Why is the MM always the bad person?

[Sub]

I also do agree with honesty, but people change from what they often originally signed up for.

Does that make it a "good thing", though? I understand people change. The point is that if such a significant change is going to come about, there are much healthier options than to be dishonest with a person you committed yourself to, for all involved.

Edited January 16, 2014 by a LoveShack.org Moderator

[William]

Due to a report, this thread was removed from view and a cleanup performed over the last 50 posts or so.

 

As a reminder, discussion of forum dynamics and/or moderation is always disallowed and will gain members a fast-track to suspension and/or banning. For those who wish to continue discussing why the MM is always the bad person, please continue. Thanks!

[ladydesigner]

Quote:

Utilitarianism is a theory in normative ethics holding that the proper course of action is the one that maximizes utility, usually defined as maximizing happiness and reducing suffering. Classic utilitarianism's two most influential contributors are Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. John Stuart Mill in his book Utilitarianism, stated, "In the golden rule of Jesus of Nazareth, we read the complete spirit of the ethics of utility. To do as one would be done by, and to love one's neighbour as oneself, constitute the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality."

 

How does an A maximize happiness and reduce suffering again My WH's A destroyed me, my families view of him, his friends view of him, my friends view of him, my view of my WH, my kids view of my WH. There is no morality involved in A's. How a conclusion can be drawn as to them being a good thing is beyond me.

[Snipercatt]

[quoteis that romantic monogamous love has only been " enforced" in marriage fairly recently.

]

 

Romantic love maybe, monogamous love not so recent - thousands of years ago.

 

I also do agree with honesty, but people change from what they often originally signed up for.

 

 

Changing doesn't preclude a person from being honest. Be honest about your changes to the person you made the commitment to. IMO that is probably the core issue why the OP asks the question, "why is the married person always the bad guy". I realize that question is a generalization in itself, because some married people are honest after they change.

 

 

In the past it was understood that you didn't marry for love.

 

Marrying for love has nothing to do with a commitment to monogamy.

 

Maybe it's being in a love relationship that is the modern invention.

 

Aspasia, please remember you are a Married Wife posting in the OW/OM forum. What I mean by that is your perspective as a Married Person, in an affair, is a very distinct difference from beng a single person (OW/OM) in relationship with a married person.

[WasOtherWoman]

My affair is a good thing...we love each other, have developed a deep and abiding friendship, have discovered depths neither of realized we were capable of..it is definitely regarded as a LTR by us even if we never leave our spouses (which is not on the cards)

 

If we break up tomorrow, I will treasure the last 5 years, and if i never speak to him ever again , just knowing he walks this earth comforts me.

 

An affair is not a bad thing, it is a revolt against the ridiculous and limiting rules on love that have happened in the last 200 years.

 

 

 

WasOther,

 

Well, it depends on the situation. There's sure some motivation for an affair, and there's some people that are very satisfied with theirs... and some that develop into a long term relationship.

 

As someone who has very happily been married to their affair partner for more than ten years now, i still will go on record as saying that an affair just by nature, is NOT a good thing. They certainly can have happy endings, but, in my humble opinion, being engaged in an affair is hardly an honorable thing.

[cocorico]

How does an A maximize happiness and reduce suffering again My WH's A destroyed me, my families view of him, his friends view of him, my friends view of him, my view of my WH, my kids view of my WH. There is no morality involved in A's. How a conclusion can be drawn as to them being a good thing is beyond me.

 

I don't thnk anyone claimed that all As were invariably good. In my post, I specifically spoke only about my own experience:

 

So yes, I would say that, overall, our A was a good thing.

 

Since, on balance, you describe your experience as being weightd toward the negative rather than the positive, that would not apply - as I pointed out earlier:

 

To return to topic, unless the A caused more harm than good on balance, neither the MM nor the OW should be considered "bad people", according to utilitarian ethics.

 

Utilitarian ethics also provide only one of several ways of viewing life. Those who subscribe to virtue ethics, for example, would have rather a different view, looking not at outcome but at "character", for example.

[cocorico]

As someone who has very happily been married to their affair partner for more than ten years now, i still will go on record as saying that an affair just by nature, is NOT a good thing. They certainly can have happy endings, but, in my humble opinion, being engaged in an affair is hardly an honorable thing.

 

"Good" and "honorable" are entirely different things. For example committing hara kiri is deemed very honorable, but only some would consider someone eviscerating themselves to be a good thing. Equally, a thief who in the process of committing theft inadvertently saves someone's life has done a good thing by saving a life, but not an honorable thing.

 

That said, for some, a man's choice not to desert his family (while making his continued presence in the M bearable through an A) can be seen as honorable, as well as good (if on balance the outcomes of keeping the family together outweigh the harms). It all depends on the individual circumstances and outcomes of the A.

[Popsicle]

My affair is a good thing...we love each other, have developed a deep and abiding friendship, have discovered depths neither of realized we were capable of..it is definitely regarded as a LTR by us even if we never leave our spouses (which is not on the cards)

 

If we break up tomorrow, I will treasure the last 5 years, and if i never speak to him ever again , just knowing he walks this earth comforts me.

 

An affair is not a bad thing, it is a revolt against the ridiculous and limiting rules on love that have happened in the last 200 years.

 

 

That's a very sweet and romantic way of looking at it.

[Sub]

That said, for some, a man's choice not to desert his family (while making his continued presence in the M bearable through an A) can be seen as honorable, as well as good (if on balance the outcomes of keeping the family together outweigh the harms). It all depends on the individual circumstances and outcomes of the A.

 

I would argue, though, that it's a false narrative. If you're going to acknowledge that there are indeed harms to compare the "outcome" to, then are you arguing that the those harms pale in such a comparison?

[WasOtherWoman]

 

That said, for some, a man's choice not to desert his family (while making his continued presence in the M bearable through an A) can be seen as honorable, as well as good (if on balance the outcomes of keeping the family together outweigh the harms). It all depends on the individual circumstances and outcomes of the A.

 

We may have to respectfully agree to disagree on this point. My husband did not feel at all honorable, or good about engaging in an affair and righted that fact as soon as was humanly possible. I did not feel honorable or good while I was his other woman.

 

I do understand though, that not all folks feel this way.

[cocorico]

I would argue, though, that it's a false narrative. If you're going to acknowledge that there are indeed harms to compare the "outcome" to, then are you arguing that the those harms pale in such a comparison?

 

It depends on the individual case. In some cases, there are no harms, or very slight harms. In other cases, the harms are considerable. Similarly, in some gases the positives are considerable, in other cases slight or even absent. And the number experiencing good and harm vary too in each situation.

[Sub]

It depends on the individual case. In some cases, there are no harms, or very slight harms. ....

Again, that's based off of leaving people in the dark. It's inarguable that the potential for harm is ALWAYS present in these situations. Is it not an option to just eliminate the potential for harm, or at least minimize it through a D or separation?

[woinlove]

After reading the posts in favor of dishonesty, I still agree with the OP that it is best to be honest. Honest with one's affair partner, honest with one's spouse, honest with oneself. When children are involved and one is co-raising those children in a shared home, honesty and respect for each other is also a valuable gift to the children as well. [Of course, honesty with one's spouse implies there either won't be an affair or it will be very short-lived and end or be an out-in-the-open relationship.]

 

The trouble is sometimes when you are honest the other person disagrees and you learn you cannot have everything you want. Some here think that is too big a cost and see the cost to themselves in acting in a deceitful way is either negligible or outweighed by the benefits of getting what they want. I hope they come to see otherwise at some point in their lives, because I firmly believe there is more joy and happiness to be found in life when one does treat others with honesty and respect.

 

I think the OP got it right, the one thing to be stressed is honesty. An affair built on lies is ultimately not a positive for the liar or for the lied-to. Same goes for other relationships, particularly those involving children.

[WasOtherWoman]

To bring the subject back to the topic of this thread, I believe that both MM and OW are behaving unethically by engaging in an A. Even if their intention isn't to cause harm, they know that harm is a very likely outcome of their behavior and choose to do it anyway.

 

For me personally, this statement is very true. I knew what I was engaging in was wrong (for ME), yet I still engaged.

[Got it]

I think that we always weigh the cost of things. The potential for harm is a fact of life and happens in many decisions. You deciding to move the family across the country for a promotion may cause harm to someone in the family because they don't adjust well, etc.

 

The decision to divorce does the same thing even without infidelity. It is for the "greater good" but it is weighing the pros and cons and acceptable amount of potential harm. Now a BS may not appreciate that harm to them is being evaluated by someone else with actions tied to it but the idea of making decisions based on degree of potential harm is part of many situations/life events.

 

I am not saying whether or not it is the best practice, just pointing out that there are many situations where "harm" is factored in and potential harm to others is weighed and minimized/over ruled.

Edited January 18, 2014 by a LoveShack.org Moderator

[cocorico]

Who is qualified to judge whether the harm outweighs the good? How do you quantify the amount of good and bad that a decision creates? If a decision causes more good than harm for an individual person, do they get tallied in the "good" category, even though some harm was caused to them?

 

My experience with utilitarian ethics stems mostly from reading Peter Singer's Practical Ethics in college. I've read a lot of Bentham too, but not very much on his view of ethics. From a purely philosophical perspective, I think utilitarianism makes sense. However, I can't see its value as an applied form of ethics because it only judges morality based on the outcome of decisions, not the decisions themselves. How do you take something like a decision to engage in an affair and say with reasonable certainty that its consequences would create more good than harm? Humans are unpredictable in many cases. Had the BS in your case gone insane and decided to kill herself and/or others as a reaction to the affair, surely the affair would have created more harm than good as a consequence.

 

You cannot predict consequences with reasonable certainty - but you can weigh all the conceivable consequences - benefits and risks - and decide whether or not the action is still worth taking. In the hypothetical case you cite, it's theoretically possible that the BS may have killed herself and/ or others, certainly, and in that case the harm would almost certainly have outweighed the good, and the A would then have been a "bad" thing. As many As, judging from the consequences reported on LS, most certainly seem to be. I have never claimed that *all* As are "good" in terms of utilitarian ethics, nor that any A will necessarily end up being so.

 

Personally, I wouldn't say I subscribe to a particular school of ethics, but I am definitely in the deontological tradition. I believe that consequences cannot always be predicted by humans, and, as a result, what matters is a person's intentions. I also believe that some things, no matter how much good they bring into the world, are inherently immoral.

 

See, I take issue with deontological ethics because I believe it lets people off the hook too easily. To me, consequences matter, and matter more than intent. After all how many WS claim that they "never meant to hurt anybody" with the A? Is it good enough that they simply did not intend to cause harm - even if the harm their actions cause lands up being substantial? I'm not so happy with that.

 

To consider another example, possible less emotive - the guy who is drunk, but does not want to inconvenience anyone by staying over after the party / getting someone else to drive him home, so he decides to drive home himself, slowly and carefully. However, he lands up having an accident on his way home. Deontological ethics would let him off the hook, since his intentions were noble. Utilitarian ethics would look beyond his intentions, at the actual outcomes, and hold him accountable for the actual harm he caused.

 

To bring the subject back to the topic of this thread, I believe that both MM and OW are behaving unethically by engaging in an A. Even if their intention isn't to cause harm, they know that harm is a very likely outcome of their behavior and choose to do it anyway.

 

This last line (bolded) is contradicts your earlier claim to favour deontological ethics. The moment you go beyond intent into consequence, you have left deontological ethics behind and joined me in utilitarian ethics.

[cocorico]

Who is qualified to judge whether the harm outweighs the good? How do you quantify the amount of good and bad that a decision creates? If a decision causes more good than harm for an individual person, do they get tallied in the "good" category, even though some harm was caused to them?

 

I meant to comment on this.

 

Who is qualified to judge harm vs. good? Anyone passing judgment on whether an action was "good" or "bad". Each, with their unique vantage point, will tally up harm vs benefit and ascribe a label. We all do it all the time.

 

An issue of perhaps greater significance though is at what point an action can be deemed "good" or "bad" - since consequences are not always apparent immediately, and causality can be notoriously hard to pin down in complex situations. An action that may appear to be "good" at a certain point in time (the atomic bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima! credited at the time with ending the war, for example) may later be regarded as harmful, or of mixed outcome, when further consequences come to light (the extent of fall-out; the subsequent arms race, etc). It is best to regard any views on such matters as provisional at any point, since we can never know the full picture.

[krazikat]

I meant to comment on this.

 

Who is qualified to judge harm vs. good? Anyone passing judgment on whether an action was "good" or "bad". Each, with their unique vantage point, will tally up harm vs benefit and ascribe a label. We all do it all the time.

 

An issue of perhaps greater significance though is at what point an action can be deemed "good" or "bad" - since consequences are not always apparent immediately, and causality can be notoriously hard to pin down in complex situations. An action that may appear to be "good" at a certain point in time (the atomic bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima! credited at the time with ending the war, for example) may later be regarded as harmful, or of mixed outcome, when further consequences come to light (the extent of fall-out; the subsequent arms race, etc). It is best to regard any views on such matters as provisional at any point, since we can never know the full picture.

 

Well, Coco...how would you view it if your mm now husband had an affair? Would you be okay with it?

[cocorico]

Well, Coco...how would you view it if your mm now husband had an affair? Would you be okay with it?

 

How I view it would depend on the outcomes, which are difficult to gauge in advance. Most likely:

 

* he would be deeply disappointed in himself

* I would be disappointed that our R did not allow his needs to be met and him to voice, address and resolve his unmet needs

* his family would be upset and hurt to varying degrees

* his kids, having left home, would be less affected

* our friends would be disappointed and confused, to varying degrees

* his colleagues would be negatively impacted

 

* his xW would be ecstatic, hoping it opened a gap for her to "retrieve" her "stolen property".

 

If the depth and extent of her happiness outweighed all the negative outcomes experienced by all the others, it would quality as a "good" thing, elsewise not.