Just saw on Facebook in a city close to me where a BW required her WH to hold a sign confessing his betrayal on a streetcorner as a requirement for her not filing for divorce.

They gave the location he is at.

People are commenting and driving by to take pictures.

Not exactly MB...

But you kinda got to admire her standing up to him...

AND the OW.

I have a feeling he just may think twice before he does it again...

or any OTHER woman wants to get involved with him!!!

Jim

I absolutely guarantee you, that like me, this BW has a top need for radical honesty.

Most betrayed people develop this need, but if its always been your number one, then you find it impossible to be in love unless the person is brave and fearless when it comes to being open about the worst things about themselves.

This BW isnt shaming him, she wants him to own his mistake and shake off any reticence in standing up to it.

Me personally, I would not not necesarily need a streetcorner confession sign but I couldnt fall back in love with my wayward unless he were pretty fearless when it came to admitting the truth publicly.

Sometimes I advise BSs on here to encourage more public openness from their wayward and their reaction is completely different to mine though. They go along with exposure for practical reasons of accountability, but they dont need it to be in love, as I would.

It all boils down to your top needs I think.

Just as a top need for FC would affect the need for a post nup.

There are not a lot of FWHs willing to do that. Kudos to him, he must have gotten some kind of wakeup call!

does the sign name the ow?

I'm not sure if the sign displayed the OW name or not, however there were not any comments about her being identified.

It was kind of interesting reading the comments that the non MB people posted...

Such as "does she really think that will get him to stop?" etc.

However the VAST majority of people SUPPORTED her in what she had demanded her WH do to prevent her from filing for divorce.

Some commented that there should have been derogatory comments such as "Should make him wear a shirt with LOZER on it!!!" which shows a complete lack of UNDERSTANDING what exposure is supposed to be...

It is not supposed to be punishment...

It is supposed to expose the A to the light of day AND public scrutiny to everyone that has influence on your WS...

and leave a lasting impression on the wayward of the consequences of their actions...

and to prevent a resumption of the affair...

not be a personal vendetta of revenge against your spouse.

Jim

i googled it and saw the sign. "i cheated. this is my punishment." the article (uk mail) said she told him that's what she needed him to do, and he wanted to do it to make it right. she let him off after 2 hours (after telling him it would be for a week).

what i liked about him was his willingness to "do whatever she needed" to get the marriage back on track. he did it, she saw that he WAS willing and repentant. hopefully they will have the support they need to restore their marriage.

Letty,

Did the article you referenced say if it occured in the US or in the UK (UK mail)?

Just wondering if it's the same incident as the one that I saw was in the US.

Thanks.

Jim

it said USA - virginia i think? aw crap, i was just going to link you, because there were so many different publications with it, and i see the date is 2009!!! was yours in VA? i've scrolled down the list (googled cheating husband sign street corner) and they're all 2009...

As with all male-female stories, I'm compelled to spin it around and test it for reasonableness.

If a WW were forced (Yes, forced. Emotional blackmail to extract his "willingness" is still compulsion.) to wear such a sign, would the proles and voyeurs that comprise our media managers think this story were so "charming"?

Would we?

I personally wouldn't give a dern if the wearer of the sign were male or female. What I think is good is that it shows that this WS is actually willing to do whatever it takes. The fact that the BW asked him to stop after 2 hours would also show that she only wanted to see that he was truly serious.

Hey NG, ever hear of the Scarlet Letter? HAHAHA

To me personally, gender doesn't matter. I would have done it in a heartbeat, if it would have saved my M.

(That said, I'm not so sure the news media would have put the same spin on the story had the genders been switched, b/c of other examples of gender-bias in the media)

I don't think it is charming at all. It think it is an unpleasant story.

I know that the couple involved, and newspaper readers in general, are not familiar with MB, but we are. We know the steps that Dr Harley recommends for a complete marital recovery after infidelity, and humiliation of the WS is not one of them.

This might be something that, momentarily, some of us here wish we could have done to our WSs. Not for humiliation, perhaps, but to see a demonstration that they would have done anything - ANYTHING - to stay with us and make amends. Many of us did not have a spouse who went to extraordinary lengths to keep us. Some of us had spouses who were trickle-truthing or foot-dragging or CYA- ing. But much as we might wish he had set the bar much higher than we did, and wish that the WS had gone all out to jump over it, that particular requirement of that particular BS is bad for marital recovery.

I'm sorry, but I would never do that to my husband. I am all about exposure but this is beyond the pale to me. Nor do I like parents that make children do that.

ITA. It is humiliating. It is not within MB context. Even at my most distraught, I would never have made my FWH humiliate himself so that I could score a pound of flesh. I would never humiliate my child to prove a point or teach a lesson.

I do not think she meant to humiliate him (I could be wrong), I think it was more about seeing if he was serious.

I wouldn't do this either.

The method she used to establish his seriousness had only one possible outcome: humiliation. There are so many other ways to establish a wayward's commitment to recovery. EPs immediately come to mind.

I wouldn't be surprised if the BW thought of this at a time when she was heavily into a Plan F/U. The fact that she told him to stop shows that she thought it wasn't right, but in a moment of anger, it seemed like a good idea.

Of course this goes against what MB stands for.