rainfall Posted September 22, 2006 Posted September 22, 2006 Cheating is getting physically/romantically involved with someone else other than their partner, without their consent. The rest may be grounds for a breakup, but it isn't necessarily cheating. To cheat requires i) a prior agreement (monogamy, in this case), and ii) breaking that agreement. Murdering a child is horrible, and grounds for divorce, but it isn't cheating, is it? Neither is going to a strip club (you could be an employee or entertaining clients for business reasons, for example), neither is sleeping over at an ex's house (could have had a car accident), neither is having an opposite friend who you confide problems to (nothing wrong with a genuine friendship), neither is seeing someone on a webcam (oh yeah, *looking* at a headshot of a person - how evil!). Quite frankly there are some ludicrously repressive responses on here. The only person who will qualify under your rules would be the Pope or Mother Theresa, and neither of them are going to get it on with you! Again going to the strip club wouldn't be the reason for the break up. The sexual contact that happens with the strippers would be. There would be no reason at all for my bf to even be in the same town as one of his ex gfs (they all live in other states by now) so therefore he would have no reason AT ALL to sleep over there.A genuine friendship of the oppposite sex would not be a problem as long as either they were friends before we got together or she had a bf. In my mind when I heard webcam I was thinking porno type pictures not tasteful ones. So if you feel my respone was ludicrously repressive thats fine. I am happy in my relationship and my bf is happy which is prbably why we don't feel the need to engage in any of these "cheating" behaviors.
catgirl1927 Posted September 23, 2006 Posted September 23, 2006 Again going to the strip club wouldn't be the reason for the break up. The sexual contact that happens with the strippers would be. There would be no reason at all for my bf to even be in the same town as one of his ex gfs (they all live in other states by now) so therefore he would have no reason AT ALL to sleep over there.A genuine friendship of the oppposite sex would not be a problem as long as either they were friends before we got together or she had a bf. In my mind when I heard webcam I was thinking porno type pictures not tasteful ones. So if you feel my respone was ludicrously repressive thats fine. I am happy in my relationship and my bf is happy which is prbably why we don't feel the need to engage in any of these "cheating" behaviors. I love this whole post. I'm so glad there are other people on here who understand what I'm talking about! I find that people who engage in cheating behaviors justify those behaviors by saying the people who object to them are crazy, insecure, unrealistic and frigid. I hope they are happy in their lives, but they certainly don't seem to be.
mental_traveller Posted September 23, 2006 Posted September 23, 2006 Again going to the strip club wouldn't be the reason for the break up. The sexual contact that happens with the strippers would be. There would be no reason at all for my bf to even be in the same town as one of his ex gfs (they all live in other states by now) so therefore he would have no reason AT ALL to sleep over there.A genuine friendship of the oppposite sex would not be a problem as long as either they were friends before we got together or she had a bf. In my mind when I heard webcam I was thinking porno type pictures not tasteful ones. So if you feel my respone was ludicrously repressive thats fine. I am happy in my relationship and my bf is happy which is prbably why we don't feel the need to engage in any of these "cheating" behaviors. Well, *what you had written* was too repressive IMO. However, now you are saying you didn't actually mean a lot of what you wrote. So in that case my response doesn't apply. I do think though that it's important to distinguish between behaviour that is outright cheating, with behaviour that is inappropriate or hurtful, but not cheating. For example, if your gf/bf sleeps over at a someone of the opposite sex's house, but nothing at all fishy goes on, then they haven't cheated. However, they may well have made you very uncomfortable. That could well be *inappropriate* or *hurtful* behaviour, but they didn't cheat, did they? On this thread, I think many people are using the term "cheating" in a context broader than what the word actually means. Better to call behaviour for what it actually is, rather than whop out the "cheater" accusation when it isn't warranted. So - going to a strip bar and getting a lap dance, sure I can see that's cheating. But going there and just looking? That isn't cheating, since there's no contact, unless it has been agreed beforehand that the guy (or woman) isn't to go. Equally, looking at porn may be upsetting, but it isn't cheating, since there's no emotional or physical interaction between the viewer and performer. However, if someone starts up a long email and MSN online relationship with a porn actor or actress, then yes that would become cheating, at least emotional cheating. Do you see the distinction?
mental_traveller Posted September 23, 2006 Posted September 23, 2006 I love this whole post. I'm so glad there are other people on here who understand what I'm talking about! I find that people who engage in cheating behaviors justify those behaviors by saying the people who object to them are crazy, insecure, unrealistic and frigid. I hope they are happy in their lives, but they certainly don't seem to be. Ok, but in your next relationship, if your bf says that you are "cheating" by chatting to male co-workers, platonic friends, or even smiling at men who you have to interact with socially or professionally, how are you going to respond to him? If he demands you never even speak to a man or hang out with men, wouldn't you call that behaviour ridiculously controlling and possessive, even downright abusive? Yet all he has to do is log onto loveshack and point at your post, and say "see - cheaters like you justify their behaviours by saying the complainer is crazy, insecure, unrealistic etc". What would you say? It seems you need to say no, that isn't cheating - but then you've just implicitly criticised and labelled people here for saying exactly that.
Merin Posted September 23, 2006 Posted September 23, 2006 My perspective is this... IF a person wouldn't feel okay about thier S.O. seeing them do something, hearing them say something, or interacting with another person in whatever manner it happens to be then there is an issue. What is okay for one couple (stip clubs or what not) may not be okay for another... so yeah, you take your cues from your own relationship partner and know fully how your partner feels about topics (porn, clubs whatever) IF you know your S.O. would flip the f**k out over your behaviour with someone (and you know it isn't because they are unreasonable) then you shouldn't be doing it.
silktricks Posted September 24, 2006 Posted September 24, 2006 My perspective is this... IF a person wouldn't feel okay about thier S.O. seeing them do something, hearing them say something, or interacting with another person in whatever manner it happens to be then there is an issue. What is okay for one couple (stip clubs or what not) may not be okay for another... so yeah, you take your cues from your own relationship partner and know fully how your partner feels about topics (porn, clubs whatever) IF you know your S.O. would flip the f**k out over your behaviour with someone (and you know it isn't because they are unreasonable) then you shouldn't be doing it. I agree 100% with this.
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