X-rated Internet explosion wreaks havoc with troops’ careers, lives

By Jon R. Anderson - Staff writer
posted 4/5/10

Excerpt:
Civilian pornography use is high: The most recent studies suggest as many as one in 10 people in the general population suffer from pornography and others sexual addictions fueled by the Web.

But military use, given the largely young and male population, is believed to be much higher.

“Twenty percent would not shock me. That would be a conservative estimate,” says Navy Lt. Michael Howard, a licensed therapist and chaplain who specializes in treating sexual addiction. He has helped dozens of troops and their spouses overcome sexual addiction issues, he says.

Porn can destroy marriages as easily as the infamous “other woman.” According to a 2002 survey of 1,600 top divorce lawyers, more than half of all divorces involved a spouse hooked on porn sites. That same year, Army Lt. Col. David Bartlett Jr. strangled his wife with a computer cable after an argument about his online porn habit.

But the online videos available then are nothing compared with what porn users can find today, thanks to the same Web 2.0 technologies that have fueled revolutionary social media sites such as Facebook and YouTube. Porn 2.0 is as much user-created and traded as it is industry-generated and sold. Online do-it-yourself porn is creeping out from sites such as RedTube and Adult FriendFinder onto mainstream social media sites such as MySpace, Facebook and Twitter. the rest