I know very few people on these boards who honestly believe that an affair is ever an ethical choice.....I certainly don't!!! Even in situations of abuse or severe neglect, there are many many other choices, besides infidelity, that preserve the integrity of someone who feels unloved, abused, out of love, or invisible in their marriage. The "state" of their marriage helps us perhaps to "understand" why and how infidelity occurs...but it will never justify that action. Infidelity is unethical...pure and simply, and it is almost always the poorest and most destructive choice that a wayward spouse makes when they have a SEA of choices.
Unfortunately....many of us fail to recognize that the same logic also cuts the other way. There have been times when I've seen violence, abuse, even murder justified as "deserving" in response to d-day. *shudder* There are many ethical choices that a betrayed spouse can make in response to the knowledge that the person they love the most, has hurt them to their core. Just as there is NO justification for an affair....there is also NO justification for violence or abuse at the discovery of an affair. A few F U's and slammed doors are not going to raise any eyebrows....but causing physical harm, trying to run someone down in a car, murder, and other such craziness....is just that....crazy (although I have seen those things "explained" away because d-day creates "unpredictability" because of the pain it causes.
One of the strangest dynamics I've noticed after being on these boards as long as I have, is that so often, those who acted the most abusively BEFORE the affair....are the same folks who act the most out of control after the affair....only NOW they have a "reason". Now, they are forgiven their lack of control "because".
Both infidelity AND d-day violence/abuse each speak to LACK OF CONTROL and weakness of character. Sure, d-day can make otherwise healthy people act nutsoid....but otherwise faithful spouses lose their heads sometimes too and maybe the process is more similar than different....yanno? We forgive the violence of BS far far more than we forgive the lack of control by WS. I find that troubling even when the situation cries out for some empathy....often there is none.
If we are willing to entertain the idea that a wayward spouse "deserves" anything they get on d-day.....we are opening the same logic to wayward spouses who will claim that the BS "deserved" for them to find someone who would give the love, respect, passion, time and energy they have feel robbed of. Not all of us BS's of course "deserved" what we got....and I think for those of us who know that...it's particularly hard to understand that not all BS's are the same, anymore than all WS's are the same.
This is faulty logic from both ends. Nobody "deserves" infidelity. No one is a bad enough spouse to merit that kind of unethical/destructive behavior. However, no one "deserves" physical abuse either....even if they were unfaithful. The same logic that protects one....also protects the other. We are ALL human beings that deserve to be happy and protected....when someone violates that....NO MATTER WHAT REASON they use (and in this case, both WS and BS usually use the same reason...."he/she doesn't love me! And I'm in PAIN" ) there are, and always will be ethical, reasonable, compassionate, sane ways to deal with those issues.
BS's are GOING to react badly to discovery....but when "badly" includes violence it's not "deserved" anymore than infidelity is "deserved". People are not automatons...they are going to yell and scream and gnash their teeth....maybe slam doors, smash things, make threats and run away or cry for days. But when they smash things across the WS's head, injure, or use the children as weapons etc, or worse....they have crossed the ethical line of reasonable and healthy responses to infidelity. The same is true for the WS....when he/she responds to marital problems or incompatibility by having an affair....they have crossed the ethical line of reasonable and healthy responses.
As BS's we want to believe that we are exempt from these things because of the depth of our pain. The truth is....we aren't. And if we were....we would simply become what we hate.
