Should adultery be illegal?

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marriage has no place in law
and that would be religious based
governments have no place in my bedroom, just like they have no right telling me what to watch or eat

You can't "eat" (or consume) illegal drugs.

Dito to that. I find that western society has taking marriage too lightly. I mean, nowadays, there is little difference between a dating couple and a married couple aside from a piece of paper that proves your marriage and MAYBE having children (but premarital pregnancies do happen).

I don't think thats considered adultery. Its called fornification.

Don't get me started, jc! I might hijack the thread.

Actually, the word is "fornication." It's derived, I believe, from a word that referred to temple prostitution ("fornix," meaning "vaulted chamber" and later referred to a "brothel"). I might be wrong about that, but in any case fornication refers more to unmarried sex while adultery has to do with a married partner. Fornication is a general term that just means two people who aren't married to each other, which may or may not include statutory adultery.

So I stand corrected.

I think that legally defined adultery should include fornication, though, and there should be consequences if caught. I don't think non-adulterous fornication should be quite so severely penalized, though. I just mean that consequences of irresponsible sex are serious enough (spreading disease, unwanted pregnancy) that the participants ought to be held accountable for what they do. So make it a first-time misdemeanor crime, same way you treat DUI cases and "shotgun" marriage if pregnancy occurs.

The real trouble with the lesser fornication misdemeanor is a matter of enforcement. The laws regarding underaged sex are already fairly stiff to the point that if you're so much as a day too old you get a lifetime scarlet letter. I find some interpretations of the laws very appropriate in which BOTH participants are locked up as sex criminals if they are both underaged. Obviously this won't follow them through life, but it goes a long way to discouraging the behavior while too young to enforce the laws otherwise. The other problem you'll have is with college students. But I think since having a baby pretty much will cost a young woman her college career unless she has a lot of help, she's already in a horribly unfair position. That's why I think forced marriage is a suitable option because it guarantees she has an appropriate support system while she finishes her work while shifting more of the accountability to the father of the child. I also think that because women do have the burden of carrying a child and giving birth, interrupting their lives in the process, the man OUGHT to be held to a higher standard of accountability.

Further: I won't deny that my ideas are based on a Biblical model. But I think its a good model because of the problems it either prevents or solves. Obviously, anyone over college age will be better able to avoid enforcement of those laws unless, of course, the woman makes claims against the man. But statistically couples tend to have less children the later they wait. That tells me that more responsible people are older people who take care of business if they persist in immoral behavior.

A classical Biblical view of sex may be considered something of an accepted social standard in the USA but anyone who assumes that is an actuality is totally unaware of reality. People screw each other ranging from deep attachment and passion to momentary opportunity and multitudes of variations inbetween, whatever the ultimate consequences. It's pretty damned near impossible to control and perhaps it shouldn't be.

Yes, it is, as it should be, I was just making a comment that if you tell the truth and someone tries to sue you for libel or slander for speaking this truth, they shouldn't be able to win the case. In the US, I believe your laws are like that.

I think I may have misunderstood that portion of your post in retrospect, though. If that's the case, disregard my comment.

Last edited by Asp-Z on 01 Dec 2010, 3:02 am, edited 1 time in total.

It's not adultery that is the problem. It's marriage. People change, and marital vows seem to be made under the assumption that the person you married will always be that way, and that YOU will always be that way. Plus, relatively few couples who are "in love" actually love each other in the purest form. What much of society claims as "love" is actually a combination of infatuation, lust, and attachment all fueling each other. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this, but for some reason everyone is in denial about it and refuses to accept it for what it really is. The reason that so many marriages have problems that lead to affairs or divorce or both is that one or more of the components of this "love" fade in intensity. There is a marked phenomenon in psychology, I don't remember what it's called, but the something bias. Anyway what it says is that people have a tendency to think that their moods, or feelings (including those towards another person) will last a lot longer than they actually will. I think the application of this phenomenon in marriage pretty much speaks for itself.

Not saying that nobody should ever get married, of course. True love does happen, and when it does, it is a beautiful thing. But every couple should think long and hard (no pun intended) before making a commitment that half of couples fail to keep.

You make a lot of good points.

The way it is in my marriage to my wife, we are more friends than anything else and relate to each other as such before we relate to each other in any other way.

The thing about people changing over time is that, while true to a degree, the changes all happen along the lines of choices we make. When people say they "fall out of love," most often it's because of what you referred to as that "fade in intensity." If you want to look at it that way, my wife and I "fell out of love" long before we even became engaged to be married. For us, it was never about that. It's about friendship first and understanding what it is about ourselves that make us suitable life partners--things that will never change in spite of those things that do.

I also define "love" differently than most seem to. I don't define love as merely affection or some romantic interest or infatuation. For me, it's primarily an action before it's any of those other things. How do you actively love someone? Well, you can start by just being nice to that person. You can also help meet the physical needs (real needs, like food and shelter--not "needs" in a sexual sense although that's not a bad thing, either) of your partner. Reminding that person in little ways that you are proud of that person, proud to be with that person, and building that person up and providing support to help them meet their goals are all some ways among many others in which you can love someone. And it's not something you do with the hope of a reward, but you do it because you want to and feel it's the right thing to do. Moreover, it's a choice you have to live with from day to day.

I don't always FEEL like helping my wife wake up the kids, clothe them, and get them out the door to daycare. But I do it anyway because I don't feel it's too much for her to ask of me in order for her to get to work on time. And, as much as I love her, I don't always wake up every morning feeling like she's my favorite person in the whole world. Trust me, the feeling is mutual sometimes. But I make the choice that my wife is the only person I want to be that way with and WILL, whether I feel like it or not, remain devoted to her for that day. This is a cycle that repeats itself from day to day. Most days are really easy, and some days are easier than others.

The problem, I think, with marriages that hit the skids, is that people forget to remind themselves to love their partners. You don't "love" your partner? Simple solution: LOVE your partner. I'm a firm believer in "fake it until you make it," and sooner or later you WILL come back as long as you don't give up. It's a guarantee if both partners are like-minded enough that this will work.

I think about the girl I almost married when I get into discussions like this. Yeah, I loved her so deeply (speaking emotionally now) that the prospect of leaving her made me physically ill. One thing that ran through my mind back then was that with as many things in my life I've screwed up, my marriage would NOT be one of them. I took a risk by leaving her in that there was no guarantee that I'd find a good match for me. Within a few months, I was dating one of her would-be bridesmaids. I'd reached a point with that girl that "love" just wasn't enough to justify staying in the relationship, nor did I care any longer to try to "work things out." She'd clearly demonstrated to me that if anyone in the relationship was to blame it was me and, given time, she could eventually fix me. By the time she found the strength to admit that she was wrong, I no longer cared nor believed that she really wanted to change. So I got out of there rather than enter into a lifelong contract with someone who'd live in constant misery and take me down with her. As it is, I'm in a relationship that is mutually supportive. We recognize that the changes we make are built on our choices. And while our likes/dislikes and attitudes/personalities may change over time, underneath it all we are still the same people we married. That is the one thing that will NEVER change, and I look forward to growing old with my wife.

You have evidently made a reasonable and useful choice in you marriage. Luck plays probably a greater part in that than you seem to realize although good judgment is a major factor. Do not blame people who have had neither your good luck nor your perception. People with a major part of their life yet to be lived should not be condemned for the rest of their life to the miseries of bad mistakes. And the mistakes can be horrible indeed. Let them find their way to some sense and enjoyment as best they can manage without the interference of idiotic legalities.

Yeah, lets make adultery illegal! That'll solve the problem, just like the law against drunk driving stopped people from driving drunk! We should also make it illegal to insult people, and make faces at each other, and most of all, make it illegal to disagree with anyone. Conformity! It's the only way to achieve lasting peace. Alright, everyone jump on the train!

I voted yes to make adultery a crime.
Adultery is:
-- an overt act of fraud. The prevention and supression of fraud is a legitimate area for a society to enter into.
-- adultery is one of the most effective disruptors of family life, and stable family life is critical to the nurturing of the next generation of citizens.
-- adultery through the disruption of family life is a critical issue in increasing the welfare burden borne by the citizens of a society.

In the interests of those who want to engage in a libertine life style and are completely open about this, perhaps the legislation should be aimed at "non-consensual adultery"

Luck, divine providence, or whatever else it could have been put us on the same seat on that bus that night certainly had a lot to do with it. Good judgment? Sure, she was a decent gal and still is. I understand that people get in bad situations through no fault of their own and sometimes have to choose between doing something that they know is wrong to save their own lives or just live with the misery for the duration. But I DO blame people for their lack of perception. Sure, some people are immature or naive, but that's not what I mean. I mean people who are deceiving themselves--the whole "oh, he'll change if..." or "yeah, she puts me down in front of her friends, but I LOVE her and she's not like that at home..." People who REALLY love each other won't try to change the other person and will only change themselves if they WANT to for their OWN reasons--"I want to be a better person, so I want to get control of my nasty temper." If you're the kind of person that you love yourself for who you are, then you can be reasonably comfortable that someone else will love you for the same reasons. Nothing about women offends me more than a certain attitude of worthlessness and self-pity or self-loathing that, no matter how many friends try to help them or how many good relationships they've had in which someone tries to build them up and strengthen them, they'd just rather stay in relationships in which their partners are not being monogamous when the women desire committed and safe relationships or in which their partners beat them up every day.

Yes, I blame them for that because they've had every opportunity to get help and break free, and they just DON'T. I also think that men can be the same way--we just associate this behavior more with women than men. I was with a positively EVIL girl for a long time and the deal-breaker was that I realized I couldn't keep punishing myself by promising to spend my life with that. I may be unpopular and struggle keeping a "real" job, but at least I'm happy at home and am slowly-but-surely building my own business. If I'd persisted in my hopeless pity-party, I'd have no one to blame but myself.

But people of a certain age ought to know better, and hopefully know better than I did. A girl ends up with a bf who is "a little scary" every now and then, she shouldn't expect things to get better. She should only expect things to get worse. If she want to commit herself to a lifetime of that, that's her decision and she should be held accountable for it. If she wants out and gets out, she should never be allowed that decision again because now she has a history of poor decisions and should spare any other man she might marry, even assuming he's a good guy, of any future similarly poor decisions she might make.

And if she's not allowed to marry someone else, then neither should the jerk she left--after all, there's a REASON they split. Even if he's a good guy and the split is no fault of his own, it IS his responsibility in the sense that he OUGHT to have known her well enough to know whether she'd pull a stunt like that. If her decisions are swayed by a third party where otherwise there'd been no problems, then HE should be held accountable for pursuing someone promised to someone else.

Make marriage easier, divorce and adultery difficult, and stiffly penalize wrongdoers and you'll make couples think much more seriously/less casually about who they decide to marry and how they treat their partners. If this causes them misery, then that's just tough. If you can't handle that kind of relationship, don't get into it in the first place.

Adultery is not fraud. Fraud has a very particular definition in equity, and requires three specific elements: 1) an express statement made by the defendant which the defendant knew or ought property to have known is false; 2) a reliance by the plaintiff on the statement of the defendant and 3) an actual loss suffered by the plaintiff as a result of that reliance.

So where is the statement that the adulterer knows to be false? The initial promise of fidelity at the time of marriage? At the time that promise was made the adulterer may have had every belief in the truth of that promise, and no fraud lies in reliance on it.

If there is an overt statement denying adultery after it has occurred, then there is the first element demonstrated, but no demonstration that reliance or actual loss has occurred.

As for your latter two points, I don't think that you can successfully demonstrate that adultery is an essential cause of family breakdown. It might be the "straw that broke the camel's back," but that does not mean that there were not other dysfunctional stresses in place prior to the adultery.

Yeah, the "adultery is fraud" definition is a little shaky. But DEFINITELY breach of contract, in which case they are closely related if not identical. It is your 1) that kills the fraud argument. Dangit, if you make a promise like that to someone, any "life changes" that happen along the way ought to be irrelevant. Apply the same "you don't know how you'll feel x-number of years from now" to any other crime and you'll find that "feeling differently" doesn't erase what happened nor the consequences of it. Are we really that out of control that we can't remain true to our spouses?

It does often disrupt family life, though. Most people caught in adultery never intended to get caught. The problem lies in getting away with it, and it's entirely psychological. You get away with it once, you might get away with it again, and then it becomes a pattern. Too often people talk, though, and it might be found out through a third party, mutual friend, and so forth. You also have the spread of infections and the risk of pregnancy and other factors that make the infidelity difficult to ignore. It's emotionally damaging to the innocent partner--which is a more immediate effect--and it is difficult to regain those kinds of bonds of trust within families after that. It's POSSIBLE, but difficult and could have been avoided. And then you have all the reminders from people who know once infidelity becomes public: Either laughing at you, your partner, or those knowing looks of pity. And if there are kids involved, rumors in a community can get passed down to children who will pick on kids about what mommy or daddy are doing. It does happen, and it's not a lot of fun. And then there's divorce if it ever comes to that...

Now, about 2): There's no reason why the plaintiff shouldn't be able to rely on the statement of the defendant. People should be held to their word when it comes to promises and made accountable for them. If you are concerned that you may "feel differently" 20 years later, don't make a promise that you'll be required to keep for the lifetime of either you or your partner! Just DON'T. Whatever you say should become law as far as you're concerned. Don't screw someone over one day because you woke up one day and realized you changed your mind. You made your bed, now...

3): Loss of faith or trust might be intangible, but emotional loss is still loss. Marriage implies ownership. I don't mean "ownership" in ancient terms which are clearly one-sided and favorable to men/unfavorable to women. I mean equal ownership. Sexual relations outside the bounds of marriage makes that partner "used" or "damaged" goods. If a person is said to "belong" to someone else, then they should not be "borrowed" or "stolen," and that means for ANY reason. In terms of how the Bible approached this, the point was to continue a biological family line. Marrying and impregnating a virgin was a way of guaranteeing that the children born to that couple were a product of that specific union with that specific man, and thus because of the importance of that tradition adultery was punishable by death. Well, we have tests to determine fatherhood now, so that law is irrelevant in its severity. But a woman who cheats and gets pregnant puts a burden on her husband--the insult that someone else's baby is growing in her belly. That can be psychologically devastating for most men, and it is a rare man who can insist on taking the child as his own, no questions asked. That would be a deal-breaker for me, and you can already see from my prior posts how strongly I feel about maintaining the relationship with my wife at all costs to understand what it means to me that there might be ONE thing that would kill our marriage. As for unfaithful men, I think women have a right to believe that they own their men and that men are not to be shared. The loss, in my opinion, is not quite the same for women, but again there is always the risk of disease when the woman is not at fault. Pregnancy and childbirth (extramarital) would probably require that the unfaithful husband at the very least pay monetary support at potentially severe income loss to his own family, not to mention that his faithful wife would have to deal with sharing her man across two families. And I think that's unfair.

So it's certainly not deliberately fraud, per se, but contractual agreements must be honored. I mean, if it were only that easy as saying you might feel differently 20 years from now... When I got out of college, I had 5 really good years in public and private schools. The pay varied, of course, but I always had plenty and could easily pay my student loans--which I agreed to before I set foot in a classroom. But we ran into trouble two years ago, got by longer than we ever thought we could, and then had to face paying student loans or starving. Well, the banks don't care whether you starve or not. They want their money with interest. There ARE things they can do if I fail to make arrangements to pay. I am on payroll at two different jobs, albeit part-time, and they are the kinds of places that take financial responsibility quite seriously. A wage order at either place could mean the loss of those jobs. So I have to figure out how to meet my obligations SOON. It would be NICE if I could say, "No, I changed my mind. I don't like this at all, and I'd give my education back if I could, but what's done is done..." I'm telling you, they WON'T hear of it. Married partners should expect no less of each other.

Making infidelity illegal would be a burden on the courts and jails. Emphasis on courts given that even if it's just some sort of fine or citation, it's a very hard thing to ultimately prove and investigative efforts should be better spent elsewhere on things like rape and murder and kidnappings.

The basic reason that religious people get upset about breaking promises to be faithful in marriage until death is that religion inserted this promise into every marriage ceremony. People repeat the formalisms automatically and then are castigated for violating this contract. No one can guarantee that the emotion held at the behest of hormones and inexperience and youth and simple ignorance of other people can be held for a lifetime. People only get to know each other well only after living closely together for a long time. And if i becomes evident that this cohabitation is a psychological hell the best thing is to separate as soon as possible with the path to mutual disengagement made as easy and inexpensive as possible. Adultery is sometimes the result of extreme unhappiness and frustration and perhaps, in many way, eve an attempt to save a marriage. Religious demands on people are frequently monstrously stupid and this insertion of simple minded stupidity into the most personal of relationships is one of the worst examples.