MRFF Defends Active Duty Client from Christian Superior Officer ‘Offended’ by Classic American Literature Written by WWII Combat Veteran

Published On: June 6, 2023|Categories: Uncategorized|Comments Off on MRFF Defends Active Duty Client from Christian Superior Officer ‘Offended’ by Classic American Literature Written by WWII Combat Veteran|

June 2, 2023

A self-professed “believing Christian” military commander was offended by seeing one of his subordinates reading the American literary classic ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ by J.D. Salinger (WWII Combat veteran). Apparently this mid-level military commander felt his subordinate (and their own personal Christian sensibilities) needed to be protected from Salinger’s novel since some view it as ‘dangerous’ because it contains vulgarity, violence, and sexual content. 

J.D. Salinger

Serving from 1942-44 and after initially being rejected, Salinger is drafted into the U.S. Army, where he has a distinguished military career as a Counter-Intelligence Agent assigned to the 4th Division. Salinger’s first day of combat is D-Day.  On D-Day, Salinger lands on Utah Beach and participates in the invasion of Normandy, France as a member of the Fourth Division.

Among other accomplishments, he takes part in the Battle of the Bulge and, later, enters Kaufering, a sub-camp of Dachau. He also forges a strong friendship with war correspondent Ernest Hemingway. Salinger continues his writing career during the war, carting his typewriter around in his Jeep. His experiences in the war leave a deep impression on him and prove to be the transformative trauma of his life and career. His writing is changed forever. After the war, Salinger checks himself into a mental hospital and is treated for “combat fatigue” which was post-traumatic stress syndrome.

The American Library’s Association’s Office of Intellectual Freedom listed The Catcher in the Rye as one of the top 100 Most Banned and Challenged Books: 2010-2019 (https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/decade2019). 

This mid-level military commander apparently thought it was either his command duty and/or prerogative to actually order this subordinate to stop reading the book.  The active duty subordinate became a MRFF client after contacting MRFF Founder/President Mikey Weinstein for assistance.  The immediate results of Mikey’s involvement in this matter were detailed in a June 2, 2023 email:

From: (Active Duty MRFF Client’s and Military Member’s E-mail Address Withheld)
Subject: The Catcher in the Rye
Date: June 2, 2023 at 2:09:41 PM MDT
To: Information Weinstein <[email protected]>

Mr. Weinstein, I am stationed overseas in an active duty combat billet and wanted to finally thank you all the MRFF for intervening on my behalf to help me when my (mid-level military command title withheld) ordered me to stop reading the classic book “The Catcher in the Rye”. I only read it on my personal meal time at the DFAC (“dining facility”) at (military installation name withheld).

He had told me that “as a believing Christian” it offended him to see me read it. He never ever said how it offended him. He outranked me by a lot so what could I do?  I also want to stress that this (mid-level military command title withheld) is always reading aloud from his bible and carries it everywhere in front of all of us under his command and is almost always present with him at our (unit title withheld) meetings.

After you contacted our (senior level commander’s title withheld) 2 things happened within a few days.  First, I was informed that I could go back to reading my book “The Catcher in the Rye” by author J.D. Salinger at the DFAC or any other time I was not on mission duty. Second, Our (mid-level military command title withheld) was told to stop publicly reading from and displaying his bible at our mandatory unit meetings.

This all happened back in mid-April and I’m sorry it took so long to thank you.  I cannot stress enough how much I owe to the MRFF for making this mess go in the right direction.

V/R

(Active duty military member’s name, rank, unit and installation all withheld)

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