Particpant to Cheating, What constitutes responsibility?

[velvette]

I really think there is some deliberate thickness going on.

 

Just to make things clear.

 

People are not saying the om or ow are completely responsible for the A, that they are more responsible for it that them. What they are saying is to take the mm and ow/om and ask whether or not the are responsible.

 

No one is talking about legally responsible. They are talking about ethically responsible. Some may not have a set of ethics that see infidelity as wrong, and even if they do see it as wrong, they don;t feel that they hold any responsibility for it happening, since they are not the one married.

 

The question then becomes this. Let's say Jane meets Dick. Dick is married to Ann. For whatever reason, they become involved, and though Jane knows Dick is married, she still chooses to get involve dint he A.

 

Anne finds out. Anne is hurt by the A. The A hurt Anne.

 

Who are the two involve din the A? Dick and Jane. Who is responsible for the A happening? Dick and Jane. Sure, if Jane had said "no", Dick might very well have moved on to Nancy, but Jane didn't say "no".

 

i find it really strange how some are very willing to hold anyone and everyone else responsible for the A except the ow/om, , and that person is one of the two people who were involved in it.

 

 

Apparently it boils down to AP's who don't think they have any responsibility, don't give a rat's behind about anyone on the planet except themselves and possibly the people they are related to or know.

 

 

That's what I'm getting out of this thread.

 

 

No surprise really. We all know these kind of people exist. IMO they basically fit the definition of sociopaths.

[OpenBook]

i find it really strange how some are very willing to hold anyone and everyone else responsible for the A except the ow/om, , and that person is one of the two people who were involved in it.

 

And I find it equally strange how some are laser-focused on squeezing some kind of confession out of the AP - any AP, it seems - instead of focusing on their own spouse/marriage. What in the world do you hope to accomplish with this approach?

[velvette]

And I find it equally strange how some are laser-focused on squeezing some kind of confession out of the AP - any AP, it seems - instead of focusing on their own spouse/marriage. What in the world do you hope to accomplish with this approach?

 

 

How did you come to the conclusion that people aren't focusing on their own marriage or for that matter that people cant focus on more than one thing?

 

 

Its a discussion, if its not of interest to you, why are you here?

[Gloria25]

And I find it equally strange how some are laser-focused on squeezing some kind of confession out of the AP - any AP, it seems - instead of focusing on their own spouse/marriage. What in the world do you hope to accomplish with this approach?

 

Thank you....

 

All this venom should be directed to the WS. But it's easier to blame the OW/OM then have to confront ugly facts - facts like you're probably gonna have to divorce your WS. That your WS is a liar anf laid up next to you ever nite while having sex and/or feelings for someone else.

 

Gotta love it, blame the OW so you can put your blinders back on and continue with the fairytale marriage

[AlwaysGrowing]

Well I'm glad we're finally talking about her actual argument then.

 

I think her point still stands - a hockey tryout who knows (I assume that's what you mean by intentionally) that winning a spot over another tryout will cause them pain isn't guilty of "hurting" that player either - but I'll leave it to her to make that case.

 

What is the "either" in reference to?

[AlwaysGrowing]

Thank you....

 

All this venom should be directed to the WS. But it's easier to blame the OW/OM then have to confront ugly facts - facts like you're probably gonna have to divorce your WS. That your WS is a liar anf laid up next to you ever nite while having sex and/or feelings for someone else.

 

Gotta love it, blame the OW so you can put your blinders back on and continue with the fairytale marriage

 

 

This particular thread is about AP and responsibility.....I think a thread about WS and responsibility would be moot.

[Sub]

Thank you....

 

All this venom should be directed to the WS. But it's easier to blame the OW/OM then have to confront ugly facts - facts like you're probably gonna have to divorce your WS. That your WS is a liar anf laid up next to you ever nite while having sex and/or feelings for someone else.

 

Gotta love it, blame the OW so you can put your blinders back on and continue with the fairytale marriage

 

Nah. I love my WW, and she loves me. After 21 years. I've directed enough venom towards her. I don't hold the OM responsible for anything he didn't do or say. "Lmao".

[velvette]

Thank you....

 

All this venom should be directed to the WS. But it's easier to blame the OW/OM then have to confront ugly facts - facts like you're probably gonna have to divorce your WS. That your WS is a liar anf laid up next to you ever nite while having sex and/or feelings for someone else.

 

Gotta love it, blame the OW so you can put your blinders back on and continue with the fairytale marriage

 

 

This thread is about AP responsibility in an A. What does the WS responsibility have to do with that.

 

 

Are you saying that the WS is responsible for the AP bad behavior?

 

 

Every day in this country ordinary people on juries decide how much blame is apportioned to different parties in cases involving damages. Not like this is an unusual or difficult concept.

 

 

My WS was not responsible for things his OW did to attack or harass me. Why would I hold him responsible for that?

[Arieswoman]

velvette,

My H OW literally went ballistic when I called her H to tell him she was still contacting my H. She wanted to know "How dare you talk to my H and interfere in my M?'' Really??? You think its ok to have an A with my H, but you're foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog because I had a phone convo with yours?

 

My H's OW did the same when I called her fiance and put him in the picture. She came round with H and yelled at me and threatened to put all my windows in, while H stood there like ten-penneth-of-God-help-you.

At this point I realised that I was dealing with two disordered individuals who really deserved each other.

 

I had a good laugh over this as well.

[velvette]

velvette,

 

 

My H's OW did the same when I called her fiance and put him in the picture. She came round with H and yelled at me and threatened to put all my windows in, while H stood there like ten-penneth-of-God-help-you.

At this point I realised that I was dealing with two disordered individuals who really deserved each other.

 

I had a good laugh over this as well.

 

 

LOL. I hear you. If my H had defended her, I'm sure we would not still be married. Fortunately, he wasn't as disordered as his OW.

[Rejected Rosebud]

This is important bc assuming the former is bscly saying "cocorico believes that relationships are like hockey - may the best man win!" whereas what she was actually saying is that APs are no more responsible for the upset that an affair causes a BS than a hockey player is another hockey player they displaced on the team.

 

Knowingly arguing sth other than what the arguer offered for consideration is an ad hominem logical fallacy.

 

We know what she was "actually saying." We don't need an interpretation.

 

What she "offered for consideration" was a logical fallacy in itself, known as a weak analogy.

 

Tryouts for rugby really are not remotely analogous to purposefully setting out to have emotional and sexual involvement with a married person. A sports team is in no way analogous to a marriage in any of its aspects, and winning a spot on a sports team is in no way analogous to falling in love and marrying somebody.

 

But, since that poster chose to use this spurious similarity, they get to observe it being dismantled.

[Rejected Rosebud]

It really surprises me that people talk about hurting children and such, but IMO, a divorce is far more harmful to a child than a discreet affair.

 

IMO, defaulting straight to divorce, at the slightest wrinkle in the marital fabric, is peculiarly American.

 

IMO, it takes a particular level of maturity to accept that an affair need not end a marriage.

 

Now there are some people who flaunt there affair, and that would be harmful for the children.

 

Still, if it is true that 50 percent of spouses do not ever learn that an affair has occurred in a marriage, IMO, most people are being discreet.

 

All this might be true if the concept of HONESTY has no place in your value system.

[OpenBook]

This thread is about AP responsibility in an A. What does the WS responsibility have to do with that.

 

See below.

 

My WS was not responsible for things his OW did to attack or harass me. Why would I hold him responsible for that?

 

Because he was the one who brought her into your M in the first place! She wouldn't even be there unless she was invited in.

 

Every day in this country ordinary people on juries decide how much blame is apportioned to different parties in cases involving damages. Not like this is an unusual or difficult concept.

 

It is when one is trying to be judge, jury and executioner on the social dynamics of other people. Maybe if people like you concentrated on taking your own inventory instead of everyone else's, you wouldn't have the problems you do.

[Sub]

See below.

Because he was the one who brought her into your M in the first place! She wouldn't even be there unless she was invited in.

 

Completely disagree with this. I may invite somebody to a party without asking the host. I'll take responsibility for that. That person starts acting like an a**hole and breaking things....they're responsible for their actions while there. Just because they weren't invited by the host doesn't give them freedom to do whatever they want without some sort of accountability.

[OpenBook]

Completely disagree with this. I may invite somebody to a party without asking the host. I'll take responsibility for that. That person starts acting like an a**hole and breaking things....they're responsible for their actions while there. Just because they weren't invited by the host doesn't give them freedom to do whatever they want without some sort of accountability.

 

So you would just stand there and do nothing like a gimp and watch that person be an a**hole and break things and say to the host, "Hey that's on them, not me"? I highly doubt it. You would help usher that person out the door, wouldn't you? You wouldn't stay and try to wreak some kind of confession out of the a**hole in front of all the other party guests. And endlessly dwellllllllllll on it afterwards... seeking out other a**holes in the world to try to get them to be accountable to you. That would just be a huge waste of your valuable time and energy. No, you would FIX THE PROBLEM IN FRONT OF YOU - get the a**hole out of the party, and never invite them anywhere again.

 

This is totally my point - this desire to get other people who (in your view) are misbehaving, to become accountable to you. It's mystifying. What's the payoff for people who seek this accountability from others?

[Methodical]

My WS was not responsible for things his OW did to attack or harass me. Why would I hold him responsible for that?

 

This kind of makes the argument for the OM/OW not being held liable for the actions of the MM/MW. If you feel your husband wasn't responsible for the OW's attacks and harassment against you, then why wouldn't the reverse accountability also be true concerning whose obligation it is to enforce wedding vows of monogamy?

 

If my H had defended her, I'm sure we would not still be married. Fortunately, he wasn't as disordered as his OW.

 

I think it's great that you were able to work things out, but aren't you minimizing the role your husband played in the affair bc you are still together?

[redheaded-squirrel]

I used to have a brief affair with a married man, I was single at the time, very young. And emotionally and morally immature. So at first, I thought "It's his bad karma, I am not the one who is married here..."

 

After a few months, I started seeing it differently, and my final thoughts before it ended were sth like "Yes, he is the married one in this affair and it is purely his decision to cheat - but you are an accomplice and what you are doing is a betrayal of womankind as a whole. Even if the wife doesn't know it, you are hurting her, you are potentially causing hurt to another woman. And maybe a few years later, that other woman/the wife - that could be you. So don't be surprised if karma "returns the favour."

 

And I ended it.

 

That's my two cents on participation in cheating.

[elaine567]

I think it's great that you were able to work things out, but aren't you minimizing the role your husband played in the affair bc you are still together?

 

It is how it works, and I guess why so many reconciling BSs are not happy years down the line.

 

It is extremely hard to "hate" a person for their actions and then have to play the loving wife/husband at the same time.

It is, I guess why hating the OW/OM enough for two is often the norm, but the niggling realisation that it actually takes two to tango must be a very difficult fact to shake off and ignore.

I think accepting some of the blame can help here. "He/she did it because I pushed them to cheat on me, they are not solely to blame, so I am allowed to love them... "

[wmacbride]

See below.

 

 

 

Because he was the one who brought her into your M in the first place! She wouldn't even be there unless she was invited in.

 

 

 

It is when one is trying to be judge, jury and executioner on the social dynamics of other people. Maybe if people like you concentrated on taking your own inventory instead of everyone else's, you wouldn't have the problems you do.

 

 

Let's see.

 

If one follows your position, that every bit of heartache brought to the bs is the 100% the fault of the ws and the ow/om is in no way accoutnbale for their wn actions, the these two pointts would follow:

 

- if the ow or om chooses to harm the bs or harass them, etc., then that would be the fault of the ws,and the ow should be blameless, as, to quote you "Because he was the one who brought her into your M in the first place! She wouldn't even be there unless she was invited in. "

 

- the the bs chooses to lash out at the ow/om and physically harm them or harass them then the mm is once again 100% responsible for the ow/om pain, as he or she was the one who brought that person into the marriage.

 

Please note that the courts fel hat is nonsense, and both the ow/om and bs would be held accountable. Any attorney who tried the " it's the fault of my ws ' would be laughed out of the courtroom. Why? Because most people recognize that at some point, people are accountable for their own actions and the harm they cause others.

 

I fully realize that for some, every negative consequence form their actions will forever and always be someone elses fault.

[wmacbride]

velvette,

 

 

My H's OW did the same when I called her fiance and put him in the picture. She came round with H and yelled at me and threatened to put all my windows in, while H stood there like ten-penneth-of-God-help-you.

At this point I realised that I was dealing with two disordered individuals who really deserved each other.

 

I had a good laugh over this as well.

 

When the ow tried to blame the A and her subsequent actions after it was over on me and my ws, she was laughed at, and given a very stern lecture about personal responsibility for the consequences of one's own choices. Zero time was given for her lame excuses, and the legal system gave her even less consideration.

 

She was introduced to the concept of personal accountability.

 

She wa told that as an adult, she should have been able to foresee the consequences of her actions, and if she chose to ignore them and go ahead, then that was on her. When she tried to bring up the idea that the way she had been harassing me and our children was the fault of my ws, she was quickly cut off and told to be quiet and listen.

 

In her case, I sometimes wonder if she really is all that accountable, as she was obviously disordered. She is a serial ow, and every time, the A is , in her mind, not her fault, as she was "seduced" . her words, not mine. I had foolishly communicated with her a few times after the A ended, and I once asked her why she didn't just find a single guy to be with instead of mm. Her answer was that she tried to say no, but was seduced and chased every time until she had no choice.

 

If someone really believes that, then maybe she doesn't have control over herself, which is really sad. I don't know if that is really the case, but if what I heard from some of the guys she works with, she did a lot fo the "chasing " herself. If she can;t see that and turns it around to be that she was the one being pursued, then she has some issues.

[velvette]

This kind of makes the argument for the OM/OW not being held liable for the actions of the MM/MW. If you feel your husband wasn't responsible for the OW's attacks and harassment against you, then why wouldn't the reverse accountability also be true concerning whose obligation it is to enforce wedding vows of monogamy?

 

 

 

I think it's great that you were able to work things out, but aren't you minimizing the role your husband played in the affair bc you are still together?

 

As has been said, many times, this thread is about the AP's respsonsibility or lack thereof in an A.

 

 

Please see the beginning of the thread. If people want to discuss the WS responsibility, they should start a new thread.

 

 

I didn't minimize anything my H did. But again, that's not the subject of this thread.

[wmacbride]

It is how it works, and I guess why so many reconciling BSs are not happy years down the line.

 

It is extremely hard to "hate" a person for their actions and then have to play the loving wife/husband at the same time.

It is, I guess why hating the OW/OM enough for two is often the norm, but the niggling realisation that it actually takes two to tango must be a very difficult fact to shake off and ignore.

I think accepting some of the blame can help here. "He/she did it because I pushed them to cheat on me, they are not solely to blame, so I am allowed to love them... "

 

I don't hate the ow in my situation. I hate how, even years after their maybe month long A happened, I was still dealing with harassment from her. It wasn't because she had any great love for my ws or that he had made any promises to her- even she said that- it was because she has issues in her mind and sees everything as a competition. In her mind, he lost, and she couldn't stand that.

 

I hold her 100% accountable for the choices she made about how to conduct herself.

[Rejected Rosebud]

I'm surprised that there are so many people on this thread that don't have any moral qualms about going after a married person. All my life I believed that was wrong, I think I was raised to think that way. As I said before, if I were to get involved with a married man I would feel that I was doing something wrong. If you do it, I think YOU are doing something wrong!

[stilltrying16]

Plenty of cookies to be had - try not to eat someone else's.

 

That would make logical sense. But what if the cookie becomes suddenly irresistible because it's sitting in someone else's lunch box? Never mind that the one in your own lunchbox tastes better & is bigger!

 

Sadly, sexual attraction for many people intensifies when the target is forbidden fruit. By the logic of the forbidden fruit, affairs need society to have moral codes just so they can feel the thrill of breaking the code- sneakily in most cases.

 

And this is the reason weak and snivelly cheaters need to turn their husband or wife into a jailor or a parent so they can get the adolescent kick of defying them. The person being cheated upon may be NOTHING like a jailor, but it doesn't matter- the cheater is too lazy to come up with other boundaries to transgress. Why not just make use of someone so close at hand?

 

What I personally find extremely offensive are the roles into which cheaters cast the person they are cheating on, just to amp up the excitement in their own sordid little drama.

 

So I don't know if shared moral codes have or will ever slow down cheating.

They might even turn up the temperature.

 

I think what could slow it down would be not morality but the power of empathy. To actually begin to see the other people who are being hurt as human, hurt, and lost.

 

I think it's the lack of empathy in our culture that is ultimately horrifying.

Edited April 23, 2016 by stilltrying16

[Methodical]

It is how it works, and I guess why so many reconciling BSs are not happy years down the line.

 

It is extremely hard to "hate" a person for their actions and then have to play the loving wife/husband at the same time.

It is, I guess why hating the OW/OM enough for two is often the norm, but the niggling realisation that it actually takes two to tango must be a very difficult fact to shake off and ignore.

I think accepting some of the blame can help here. "He/she did it because I pushed them to cheat on me, they are not solely to blame, so I am allowed to love them... "

 

To truly forgive and move on w/o bringing up the past, especially during arguments, is a tall order.

 

There are situations where ppl are figuratively pushed to their breaking point, therefore, cheat bc they have been neglected, often times for quite a while. I'm not saying that gives anyone a free pass, but I've witnessed some situations where one spouse let him/herself go unkempt, didn't respect him/herself, much less their partner, no words of affection or appreciation, no physical contact, etc. I've even heard some say they wished their partner would go out and find someone else. In those cases, why counseling wasn't sought before it reached that point, or a separation instituted once the realization that they'd grown apart and love no longer existed in their relationship, is beyond me.

 

IMO, in loving relationships, you take care of one another. When problems arise, as they inevitably will from time to time, you work through them together. (Having a good support system or someone to vent to helps. And, sometimes friends or family can point out things you can't clearly see in the heat of the moment.) The situation might be comparable to a tsunami at the time, and if you are able to ride out the storm, you generally come out stronger as a team on the other side. Sometimes compromises that actually strengthen the marriage can be made. A lot of it depends on how devoted to the relationship both ppl are.

 

You made a very valid point, Elaine .