We used to know what infidelity was: sex with someone other than your mate.
But the 21st century seems to have blurred those clear-cut lines. Is having lunch every day with an opposite-sex work friend a breach of marital trust? What about a flirtation online? If there’s no sex, is it really cheating?
Such questions arise as societal and psychological pressures challenge deep-rooted ideas about the nature of infidelity. “We are as a society finally coming to grips with what it means to be faithful,” says Douglas Snyder, a psychologist at Texas A&M University-College Station. “It doesn’t just mean to have sex with someone else.”
The rules aren’t the only thing that’s blurry…”We are as a society finally coming to grips with what it means to be faithful,†says Douglas Snyder, a psychologist at Texas A&M;University-College Station. “It doesn’t just mean to have sex with someone else.â€
Did he really say that? When what he reportedly meant was precisely the opposite? Is this bad journalism, or inability to express one’s thoughts coherently?
And, how are readers to be sure what was really meant, unless of course they can appeal to an inner reference-sense of morality to start with?
My rule is: lunch is work, dinner is a date. The exception is when working colleagues are away from home. You have to eat. In that case, context makes the difference. A friendly dinner, no problem. Tell your spouse promptly.
As to online, etc.: if anyone gets aroused or daydreams about the same, it’s a problem. Online pornography is a problem. A friendship, online or otherwise, with a person of the opposite sex which you are unwilling to be fully open with your spouse about is a problem.
Whenever I’m about to do something that may involve another person, be it girl’s night out or what have you, I try to ask myself, “Is this going to be good for my marriage, bad for my marriage or have no effect?” If I think there’s even a possibility that it may harm my marriage, then it’s something to stay away from. (Although I really don’t do girls nites out since I’d rather be w/my honey than anyone else.) Also I think you should just put the shoe on the other foot. If my spouse was about to do what I am contemplating, how would I feel about it? If I think I wouldn’t like it, then I shouldn’t do it to them. I hope that makes sense.
[blockquote] If my spouse was about to do what I am contemplating, how would I feel about it? If I think I wouldn’t like it, then I shouldn’t do it to them.[/blockquote]
Exactly. My wife and I both already had many opposite sex friends when we started dating. We established early on that we would always have opposite sex friends. If I go to dinner and a movie with Michelle, or Audra, etc…. that’s fine. Likewise if she goes with Andy or Brandon, etc that is fine. These are friendships. Period, there is nothing more, no suggestion of something more, no desire for anything more. We both understand this. The problem is when those lines aren’t set. A frined of mine was shocked to find out just after he married, that his new wife expected him to never be in public alone with a woman other than her. Like me he does theatre so half his fiends are actresses. He had assumed since she was ok with it while they were dating, it would be ok after marriage. She assumed after marriage he would not hang out with women.
Talking to each other would clear up most of these questions.
If you’re asking yourself whether it’s infidelity, it’s infidelity.
This is the money quote, I think:
[blockquote]”We expect one person to give us what an entire community used to — family life and stability and economic support and be a trusted confidant and passionate lover and experience adventure with the same person,” says Esther Perel, a couples and family therapist in New York City.[/blockquote]
People have grown so insular. As a now-single woman, I can’t count any married couples as friends. It seems that once people marry, they don’t/won’t keep up their friendships with single people unless they’re trying to play matchmaker. Quite literally, all of my friends in the past several years have been single for whatever reason. Widows and divorced persons find themselves outside of their once-cherished friendship circles. LOL, I lost one former friend for good when she admitted her discomfiture of single me being around her husband when, in great surprise, I blurted out, “You can’t possibly believe I would be at all attracted to or interested in your husband!”
In past centuries, folks socialized much more in community, with social groups encompassing people of similar interests and stations. Men had solid, enduring friendships with other men; women, the same. I truly believe it’s this lack of non-sexual yet close relationships that have spurred homosexual, bisexual, and poly-amorous liaisons. People miss the close, platonic friendships other generations held dear and somehow expect their marital partners to be everything and fill all of the emotional gaps. I think that many of these people who find their emotional needs unmet mistakenly believe they have homosexual tendencies and use sexual relationships as a substitute.
Why would you want to have lunch every day with the same (opposite sex) co-worker?
I think Jesus Himself provided all the “rules” we need in the Be Attitudes. Basically, it’s what is in your heart, not what USA Today says.
bl
teatime, I think this is a very insightful comment. Feminism has had the counter-intuitive result of taking away our social support systems. For both men and women, there are no longer those congenial mens’ and womens’ group and activities where we could each be comfortable as we are. We’re all supposed to be the same, now; but we’re not, and a lot of unhappiness results.
This is why I have a rule that I do not lunch alone with female coworkers, and don’t even chat much with the ones I find attractive.
Katherine,
That’s interesting. I didn’t consider the role of feminism in this but you may very well be right. From the comments of the males, here, though, there are other things at play, as well. 😉
Uh, Ed, do you not trust yourself or are you presupposing that these attractive women who talk to you are automatically “interested” in you? My goodness, are you saying that men can’t even speak to women without it leading to sin?
Some of my best buds have been men. No romantic attraction whatsoever, just entirely platonic and easy-going relationships. Heh, my male friends were the first ones I called when my romantic relationships hit snags, and vice-versa. My son has a steady girlfriend but good friends of both sexes, as well. No cheating is going on and no one feels “threatened.” So, I hope that this generation can return the past emphasis on good friendships and “community.”
A friend of mine was shocked to find out just after he married, that his new wife expected him to never be in public alone with a woman other than her.
That rule has been one of Billy Graham’s for decades. He is never alone with a wone that he isn’t related to. It’s not a bad one. It keeps you away from temptation, and anyone who doesn’t think it wise to distrust himself is a fool. But it also protects you from accusations or simple suspicions.
Basic guideline:
Do I feel like I can go home and say “Oh, by the way honey, I had lunch with Diane today, and she said to tell you ‘hi’.”. If not, stay away.
By the way, for the record, I don’t know anyone named “Diane”, nor do I have lunch with any coworkers unless it’s in a group setting. For one thing, I can’t afford to go out to lunch much.
JE <><
Heh.
I don’t have many female friends, so most of my friends are my husband’s friends from before we were married, mostly men. These guys are like protective big brothers to me and neither hubby nor I have thought anything different. Along the same vein, he often has lunch with his co-workers, some of whom are women, and I have no problem with it.
Our marriage is built on trust, and neither of us have given the other any reason to distrust. We keep in communication with each other and sit down and actually TALK about the “serious marriage stuff” like finances, child(ren), sex, physical health, church, mental health, etc. We understand our marital and family obligations to each other and support each other and our son. Yes, we’ve had a few bumps along the road but nothing we couldn’t work out.
Most of the women in my family have either been divorced or had a child out of wedlock…I’m an exception.
I see my marriage as exactly what it is, a sacrament. I took vows, and I’m gonna stand by them, darnit! Some may think of me as an idealistic young person (I’m 25 and have been married for almost 4 years), but I am determined to see that hubby and I grow old together as husband and wife…unless one of us dies early that is.
I think this view of fidelity grows out of the romantic notion that our spouses are supposed to be our soul mates and are supposed to meet our every need. But I don’t really go for that view of marriage. I adore my husband, and I think we have a good, strong marriage. But he cannot meet my every physical, spiritual and emotional need. That’s not a lack on his part (or on mine), nor is it a lack in our marriage. Frankly, I think that’s an unfair burden to place on one person alone.
I believe at the heart of what it means to be human is a desire for intimacy and connectedness. Like everything else about our humanity, this longing can be powerfully good or it can be an opportunity for sin. However, the sin is not in the longing. It is in how we see that longing and how we incorporate it into our lives.
My relationship with my husband is the primary human relationship in my life. All other human relationships are ordered around it. At the heart of that relationship is openness, trust, respect and accountability. Any relationship I have with any other person, male or female, must have those same issues at their heart. For me, that means I will not have secret relationships from my husband. I will not share things with others that I cannot share with him. I will not be friends with people who do not respect my marriage. Where men are concerned, I have only a few hard rules. I don’t complain about my husband or talk about my sex life with male friends. And I make sure I am never in a place where, should temptation arise, it could be easily acted upon.
I treasure my relationships with men. Those men are father, brothers, mentors, teachers, colleagues, friends. My life is enriched by their presence. My marriage is enriched as well. Through my male friendships I learn to value and love the half of humanity that is very different from me, which helps me to value and love my husband – and even my sons. I think life would be so much less rich if I were only able to love my girlfriends. Maybe it’s time to take back the words intimacy, relationship and love. We have conceded them to romanticism. But they are so much broader and deeper than that.
[i] That rule has been one of Billy Graham’s for decades. He is never alone with a wone that he isn’t related to. It’s not a bad one. It keeps you away from temptation, and anyone who doesn’t think it wise to distrust himself is a fool. But it also protects you from accusations or simple suspicions. [/i]
If someone voluntarily does that, fine – I think they are a little crazy but fine. I would never respect anyone who made that rule for their partner though, especially if they made it after the wedding without warning the partner before the wedding. I would estimate I have around a 50-50 split among my friends. I would find it unthinkable to abandon half of them at anyone else’s say so.
#15
Perfectly put
Jason, I was not implying that all should follow that rule, just that it wasn’t a bad one. It’s a safe rule, and especially good for ministers, given how much sexual sins have taken down many warriors for God. Billy Graham has been doing great work for God without a wiff of Scandal. I would never call his precautions crazy.
As for abandoning your women friends, this rule requires nothing of the sort. It merely requires them to be more public relationships.
Now I’m not married, so take this with the necessary salt and all that, but my interpretation of the vow to “cleave to her alone” makes me think that a demand on my hypothetical wife’s part to never be alone with another women other than a relative is not unreasonable, and that a refusal do do such a thing might reasonably be construed as less than the cleaving that I had vowed to do.
But maybe I’m just a romantic that just takes vows more seriously than others.
Or maybe I can’t see the need to be that close to more than one woman. 🙂
#18
I see what you mean about Billy Graham. Precautions for a public figure obviously have to be a little different.
As for being close to more than one women, it depends what you mean by close.
In my case the fact that these people are women is irrelevant. They are people I have things in common with. My wife and I have a five year old and little money. Consequently we often go out without the other, as that means no baby sitter is required. I am as likely to go out with Michelle as Tim on those nights – to use hypothetical names. She is as likely to go out with Andy as Rebecca. It just doesn’t bother us. My sister I think put it well when she was getting married recently. Her new husband has many women friends, she has many male friends. When a co-worker asked her if she was comfortable with him going out alone with a female friend to a movie, she replied that if she didn’t feel he could be with female friends out of her sight, she wouldn’t have trusted him enough to marry him.
Jason, I understand what you mean about trust. Yes, that should be part of the relationship. I would add that the counter argument has some validity, that we often trust ourselves far too much and do not take sufficient precaution against sin. Hearts (our own) are never to be trusted implicitly. They are fickle things.
As for closeness with women. I may be arguing against an extreme viewpoint that your argument brings to mind. There are some who think that our past relationships with others should not change with marriage (again, I am not saying that this is what you are arguing). I would say that marriage must change them all. And it especially must change a man’s relationships with other women. Whether that means that he oughtn’t be alone with one of his old female friends is a judgment call that I have no right to make, and less wisdom to do so. But I frimly believe that that old relationship must be noticeably demoted to honor the new and sovereign relationship created in marriage.
Another thing I am arguing against is the idea that a female friend can be more friend than female, that somehow a man’s friendship with a woman can rise above the male-female relationship. I have heard men say things like “She’s not a woman. She’s my friend, who just happens to be a woman”.
Sorry, but I don’t buy it. Man comes in two flavors: male and female, and I firmly believe that we will always relate two eachother based upon that male-female relationship. Every other aspect of our relationships are built upon it. If a man says that he doesn’t relate to his female friend as a woman he is lying to himself, and part of himself isn’t fooled. And that part is not being closely observed and gaurded by the conscious self, who has been fooled into thinking that there’s nothing there that might need to be monitered. It’s not a few times that a “friend” has, in a moment of weakness, suddenly become something more. Being forewarned that that is a possibility is some of the way to being forearmed.
I heard on the radio a woman talking about her daughter (I think) who had a mix gender wedding. That is, the groom had a woman as a best man, or best woman. My instinct on hearing that was to think that if I was the priest I would tell the bride not to marry the man, that he wasn’t ready for marriage. And if I found the woman disagreed I would have counceled her not to get married to anyone yet, that she wasn’t ready for what marriage entailed. And in either situations I would have refused to perform the marriage.
I may sound like an inflexible dogmatic reactionary, but the piss poor state of marriage even in the church seems to justify a little reactionary thinking.
Chris,
See I think we come from opposite perspectives – which is what makes life interesting. I don’t feel my other relatianships have to change because of my marriage. Oh I spend less time with friends, and more time at home with my wife, but that’s an apportionment of finate resources 🙂
Marriage is so other, so above and beyond my other relationships that I don’t think they are that related. I have wonderful friendships, but my closest friendship is still nothing like my marriage. It is a difference of kind not of degree. I guess that;s why it bothers me when some couples say their spouse is “my best friend” to me that devalues the special place of marriage.
And I do think a female friend can be more friend than female. Indeed I would say if she is not more friend than female, she isn’t a friend, she is a possible romantic partner that one is trying to relegate to the position of friend. One of my closest female friends and I shared a house for three years. Nothing more, she had one bedroom, I had another, we had many mutual friends, and for a while she dated my best friend. When she was in town recently we went out to dinner together, and the next day she, my son, and I went to a movie. My wife had other engagements at the time. Had she not she would have come with us.
That I think is the key. I have some female friends she is not close to, she some male friends I am not close to. My wife and I obviously have some interests that don’t overlap – he eyes glaze over at a debate over the subtext of Hamlet, mine glaze over when discussing cars for example. Neither of us; however, has friends the other dislikes, or friends who don’t also spend time with my wife and I together sometimes. I think someone else said that if you wouldn’t say to your wife, “I had lunch with Donna today.” That would be a problem.
As for the mixed wedding, I have been to so many of those it wouldn’t even really register anymore. I think that mostly has to do with women in the workplace, and later marriages. The odds are you will have the opportunity to make more opposite gender friends, than in times past. I would feel just the opposite as you. I see it as proof that both parties understood the difference between marriage and friendship. Especially since it was obviously a friendship of which the wife was aware and accepting.
But the main thing comes back to honesty, if one has opposite sex friends, and one;s spouse has no problem with it, then it is fine. If one’s spouse does have a problem with it… different story. If you don’t know that before marriage either your spouse isn’t honest or forthcoming….. or you are an idiot for not bringing it up first.
Then again so many people don’t discuss important things before marriage nowadays. On that I suspect we can all agree.