Fundamentalism
According to his memoir, Marine Corps boot camp at Parris Island was the first time he had any significant experience away from the fundamentalist enclave of Greenville and the BJU campus. At basic training his rackmate was Catholic, the first time he had befriended someone outside his faith. Also, Bob Jones University was notorious for its racially discriminatory rules. At boot camp, Merritt had an African-American drill instructor, the first time a black man had been in authority over him. Merritt has described boot camp as a "liberalizing experience."
When he left his initial active duty training assignments and returned to BJU, Merritt began having problems with the rules and dogma that is a common part of fundamentalist Christianity. A year later he withdrew while on a disciplinary status known as "spiritual probation."
Sexual orientation
Merritt had not yet grappled with the issue of his homosexual orientation. In his memoirs, Merritt claimed that when he attended Bob Jones Junior High School, Bob Jones III, then-president of BJU, said at a White House anti-gay protest that "homosexuals should be stoned to death as the Bible commanded." The hostile environment forced Merritt to deny to himself that he was gay. Once removed from the fundamentalist world, however, he could no longer deny his same-sex attraction.
Periodicals
From 1996 until his resignation from the Marines in 1998, Merritt wrote an op-ed column for the
Navy-Marine Corps Times, a Gannett-owned newspaper distributed on US military installations throughout the world. The
Times had a section called "Back Talk" where one Sailor and one Marine shared their opinions on different aspects of the service. So that he could write candidly without fear of repercussion, the
Times encouraged Merritt to write under a pseudonym so he chose the name "Buster Pittman," the name of his boyfriend's dog. For his columns, the
Times editors allowed Merritt to use his column to advocate controversial positions such as allowing women to serve in combat, reducing the penalty for adultery from a felony conviction to a misdemeanor and repealing "Don't ask, don't tell" to allow lesbians and gay men to serve openly in the military.
This last column caught the attention of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, a watchdog group in Washington, DC who provided or arranged for legal aid to members of the military who needed assistance under the "Don't ask, don't tell" law.
Books
- "Secrets Of A Gay Marine Porn Star"
- "Code of Conduct"