# What Infidelity (really) Means



## EllaSuaveterre (Oct 2, 2016)

I found this video by the School of Life (whose videos on love and romance I very much enjoy) to be enlightening. As much as I embrace most aspects of Romanticism, I do think a lot of people's lives would be easier- mine absolutely included- if we as a culture disentangled love from sex and vice versa. I find myself struggling to picture a hypothetical situation in which I am sexually betrayed but do not feel romantically betrayed. I wonder if I would still feel this way if sex and love were not so linked in my head. I wonder if unlinking them is something I need to work on. I wonder how one goes about doing that.


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## Vinnydee (Jan 4, 2016)

Half of monogamous marriages fail and yet we still enter into them thinking that it will not happen to us. We deny our genetic attraction to others and urge to mate with several partners for the best genetic mix. So many post here about cheating spouses but so many more never get caught. I traveled 3 months of each year on business with co-workers and almost all cheated. Every boss I had, male and female cheated. Our siblings cheated, all but on our our friends, did not cheat. It is almost that vows of fidelity are spoken with a wink and a nod. Then again, half of non monogamous marriages fail too. I guess it is up to each of us to decide whether we want to go down in flames in monogamy or non monogamy.

After being cheated on twice, once by an ex fiance, my marriage was non monogamous but not open either. Most times my wife and I had sex with others as a couple. Although her girlfriend lived with us for much of our 44 years of marriage, my wife never had sex with her girlfriend unless I took part. I could not get her to have sex without me, and I tried a lot of times. We had what is best called an ethical non monogamous marriage. Best described in the links. It worked very well but requires a lot of trust and control of emotions than monogamy does. I lived both ways in my marriage and I felt the difference. The history of sex, monogamy and marriage is very interesting to read about, but for now here are some links about alternative types of marriages that we dabble in, as well as living in a poly triad. What we believed is to put our marriage ahead of all else, even monogamy. Most put monogamy over their marriage and feel better getting a divorce under the rules of monogamy rather than abandoning monogamy for something else.

https://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-25823/how-an-extramarital-affair-could-save-your-marriage.html

Rethinking monogamy today - CNN.com

https://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-20649/why-my-husband-i-sometimes-have-sex-with-other-people.html


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

One problem with this, if you made a promises to be faithful then you broke it. So it meant something else. Do everything in that video suggests if you want but still trust one who doesn't keep their promises at your own risk. That's the thing isn't it. If you want to have an open marriage have one, just be honest about it. And that is what the video doesn't touch on, can't touch on because it is also not honest. Infidelity is more then having feelings of lust and love and sex, it's about breaking your word, and your word is your honor. It's about breaking the contract, and that to me anyway is enough to change my relationship with you forever. If you can break the biggest contract you will ever agree to in your life. Your contract that you made of your life to someone else, what else are you capable of? 

I can however see where this is going. I can see what people like those who create this video are pushing for. Open marriage for everyone. The problems is still half of the population yearns for monogamy. Worse the vast majority of those who are predisposition to cheat, they will do what they always have, they will lie and say that want monogamy if they want to be with a monogamous person. Then just try to hide their cheating. If say we could make the punishment for doing such much more painful to stop those from doing it and be honest then maybe it would make sense but as it stands now the punishment is light, and this would only make it lighter. If we could tag everyone so we knew who really felt this way then it makes some sense. In other words in this world the only ones who suffer are the one like me who cherish monogamy and who take all the risk because of that fact. This video basically says, your thinking is silly, you should just stop thinking that way. I suspect this was made by some cheater effecting a British accent to make it seem more sophisticated. That's the thing cheaters never get. They have nothing to lose. You don't care about monogamy. But they don't have the courage to at least say they don't.

Then it gets back to what I always say. And why this video is bull****. It's about their character, it's what they are made of. It won't just be with their sexuality, it will be with all aspects of their lives. People who cheat and live dishonestly especially the kind who do so with long term lying and deceit are just like any other thieves. They steal other peoples time and loyalty. They are not to be trusted. So in a sense yes if you want an open marriage, I have no problem with you, but then you haven't committed infidelity, at least as I understand it, have you? 

Lets change the premise of this video and make it just about the contract, does it still hold up? I sign a contract to give you half of all the stuff I grow, because you give me a beautiful piece of land. Now someone else comes along and offers to give me a nicer piece of land with a stream on it. Can I break my contract and give half of what I grow to this new person instead? Not unless I pay back my dept to the first person. That is also what infidelity means, no matter what this bull**** video says.

I'm glad most of the comments are not having it.

Also in a world like this the men will make out much better then the women. No matter how anyone likes to present it. Men are far more dispositioned to separating the physical act of sex with the emotional one then the women are. Women who cheat most of the time at least emotionally leave or have left. Start teaching all your men that sex and emotion are not the same, marriage and fidelity are not necessary and you are going to get a lot of men having sex and very little commitment. People will marry for status, just like they did in the history before this.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Vinnydee said:


> Half of monogamous marriages fail and yet we still enter into them thinking that it will not happen to us and denying our genetic attraction to others and need to mate with several partners for the best genetic mix.


How many open marriages fail I wonder? Is there a better success rate, I highly doubt it? See that's the premise of your comment, monogamous marriages fail, therefore open one wouldn't or in your case polygamous won't. I don't buy it. I think the better argument is half fail so don't get married. That one seem to be growing stronger every day. Just wait until the sexbots.


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## Rocky Mountain Yeti (Apr 23, 2017)

sokillme said:


> How many open marriages fail I wonder? Is there a better success rate, I highly doubt it? See that's the premise of your comment, monogamous marriages fail, therefore open one wouldn't or in your case polygamous won't. I don't buy it. I think the better argument is half fail so don't get married. That one seem to be growing stronger every day. Just wait until the sexbots.


The failure rate for open marriages is much higher.

Moreover, surveys indicate that 80-90% of those in open marriages believe opening the marriage weakened it rather than strengthen it.


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## Mizzbak (Sep 10, 2016)

Interesting video. 

I think it philosophically addresses a possible sub-type of infidelity, and also probably overestimates its prevalence. Presumably ONS's are the clearest example of such "a passing surface desire for erotic excitement"? I have observed a tendency on TAM for posters to be far more likely to encourage forgiveness of single ONS's (compared to LTA's). Perhaps because they can be argued to only be a single fall from grace? What is interesting about this view is that it shifts attention from the primary relationship to the unfaithful one. 

I think that that the greatest proportion of affairs arise from a WS feeling contempt for their primary relationship. That infidelity is primarily an act against one's spouse, not towards the affair partner. Fidelity (sexual. emotional, virtual ... ) is part of our core understanding of mutual commitment. And both partners know and agree to this. Fidelity is about remaining true to the jointly understood promises we make to our spouse, even in an open marriage. Which is why infidelity speaks directly to the attitude of the offending party towards the relationship and their spouse. So I think that the concept of open marriages as a solution makes no sense. It would more sense to say that any idea of fidelity to the relationship agreement (whatever that may be) is a waste of time. 

For me, the vast majority of infidelity is primarily defined by deceit. Of the BS by the WS ... where the AP is really just a tool for demonstrating this. Maybe that is my way of making my husband's AP less powerful in my situation. But it does gel with how easily he walked away from the woman he almost destroyed our family for. And I think that many WS's are like that, once out of "the fog". Does the fact that my husband passionately kissed another woman hurt me? Of course it does. But, it is the times that he told me he loved me and then drove off to meet his AP for coffee, or sent me supportively loving messages and then quickly followed those with flirtatious ones to her that have caused the greater pain and damage. I think that that behaviour has more to do with him deciding that he deserved and/or could get away with something that was entirely contrary to the definition of the relationship we share. And less to do with any absolute feelings/attraction felt towards her. This makes more sense to me than the thought of my husband being overcome by a passing desire for erotic excitement, whilst still feeling an ongoing, sincere commitment to me. I'd rather think of him as someone selfish, angry and self-deluding enough to convince himself that our marriage commitment didn't have to apply to him anymore, than someone with no control of his impulses who was lured off the straight and narrow by pheromones. FWIW.


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## zookeeper (Oct 2, 2012)

Infidelity damages a relationship because of the betrayal. The broken promise of monogamous commitment. The inevitable lying and intentional deception.

Plenty of people have sex without equating it to love. The two are far from inextricably linked. I wasn't in love or pursuing a relationship with most of the women I had sex with. That assertion is nonsense. The whole video sounds like yet another attempt to excuse cheating with the old, worn out "He/she didn't mean anything to me." with a British accent added to increase credibility.

If you made a commitment to be faithful and share your sexuality with one person, anything less is betrayal. No matter how you might want to spin it to get off the hook or feel better about your actions. If you don't like monogamy, don't commit to it. Simple.

Many people do wrong and seek ways to justify it. That doesn't mean those you have wronged will agree.


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## SunCMars (Feb 29, 2016)

This is nonsense.

Contrary to our existing world, our existing genetic makeup.

No culture would survive where individual men and women have no bonding principle.

Who would raise the children? A collective? As in a Hippy Commune? As in advanced Socialism and Communism? 

Where women are passed around as cattle? Or women themselves jump and flitter-flirt from one man to another?

What about innate and natural jealousy? A man claiming a women for his own. Or vice-versa. This WILL still happen.

What about a women's powerful urge to become a mother? Does this feeling just go away via cultural conditioning?

Take the children out of the equation and this might work for a while. But the society that does this will die out for lack of fresh replacements.

Our present culture with EQUALITY OF THE SEXES, will doom this lifestlye. Each sex has different needs and different outlooks, culture aside.

And men being the stronger sex [physically and violence wise] will still dominate the outcome(s).


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## Rocky Mountain Yeti (Apr 23, 2017)

I guess I'm bound by romanticism, and I may well be in the minority, especially relative to other men.

For me, the loving and the screwing _are _inextricably linked. Personally, I can't see it any other way. 

I my single days, I had no shortage of offers from attractive women--which I turned down quite flatly due to my not having feelings for them. For me, the words "casual" and "sex" just don't go together. I find sex to be an inherently intimate thing, and I don't do intimate outside an intimate relationship. 

With that foundation, for both my wife and I, we are easily able to keep the probability of that particular "catastrophe" at absolute zero, saving our energy to deal with whatever other difficulties may insert themselves into our marriage.


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## GusPolinski (Jan 21, 2014)

EllaSuaveterre said:


> I found this video by the School of Life (whose videos on love and romance I very much enjoy) to be enlightening. As much as I embrace most aspects of Romanticism, I do think a lot of people's lives would be easier- mine absolutely included- if we as a culture disentangled love from sex and vice versa. I find myself struggling to picture a hypothetical situation in which I am sexually betrayed but do not feel romantically betrayed. I wonder if I would still feel this way if sex and love were not so linked in my head. I wonder if unlinking them is something I need to work on. I wonder how one goes about doing that.
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLq1ktogxn4





Vinnydee said:


> Half of monogamous marriages fail and yet we still enter into them thinking that it will not happen to us. We deny our genetic attraction to others and urge to mate with several partners for the best genetic mix. So many post here about cheating spouses but so many more never get caught. I traveled 3 months of each year on business with co-workers and almost all cheated. Every boss I had, male and female cheated. Our siblings cheated, all but on our our friends, did not cheat. It is almost that vows of fidelity are spoken with a wink and a nod. Then again, half of non monogamous marriages fail too. I guess it is up to each of us to decide whether we want to go down in flames in monogamy or non monogamy.
> 
> After being cheated on twice, once by an ex fiance, my marriage was non monogamous but not open either. Most times my wife and I had sex with others as a couple. Although her girlfriend lived with us for much of our 44 years of marriage, my wife never had sex with her girlfriend unless I took part. I could not get her to have sex without me, and I tried a lot of times. We had what is best called an ethical non monogamous marriage. Best described in the links. It worked very well but requires a lot of trust and control of emotions than monogamy does. I lived both ways in my marriage and I felt the difference. The history of sex, monogamy and marriage is very interesting to read about, but for now here are some links about alternative types of marriages that we dabble in, as well as living in a poly triad. What we believed is to put our marriage ahead of all else, even monogamy. Most put monogamy over their marriage and feel better getting a divorce under the rules of monogamy rather than abandoning monogamy for something else.
> 
> ...


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## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

*I do know what infidelity is not:

It shows no regard for the holy or civil vows that partners take to always be true and faithful to each other!

It flies in the face of holding your partners psychological and physiological faithfulness intact for only each other.

It doesn't concern itself about the biological security of a family or of each other, pretty much letting the wayward partner bring home seminal fluid which could well impregnate her; or him leaning his affair partner somewhere else in much the same shape!

If we're going to start living like that, let's start soliciting our legislators to make such no-fault adultery the law of the land! 

God made us foremostly in His image and the dominant life form above all others! He gave us vows for a reason! 

Why can't we follow them? *


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## TDSC60 (Dec 8, 2011)

EllaSuaveterre said:


> I found this video by the School of Life (whose videos on love and romance I very much enjoy) to be enlightening. As much as I embrace most aspects of Romanticism, I do think a lot of people's lives would be easier- mine absolutely included- if we as a culture disentangled love from sex and vice versa. I find myself struggling to picture a hypothetical situation in which I am sexually betrayed but do not feel romantically betrayed. I wonder if I would still feel this way if sex and love were not so linked in my head. I wonder if unlinking them is something I need to work on. I wonder how one goes about doing that.
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLq1ktogxn4


So if you work on separating sex from love and succeed, what would you gain from this new enlightenment being a married woman?

Does you husband feel the same way? Would you both agree to an open marriage at that point? Is your goal polyamorous relationships?


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## StillSearching (Feb 8, 2013)

To me my experience is not about sex. It about betrayal plain and simple. 
The visions of sex just remind me of the betrayal.
I know marriage may work against nature. 
Betrayal is the dark side of nature.
Truth is the light side of nature.


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## Mizzbak (Sep 10, 2016)

SunCMars said:


> flitter-flirt


SunC - you paint so beautifully with words ... 




SunCMars said:


> ...And men being the stronger sex [physically and violence wise] will still dominate the outcome(s).


But on your last point, I must disagree. 
Most strongly.
:smile2:


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## MrsAldi (Apr 15, 2016)

The man behind these videos believes that adultery is an invented term. 

Sent from my F3311 using Tapatalk


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## Mizzbak (Sep 10, 2016)

GusPolinski said:


>


Dear Gus, 
If you scare away all the dissenting views...
What fun will there be in the rest of us, 
Sitting here - agreeing with ourselves?


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## GusPolinski (Jan 21, 2014)

Mizzbak said:


> Dear Gus,
> If you scare away all the dissenting views...
> What fun will there be in the rest of us,
> Sitting here - agreeing with ourselves?


Anyone "scared away" by that simple gesture isn't worth listening to anyway.

Along with many who aren't.


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## GusPolinski (Jan 21, 2014)

Mizzbak said:


> Dear Gus,
> If you scare away all the dissenting views...
> What fun will there be in the rest of us,
> Sitting here - agreeing with ourselves?





MrsAldi said:


> The man behind these videos believes that adultery is an invented term.


All terms are invented, but anyone that would single out the word "adultery" is such a way is clearly a ****ing idiot.


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## Robbie1234 (Feb 8, 2017)

Anyone who would allow a ons to go unpunished is making a rod for his own back.It may start asa ons but once the cheater gets away with it it will happen again.


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## TX-SC (Aug 25, 2015)

Why on earth would I want to separate sex and love? For the fear of being hurt? Yes, I have had several ONSs in my life and none of them left me fully satisfied. It's the romantic side of me talking here, but honestly, I love being in love and have no desire to reduce sex to just a primal urge with no emotions attached. 

A woman having an orgasm is a beautiful thing, but seeing the woman I love have one is on another level.


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## uhtred (Jun 22, 2016)

I think there are lots of reasons to separate love from sex. I love my wife but we are badly sexually incompatible. How nice it would be if I could get my sexual desires met somewhere else while staying happily married. 

I think the problem is that for many people having sex causes an emotional attachment that interferes with their primary romantic relationship. I think far fewer people are really able to separate the two than think that they can. 

For those who can separate, that is great.


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## SunCMars (Feb 29, 2016)

Mizzbak said:


> SunC - you paint so beautifully with words ...
> 
> But on your last point, I must disagree.
> Most strongly.
> :smile2:


Thanks, Dear! :grin2:

Maybe not in your case! Men have more muscle mass. Women have more endurance [maybe more patience and are more dutiful]. When young, male babies are more susceptible to illness. Same with old men. Women live longer.

Men are definitely more violent.

Few women rape men and when done throw the body on a garbage heap.

This old guy can still beat you arm wrestling. Hah!


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## StillSearching (Feb 8, 2013)

MrsAldi said:


> The man behind these videos believes that adultery is an invented term.
> 
> Sent from my F3311 using Tapatalk


My he have his heart ripped out by someone he loves.


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## SunCMars (Feb 29, 2016)

EllaSuaveterre said:


> I wonder if I would still feel this way if sex and love were not so linked in my head. I wonder if unlinking them is something I need to work on. I wonder how one goes about doing that.



Ella,

Now, don't get angry with me. I am trying to read between your inferred lines about future conduct between the 500 count sheets on your mattress.

In an offhand way, you are using your left hand to talk for your rightful and dominant...... one.---->

----> I am reading your post, such that you want to have sex with other men, and not have guilty feelings? 

Well, you can do this by repetition. The first time you commit adultery you feel guilty. After the fourth time, or so, not so much. Maybe not at all.

Yes, you would become inured, maybe numb, definitely mum to others.

You did not write this. I plopped words down in this post. Like a damned messy pigeon

You think you would be happier unlinking sex from romantic love? 

What benefit would you attain from separating sex from love? How specifically would this impact you, your marriage?

If you wished to be a female guru who viewed others transgressions from an enlightened viewpoint, such that infidelity is to be expected from flawed humanity. I might concur.


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## dmatters (Apr 19, 2017)

What infidelity really means is a total lack of respect for the other person, your commitment and vows you made, your children and the life you asked another to invest in with you.

As for the premise that you can love one person and still have sex with someone else is a contradiction to what the experts say is needed for a strong relationship. Sex is a bonding event, yeah there is not much bonding in a one night stand well sometimes(not advocating O.N.S. cheating is cheating), but have sex with someone multiple times and a bond does form and that can lead to love so now what? where did the love for the first person go.

There are so many books, papers, videos and other media that try to soften the crime of infidelity, whether these things were put together by cheaters I don't know but in my opinion it is just another way for a cheater to try and justify their actions. 

More excuses for poor behavior.

Poor selfish behavior.


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## Quality (Apr 26, 2016)

sokillme said:


> If you can break the biggest contract you will ever agree to in your life. Your contract that you made of your life to someone else, what else are you capable of?


Alain de Botton's point isn't to excuse "breaking the contract" but that the "contract" is simply overly ambitious in all but a few extremely lucky cases as we are all capable of being human and failing. I don't necessarily agree with everything Botton says about love and relationships {he's a pessimist and an atheist so our world views differ wildly} but he is seemingly quasi-happily married and monogamous himself. It's not like he's a boorish pontificating adulterer like M. Scott Peck extolling the benefits of adultery and the mature love he eventually had for his brow beaten wife {all his cheating helped him appreciate her more}.

For Example ~~

In his book "_How to Think More About Sex" _, Botton argues that we must not underestimate how tempting and exhilarating affairs can be, nor how difficult it is to stay with one partner over our increasingly long life-spans. This is especially tough with all the pressure for genuine love and passionate sex to last through illness, children, conflicts, and all the other challenges that long term relationships face. Botton argues that: "spouses should not blame each other for occasional infidelities; instead they should feel proud that, for the most part, they have managed to remain committed to their union". He suggests that it takes immense patience and kindness not to sleep around and also not to end up hating one another.

While I don't agree that spouses shouldn't blame each other for "occasional infidelities" or that monogamy is really that hard, but, absent words to the contrary {I haven't read everything the guy's written} I think he's actually more in the camp of celebrating couples that successfully do/accomplish lifelong monogamy. He is PRO monogamy. He is against polyamory and cheating, but as an atheist, it's for much more pragmatic reasoning than anything else.



Alain de Botton said:


> There’s no dispute at all that polyamory will work for some people; but like many very alluring ideas, this doesn’t mean it will work for us. Mostly likely, if we become polyamorous, we will once again encounter almost all of the problems we’d once known well in monogamy – only far more often, more chaotically, and with a greater sense of violated expectation. .





sokillme said:


> I can however see where this is going. I can see what people like those who create this video are pushing for. Open marriage for everyone.


Botton doesn't advocate open marriage and doesn't promote or suggest some alternative lifestyle or definition of marriage. He likes marriage for himself. He's trying to be more of a realist.

This is what he says about having crushes:



Alain de Botton said:


> It can be a deeply private and very thrilling experience. We’re married and caught up in the routines of daily life – when we start to focus on someone else who strikes us as properly extraordinary. They might be someone near our office; or who goes to the same tennis club or who moved into the house opposite. We may hardly have met them but something about them – their smile, their clothes, they way they flick their hair – speaks deeply to our imagination. Our minds elaborate: it would be so wonderful, if only we could be with them; they wouldn’t nag or get shouty; we’d be so happy together. We’re in the grip of a crush. We tend to secretly compare our partner very unfavourably to our crush and might get snappy at home as a result: but what really separates our partner from the object of our crush is simple: knowledge. We simply know our partners very much better. Any person, who we get to know across the full range of their being will emerge as terribly flawed. The biggest single asset of the person we have a crush on is our extremely limited grasp of what they are really like. We’re encountering a stringently edited version: the rest we are elaborating from our imaginations. The truth about the crush is, of course, that they’d drive us crazy too; we just haven’t as yet discovered in what deep ways they would irk, annoy and upset us if we actually did try to share our life with them. As we got to know them, their ideal nature would fade to be replaced by a stark, honest, unflattering portrait. They wouldn’t be appalling, but not wonderful either. Just human. And therefore we should consign crushes to their proper place – the hidden recesses of our fantasy life – rather than deploy them as a deeply unfair point of comparison to our real-world marriage.






SoKillme said:


> The problems is still half of the population yearns for monogamy. Worse the vast majority of those who are predisposition to cheat, they will do what they always have, they will lie and say that want monogamy if they want to be with a monogamous person. Then just try to hide their cheating. If say we could make the punishment for doing such much more painful to stop those from doing it and be honest then maybe it would make sense but as it stands now the punishment is light, and this would only make it lighter. If we could tag everyone so we knew who really felt this way then it makes some sense. In other words in this world the only ones who suffer are the one like me who cherish monogamy and who take all the risk because of that fact. This video basically says, your thinking is silly, you should just stop thinking that way. I suspect this was made by some cheater effecting a British accent to make it seem more sophisticated. That's the thing cheaters never get. They have nothing to lose. You don't care about monogamy. But they don't have the courage to at least say they don't.



I suspected the same thing and I don't necessarily love the guy {I don't know him well enough} {btw, I believe he narrates the video's himself}. So far I find him interesting {probably why he's so popular}. I think it's the 'yearning for monogamy" and the way we go about getting it that de Botton, a philosopher, questions and muses upon. I'm personally much more of a romantic than Botton and think romantic love can be achieved and maintained in relationship for decades, because my wife and I are doing it, but we're doing it pragmatically and intentionally much like Botton suggests and have been, to a large degree very fortunate to get a long so well after realizing, facing and overcoming our imperfections and "cheating predispositions" through repentance years ago. 



Alain de Botton said:


> Love is a skill, rather than an enthusiasm





> Love is ultimately not just a feeling, but a skill that has to be learnt



His interesting non-religious take on romanticism and marriage:



Alain de Botton said:


> "Marriage: a hopeful, generous, infinitely kind gamble taken by two people who don't know yet who they are or who the other might be, binding themselves to a future they cannot conceive of and have carefully omitted to investigate."


Interesting stuff.

I think if I might actually use some of his "20 Ideas on Marriage" stuff {LINK} for discussions sake with one couple we are working with currently that aren't particularly religious and just can't stop fighting and picking at one another.


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## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

Robbie1234 said:


> Anyone who would allow a ons to go unpunished is making a rod for his own back. *It may start as a one night stand, but once the cheater gets away with it, it will happen again.*


*I'm living proof of that profound statement, my good man!*


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## Quality (Apr 26, 2016)

MrsAldi said:


> The man behind these videos believes that adultery is an invented term.
> 
> Sent from my F3311 using Tapatalk


Where did you read this?

Sometimes it's easy to figure guys like this out by just googling things like Alain de Botton cheater or 2nd wife or adulterer....but he writes so much on the subject it's harder to pin him down as an unapologetic adulterer himself. 

As a pop-philosopher, I'd expect him to push bottons {see what I did there} and say outrageous things to draw attention to his writings. But it's not all awful.

As an atheist, I don't expect him to have or promote the highest morals either as, to him, everyone is allowed to set their own standards, boundaries and morals. A preacher his is not, but he's not Peck or Ester Perel either.

I just didn't see anything that offensive....I suspect there's some because he's also a super wealthy, seeming elitist, boarding school intellectual but he seems to me to be more a fairly pragmatic self-help realist meets philosopher asking questions, making suggestions and promoting discussions moreso than any kind of relationship expert. 

For example, I plan to discuss this recent article with my more impulsive still single son ~~ LINK


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## Quality (Apr 26, 2016)

I forgot I hadn't watched the video Ella posted originally.

Interesting that de Botton used the word "repentance" in there. 


This video is not suggesting affairs are permissable, that recovery is supposed to be a rug sweep and just let them get away with it or not holding an unrepentant adulterous spouse accountable, it is merely suggesting the simple fact that forgiveness AFTER repentance is achievable and it may help a betrayed spouse to consider their own fallibility and sexual history {in thought and deed} when considering intellectually whether their spouses can both love them {then, now and in the future} though they betrayed them sexually/emotionally historically {they've repented ~ it's over}. 

It's pretty basic stuff but I can certainly understand that when you throw it out there in a 4 minute cursory video it FEELS offensive to a group of individuals crushed by infidelity and, more particularly, those who never saw their wayward spouse repent and remain very vested in the demise of their relationship being 100% the cheaters fault and nothing could have ever changed that {which may or may not be true}.


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## Diana7 (Apr 19, 2016)

You can't separate sex from love, because they are not supposed to be separate. Sex is supposed to be an expression of love between 2 committed people. It's not supposed to be something casual and shallow and selfish.

If someone doesn't want to be faithful, then remain single.


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## EllaSuaveterre (Oct 2, 2016)

TDSC60 said:


> So if you work on separating sex from love and succeed, what would you gain from this new enlightenment being a married woman?
> 
> Does you husband feel the same way? Would you both agree to an open marriage at that point? Is your goal polyamorous relationships?


No, poly relationships are not my goal, but if he were to want to cheat (not that I can see it happening, but hypothetically speaking) I have always said that he can come to me and talk openly and honestly if he falls in love with someone else, BEFORE he decides to cheat, and we'd talk about opening the marriage so he could have his cake and eat it too, (and actually, so could I if I ever wanted it in the future) without having to lie or break my trust or hurt me. I would so much rather be in a consensual poly relationship than be betrayed. 

And separating sex and love would solve SO many problems in SO MANY marriages. My husband and I, for example, both have physical and psychological inhibitions that mean we seldom have sex. It's painful for us, we have no idea how to orgasm with a partner, and we have so many hang-ups and insecurities about sex and attractiveness that often, sex leaves us feeling defeated rather than blissful. Therefore, we generally only make love when we're both drunk. The thing is, we adore each other. We love to touch and hold and play and kiss and caress each other. We love each other's company, and we are madly attracted to one another. We know this, and we talk often about sex and love and have reached the conclusion that our problems don't, for the most part, hurt our relationship. We are both relatively low-libido, and sex, while a fun concept, doesn't rank as vital to our lives. The only reason that our poor sex life is even an issue is because of this cultural tie between sex and love. The stereotype is that if you have a dead bedroom, you actively resent each other. And we don't! We almost worship each other, find each other madly attractive, and we are physical in every way but sex. If we could fully break free of the chains that bind sex and love, it would not only spare our feelings when it comes to swinging, but would also ease a whole lot of mental and societal pressure to have mind-blowing orgasms three times a week.


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## Diana7 (Apr 19, 2016)

EllaSuaveterre said:


> No, poly relationships are not my goal, but if he were to want to cheat (not that I can see it happening, but hypothetically speaking) I have always said that he can come to me and talk openly and honestly if he falls in love with someone else, BEFORE he decides to cheat, and we'd talk about opening the marriage so he could have his cake and eat it too, (and actually, so could I if I ever wanted it in the future) without having to lie or break my trust or hurt me. I would so much rather be in a consensual poly relationship than be betrayed.
> 
> And separating sex and love would solve SO many problems in SO MANY marriages. My husband and I, for example, both have physical and psychological inhibitions that mean we seldom have sex. It's painful for us, we have no idea how to orgasm with a partner, and we have so many hang-ups and insecurities about sex and attractiveness that often, sex leaves us feeling defeated rather than blissful. Therefore, we generally only make love when we're both drunk. The thing is, we adore each other. We love to touch and hold and play and kiss and caress each other. We love each other's company, and we are madly attracted to one another. We know this, and we talk often about sex and love and have reached the conclusion that our problems don't, for the most part, hurt our relationship. The only reason that our poor sex life is even an issue is because of this cultural tie between sex and love. The stereotype is that if you have a dead bedroom, you actively resent each other. And we don't! We almost worship each other, find each other madly attractive, and we are physical in every way but sex. If we could fully break free of the chains that bind sex and love, it would not only spare our feelings when it comes to swinging, but would also ease a whole lot of mental and societal pressure to have mind-blowing orgasms three times a week.


I disagree, separating sex and love would not help many marriages, it would weaken marriages and damage them. Sex between 2 committed people is the best thing.Sex with a stranger is pointless and shallow and empty. Swinging is a fools game. 

Surely what you need to is the right sort of help to get over the issues you have?


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## Rocky Mountain Yeti (Apr 23, 2017)

Diana7 said:


> I disagree, separating sex and love would not help many marriages, it would weaken marriages and damage them. Sex between 2 committed people is the best thing.Sex with a stranger is pointless and shallow and empty. Swinging is a fools game.
> 
> Surely what you need to is the right sort of help to get over the issues you have?


I must agree wholeheartedly. 

There are different kinds of love. It certainly is possible for me to love my spouse and not have sex with her, but what kind of love would that be? It certainly wouldn't be romantic love. It wouldn't be the type of love that is the basis of a marriage. There is such a thing as platonic love, but then the couple is back to just being really close roommates, not lovers. Being lovers is an essential part of a marriage. 

If the only place I can get sex is outside the marriage, then I must acknowledge that my love for my spouse is either unrequited, or not even romantic love at all. Neither is a solid basis for a marriage.


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## TDSC60 (Dec 8, 2011)

StillSearching said:


> My he have his heart ripped out by someone he loves.


I don't think this guy is capable of loving anyone but himself.


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## TDSC60 (Dec 8, 2011)

EllaSuaveterre said:


> No, poly relationships are not my goal, but if he were to want to cheat (not that I can see it happening, but hypothetically speaking) I have always said that he can come to me and talk openly and honestly if he falls in love with someone else, BEFORE he decides to cheat, and we'd talk about opening the marriage so he could have his cake and eat it too, (and actually, so could I if I ever wanted it in the future) without having to lie or break my trust or hurt me. I would so much rather be in a consensual poly relationship than be betrayed.
> 
> And separating sex and love would solve SO many problems in SO MANY marriages. My husband and I, for example, both have physical and psychological inhibitions that mean we seldom have sex. It's painful for us, we have no idea how to orgasm with a partner, and we have so many hang-ups and insecurities about sex and attractiveness that often, sex leaves us feeling defeated rather than blissful. Therefore, we generally only make love when we're both drunk. The thing is, we adore each other. We love to touch and hold and play and kiss and caress each other. We love each other's company, and we are madly attracted to one another. We know this, and we talk often about sex and love and have reached the conclusion that our problems don't, for the most part, hurt our relationship. We are both relatively low-libido, and sex, while a fun concept, doesn't rank as vital to our lives. The only reason that our poor sex life is even an issue is because of this cultural tie between sex and love. The stereotype is that if you have a dead bedroom, you actively resent each other. And we don't! We almost worship each other, find each other madly attractive, and we are physical in every way but sex. If we could fully break free of the chains that bind sex and love, it would not only spare our feelings when it comes to swinging, but would also ease a whole lot of mental and societal pressure to have mind-blowing orgasms three times a week.


I don't think separating sex/love will solve the problems that you are describing. Trying to separate the two can only eliminate or decrease the love not make the sex better.

Alcohol is know to eliminate or decrease inhibitions. So your problems may be that you are putting too much pressure on yourselves to conform to what you think society demands. This results in an almost automatic fear of failing at sex. Sound like a good sex therapist might help.


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## Quality (Apr 26, 2016)

EllaSuaveterre said:


> And separating sex and love would solve SO many problems in SO MANY marriages.


No it wouldn't and that's not what the video or de Botton is suggesting.


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## EllaSuaveterre (Oct 2, 2016)

Quality said:


> No it wouldn't and that's not what the video or de Botton is suggesting.


I thought that was the heart of the video, that one can be in love without having sex, and one can have sex without being in love with their lover, and that understanding that can help to break the chains of post-infidelity suffering. He really DOESN'T love you less just because he had sex with her. The sex really DID "mean nothing" to him.


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## MrsAldi (Apr 15, 2016)

Quality said:


> Where did you read this?


He mentioned it on one of his TED talks, IIRC the subject was romanticism. 



> Sometimes it's easy to figure guys like this out by just googling things like Alain de Botton cheater or 2nd wife or adulterer....but he writes so much on the subject it's harder to pin him down as an unapologetic adulterer himself.


I can't remember his reasons, he says he looks to the past, instead of stating his personal life. 



> As an atheist, I don't expect him to have or promote the highest morals either as, to him, everyone is allowed to set their own standards, boundaries and morals. A preacher his is not, but he's not Peck or Ester Perel either.


He has TED talks regarding his views on atheism but I haven't watched as it doesn't interest me. 



> I just didn't see anything that offensive....I suspect there's some because he's also a super wealthy, seeming elitist, boarding school intellectual but he seems to me to be more a fairly pragmatic self-help realist meets philosopher asking questions, making suggestions and promoting discussions moreso than any kind of relationship expert.


I like some of his work regarding mental health and personality but disagree on his views regarding love, marriage, religion etc. 


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