What's your opinion on relationship cheaters?

[Fizzzzle]

Certain parts of Reddit and Twitter have been blowing up because it turned out one of the members of the Try Guys, who kind of characterized himself as the "family is everything" guy cheated on his wife with one of his employees.

 

Putting aside the "boss/employee"dynamic which is problematic, what do you think of people who have cheated?

 

I don't mean if someone cheated on YOU. There's an obvious answer to that. But like... What if you found out your best friend of 20 years cheated on their spouse? Would you disown them?

 

Story time: I was cheated on in my last relationship. When I found out, of course I was upset, at first. Then, the more I thought about it, the more I was like "... Yeah, that makes sense." We had been running on fumes for quite some time. We argued a lot. There were plenty of times when I would purposely ignore her calls/texts because I didn't want to see her. We weren't in a good space and hadn't been. After she cheated, we met up and just talked for like 2 hours. It wasn't an argument because I don't think either of us were under the impression that the relationship could be saved at that point, but we just aired out years worth of things we wanted to say but never said. We both cried a lot. In the end, we split amicably. We both agreed we should have broken up a long time ago.

 

Point being, do I think she's a bad person just because she cheated? No.

[Mr.Vic20]

I think cheating can be looked at in several layers. The more that is connected to the relationship the more damage it can do. Cheating when you have kids harms a whole family.  Ultimately, good relationships last because the people involved understand one another, like one another,  and grow together, not apart over time.

 

I guess what I think about the cheater is as varied as the circumstances of their cheating. 

[Bacon]

I would never date a known cheater. I would not be friends with a known cheater unless I had already been friends with them for years at this point. 

 

I have never dated anybody so, yeah, but in my mind, there is basically zero reason to ever cheat. You wanna get with someone else? Fine, but break up first. I don't really care about any kind of justifications you had to cheat on your current partner. 

[Fizzzzle]

25 minutes ago, Bacon said:

I would never date a known cheater. I would not be friends with a known cheater unless I had already been friends with them for years at this point. 

 

I have never dated anybody so, yeah, but in my mind, there is basically zero reason to ever cheat. You wanna get with someone else? Fine, but break up first. I don't really care about any kind of justifications you had to cheat on your current partner. 

The friend thing is more of what I'm curious about. Like, what if your best friend of 20+ years cheated on their spouse? The tricky thing is that their spouse is probably also someone you consider a good friend by that point.

[Biggie]

If I were a good looking man who could get pussy I would cheat all the time. 

[Amazatron]

Respect and integrity is big for me for any relationship that I have, friendship or romantic. I don't really care what the situation is, cheating displays a huge lack of those two things.

 

So in terms of if a best friend cheated, I don't think I would instantly cut them out, but I would lose a huge amount of respect for them, would probably be less inclined to interact with them, which would ultimately lead to an eventual phase out.

[Bacon]

2 minutes ago, Fizzzzle said:

The friend thing is more of what I'm curious about. Like, what if your best friend of 20+ years cheated on their spouse? The tricky thing is that their spouse is probably also someone you consider a good friend by that point.

The reason why I thing I'll be willing to remain friends is because we were friends for this long. Like, them cheating on their partner doesn't really change our relationship. I'd want to know why they did it. If the reason was like something like "I just want a little fun, man" I don't think I would remain friends with them.

 

It would be really hard to give up a friend when what they did doesn't really affect you. Cuz like, while their partner might be on good terms with me, I actually doubt I would consider them a friend. I have been in friend groups where I just wasn't friends with some of the people in the group. Sure, they were nice friendly people I was on good terms with but I never hung out with them unless the gang got together. 

[Fizzzzle]

I do think cheating is the death of any relationship, as much as people might try to save it. It might take months, it might take years, but that fundamental break if trust is something that can never be fully repaired.

 

And before anyone says "my grandpa cheated on my grandma and they were together for 60 years!" That was when divorcees were shunned from society, it's not really applicable.

 

Relationships require balance. One person can't view themselves as "better" than the other, otherwise that's just called abuse. Cheating and trying to continue the relationship automatically puts one person in the dog house for basically forever, and I don't think you can have a functioning relationship at that point. The power dynamic has shifted too much.

[Fizzzzle]

12 minutes ago, Bacon said:

The reason why I thing I'll be willing to remain friends is because we were friends for this long. Like, them cheating on their partner doesn't really change our relationship. I'd want to know why they did it. If the reason was like something like "I just want a little fun, man" I don't think I would remain friends with them.

 

It would be really hard to give up a friend when what they did doesn't really affect you. Cuz like, while their partner might be on good terms with me, I actually doubt I would consider them a friend. I have been in friend groups where I just wasn't friends with some of the people in the group. Sure, they were nice friendly people I was on good terms with but I never hung out with them unless the gang got together. 

This is why the Ned Fulmer thing has me so curious. So many people on the Internet who have never met him are immediately calling him a total scumbag because he cheated, and I'm like... If he was your friend, would you feel the same way? If he was your friend, you would just think "why? What was wrong?"

 

Because it's your friend and you have decades of experience that tells you that your friend is not a bad person, and yet they did a bad thing

[Guest]

I guess I would take my cue from the person who was cheated on. Not everybody reacts the same way, and so while it might be a bit weird if I knew somebody’s business but their spouse stuck with them, that’s fine. If the spouse ends up ditching them I think it would be hard to continue having a relationship with the one who cheated as I think that pretty likely feels like some betrayal to the person who was cheated on, if that makes sense.

 

This scenario hasn’t yet come up in my life so I’m just guessing at what I’d think/feel/do

[Chris-]

17 minutes ago, sblfilms said:

I guess I would take my cue from the person who was cheated on. Not everybody reacts the same way, and so while it might be a bit weird if I knew somebody’s business but their spouse stuck with them, that’s fine. If the spouse ends up ditching them I think it would be hard to continue having a relationship with the one who cheated as I think that pretty likely feels like some betrayal to the person who was cheated on, if that makes sense.

 

This scenario hasn’t yet come up in my life so I’m just guessing at what I’d think/feel/do

 

This more or less mirrors my thoughts; I think it would be weird to layer on a moral evaluation if the aggrieved party is ultimately forgiving.

[5timechamp]

It has to be on a case by case basis.. 

 

-some are malicious about it

-others are blind in that they keep exposing themselves to situations that snowball into cheating

-others is just circumstance or lack of tending to relationships..

 

My mother was unfaithful to my father and played the “use kids to hurt him” tactic, I carry resentment for that always.

 

Being in the military the big stigma is that your marriage is unlikely to last the lifestyle.. I just concluded and retired from my time in service and kept all the things I came in with even while being deployed in combat arms and the time sink that is DS duty… in many ways I cant understand the failures or infidelity in the lives of my peers…

 

 Recently a friend in the service who had the picture perfect family broke up.. They are both outstanding accomplished folks with 2 beautiful kids… Im not sure if it was infidelity or just a burden of being a DS that pulled them apart.. that stuff is really hard to judge without living it

 

all that before taking into account the whole religious aspects to marriage

[TheLeon]

Hard to say. My dad cheated on my mom (with a coworker) and that imploded my childhood, so my gut instinct is to say fuck all cheaters. But I suppose there are levels to these things. 

[best3444]

I had an affair with a married woman and she had kids. If I could do it all over again I would have never done it. 

 

They ended up in a nasty divorce. Just really shitty. I wouldn't trust that woman for the life of me.

[Brian]

If I ain’t in the relationship, don’t care. Whether people have reasons or not for their actions, I am not one to judge them.

[Keyser_Soze]

It's not hard to be honest. If they can't open up to their own spouse and can't open up to their friends that they are cheating then I probably wouldn't want to associate with them. It's not hard to cut people off, sometimes they'll do the work for you.

[TUFKAK]

I have a unique perspective here.

 

 I practiced enm with my fiancé prior to going poly with my gf. So I agree being open and honest is important, but I also know life has shades of grey and I can think of numerous reasons to cheat. I’d not care, if I’m involved or if I’m not. If it’s a friend, it’s none of my business so do as you will.

[Bloodporne]

I don't really buy that most people are anywhere near as black & white as their theoretical online opinions in practice. I think it's entirely too easy to judge people when in reality who knows what complicated scenario really played out in the background. And let's be real, if we cut out everyone who did a "bad thing", we'd have almost nobody left in our lives. 

[Keyser_Soze]

1 hour ago, Bloodporne said:

And let's be real, if we cut out everyone who did a "bad thing", we'd have almost nobody left in our lives. 

 

As you say not nearly as black and white but I think there's a distinction between cheated in a game of poker and cheated on your wife or punched a guy at a bar / beats his wife.

[Bloodporne]

10 minutes ago, Keyser_Soze said:

 

As you say not nearly as black and white but I think there's a distinction between cheated in a game of poker and cheated on your wife or punched a guy at a bar / beats his wife.

No I agree, I was specifically talking about cheating/relationship issues. When I said "bad thing" I just meant relationships-related things, not like hey he killed his family lol let's be friends still. Beating your wife...I've never had the displeasure of this happening (to my knowledge) in my friend circle but I know they would more than likely get an ass kicking. 

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Bloodporne said:

we'd have almost nobody left in our lives. 

The older I get the more I like this idea  

[Biggie]

Men are horny pigs. I'm sure there are some who are 100% faithful but no way they don't think about it.

[Fizzzzle]

I had one friend who killed his wife. That was like... I don't give a shit what you were going through, I don't feel bad for the piece of shit in any way and never have. May he rest in piss.

 

Cheating, on the other hand, you don't know what's going on. Not to say it's excusable, but I don't like to paint everyone who cheats as some irredeemable monster.

 

[best3444]

On 9/29/2022 at 4:58 PM, Fizzzzle said:

I had one friend who killed his wife. That was like... I don't give a shit what you were going through, I don't feel bad for the piece of shit in any way and never have. May he rest in piss.

 

Cheating, on the other hand, you don't know what's going on. Not to say it's excusable, but I don't like to paint everyone who cheats as some irredeemable monster.

 

 

Oh, I was an alcoholic monster when I cheated. I ruined an entire family.