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Changing their tune

Being a Marine is a tough job. But it is especially tough on the young leathernecks who leave home for the first time and have to live on a military base full of strangers.

The Marine Corps understands that being alone on a military base can be a nerve-racking experience and has created the Single Marine Program. The SMP was established to provide a forum for Marines to identify their specific quality-of-life issues and recommend solutions.

Each major Marine Corps installation has an SMP council that meets regularly and is composed of unit representatives from throughout the command. The SMP participates in volunteer organizations such as Habitat for Humanity and Toys for Tots.

The program helps by offering activities for single Marines, but it falls short of solving all their issues and challenges.

But being single is not all bad. When you are single, you control all of your own finances. You spend money on things that make you happy. Single people get to spend more time with their friends. Many of my friends have gone off and gotten married, and I haven’t seen them since.

When you’re single, you also have more time for self-improvement. Perhaps the best thing about being single, though, is that you can go out and flirt. When you’re in a relationship, the voice of guilt always nags in the back of your skull when you speak to someone else of the opposite sex, even if you’re not doing anything wrong. Single people don’t have these worries.

Maintaining a relationship can be difficult when your job entails the stress and travel requirements of the military. Some Marines deal with the pressure of leaving home by getting married. They want to take a piece of their hometown to their new duty station, and the only way to bring their significant other along with them is to get married.

Being married does carry a lot of advantages. Married Marines share a strong support structure not only with their spouse, but also with other married Marines. While their significant others are away, spouses tend to band together to help one another through what can be the most difficult time in marriage to a Marine.

This is one of the best things about being in a relationship — the fact that you have someone there for you during times of extreme stress. Being in a relationship can also give you that ego boost we all need every now and then. No matter who you are, having your spouse brag to friends about how funny or cute you are will always bring a smile to your face.

Some who marry while in the Corps will have a long-lasting relationship. Unfortunately, for many married couples, the stress of military life can cause an irrevocable rift and lead to divorce. Divorce, needless to say, has both financial costs and emotional strains for all involved. Financial expenses such as legal and civilian attorney fees, the costs of dividing property, possibly child support and alimony, and the costs of separate living places put even more stress on the Marine. The emotional stress associated with child custody and care issues and adjustment to being single again can be extremely difficult.

Unfair treatment?

There have been complaints over the supposedly preferential treatment that married couples within the military receive. I have read numerous letters in this newspaper from single Marines who say that married Marines receiving more pay and better housing is unfair. But let’s look at this logically: Could you really see a married couple living in a barracks?

The solution to making quality of life equal between married and single Marines is not bringing the quality of married life down to that of the singles. The better solution is to improve pay and living quarters for singles so that their quality of life and pay are the same as or perhaps better than those of married Marines.

The Corps is moving toward giving barracks Marines more freedom, including less frequent field days and the ability to personalize their rooms.

And the Navy has a plan to build barracks for singles that have the look and design of high-rise luxury apartments. That’s the right direction to solve the equality problems between singles and married. It won’t happen overnight, but there may come a day when married Marines complain about how good singles have it.