Revision to Marine Corps Military Equal Opportunity Terminology

1. Purpose.  Effective immediately, this MARADMIN
announces the realignment of Marine Corps program terminology from
"Prohibited Activities and Conduct (PAC)" to "Military Equal
Opportunity (MEO)." This change ensures consistency with Department
of the Navy (DON) and Department of War (DoW) policy.
2. Background
2a. The Marine Corps originally adopted the PAC construct to
consolidate various forms of misconduct– including harassment,
unlawful discrimination, hazing, bullying, and sexual harassment–
under a single prevention and response structure.
2b. Over time, the scope of PAC expanded to include behaviors such
as extremism, criminal gang activity, and certain political
activities, which lead for misconduct outside the statutory and
regulatory scope of the DoW MEO program.
2c. To address this, the DON has directed this realignment to
restore clarity to program authorities and reinforce proper
governance boundaries across programs.
3. Policy
3a. Effective immediately, the term "Prohibited Activities and
Conduct" will no longer be used to identify the Marine Corps MEO
program.  All official policies, training materials, reporting,
and communications will use the "Military Equal Opportunity"
designation.
3b. This change is administrative in nature and does not alter the
existing definitions of misconduct, reporting requirements, or
commander authorities. All prohibited behaviors remain prohibited.
3c. Incidents will continue to be addressed under the appropriate
authority.  This realignment ensures that issues are routed to the
correct functional program (e.g., MEO, Inspector General of the
Marine Corps (IGMC), law enforcement, or command action) based on
governing policy.
3d. This realignment reinforces a critical distinction: the MEO
program is a non-investigative entity focused on its statutory
mission, and it is not the lead agency for misconduct that falls
outside its specific scope.
4. Implementation
4a. Headquarters Marine Corps, Manpower Equal Opportunity Branch
(MPE), will issue a communication plan to Equal Opportunity Advisors
to ensure a standardized, Fleet-wide transition.
4b. Commands will update local directives, briefs, and all other
materials to reflect the change to MEO terminology.
4c. No changes are directed to current complaint processing
procedures, timelines, or systems of record.
5. This guidance remains in effect until superseded by an updated
revision of reference (a).
6. This MARADMIN is applicable to the Marine Corps Total Force.
7. Release authorized by Lieutenant General William J. Bowers,
Deputy Commandant, Manpower and Reserve Affairs.