attractive - unless I'm very drunk myself, in which case they're legally obliged not to rape me.

Re:Ick

[Imrik]

You may have missed the part where a many of the pictures were taken without the knowledge of the subjects.