Why do women blame each other instead of their partner?

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On lots of movies & shows when a woman gets cheated on, she blames the other woman a lot more than she blames the guy who cheated on both of them. If anything the two women should be friends because they were both used by the same guy that they should both hate for it. Why do women blame each other instead of their partner when they get cheated on?

In a lot of cases, the other woman knows....

The women in those movies and shows are characters portrayed by actors who are following scripts under the guidance of directors.

In other words, they do it because they're told to.

There's also lots of vids on YouTube of women fighting each other over guys

The women are coming into territorial conflict over the man, and attack each other because they are romantic rivals. They each still want to "win" the man, even if he is a cheating jerk. Especially if it was known the man was "taken", the other woman sleeping with him is considered to have betrayed the sisterhood of women which attracts as much approbation as the man does for cheating.

Staged. Think "Jerry Springer", and not "The 6-o'Clock News".

Not as common as you think, and remaining attachment to their partner that cheated on them.

When my first husband cheated I blamed them both. I don’t know who made the first move, him or her. Either way they both knew he was married. She was also. She HAD been a friend, but she certainly wasn’t after I found out. I would never have fought to keep him.

Have to agree with Fnord on this one. You can't judge society by how people act in works of fiction.

On a related note, in one of the Saw movies these two guys were in a trap where they had to try to kill each other or this woman who had been cheating on one guy with the other. They realized they were both being used and ended up letting her die in the end. I'm sure all the incels watching gave a standing ovation.

I will never understand people who are unable to distinguish fact from fiction.

Well...yeah, I mean...anything goes in fiction.

If there's something reality-based about it, I think it's because men are expected to cheat. Men get away with everything because nobody expects any better from them. They lack the intelligence required for fidelity, women mature earlier in life, and men never really grow out of being little kids who don't know any better. Men can't help it.

But women expect better from each other. Female bonds are stronger than romantic bonds with the opposite sex. So when her best friend "plays the harlot" to entice her man away from her, a woman sees it as a deliberate, purposeful act of malice. EVEN IF it was the man who took the initiative, the other woman should have had enough sense to not be there in the first place. What were you doing there if you weren't trying to steal MY man? You KNEW he'd go for you, so how could you betray me like that?

Real-life women, given the choice, would rather their men just not cheat. But if boys are going to be boys and women can do nothing to stop it, then the very least a woman can do is avoid men attached to their friends. A woman would rather her man cheat on her with a stranger than someone she knows, and she'd rather not ever know that it happened. The unspoken assumption is that a man will cheat. But if her man and his mistress are so stupid that the truth gets out, it's a public embarrassment for the first woman.

Men are almost exactly the same way. The differences are few, but not subtle. For instance, men are expected to accept and tolerate whatever women throw their way. Men are expected to live in fear because, while men have more demand on them for fidelity, placing the same demands on women is seen as isolating and abusive. If a man is chatting with any random woman, he's looking for an opportunity to cheat. If a woman is chatting with any random man, well...that's her prerogative and it's none of anybody's business. Men have to live in fear of other men manipulating their wives and girlfriends and losing their partners, or they have to live in fear of wives or girlfriends dumping them because they open up about being uncomfortable about their women hanging out with other guys. Men have no way of winning if you go by societal expectations of men and women.

My wife and I discussed this early on in our relationship. I'd been away at school for two years during which we barely got to spend much time together. We became involved with other people at various times. After I moved back home, we picked up right where we left off and agreed we wouldn't see anyone else. After I proposed to her, there was one incident when another man tried to take advantage of her after she'd been drinking. Nothing happened, and I know she'd have told me if it had. But she did tell me THAT much, and I let her know in no uncertain terms that I was angry with her. If we're getting married and preparing to spend our lives together, the least she can do is cut other men out of her life. We have to stop acting like we're not a couple, or we need to agree that this was all a big mistake.

So our decision not to spend very much time with the opposite sex came out of an unfortunate necessity. I can't be alone with female friends because, yeah, the temptation is a bit much for me. I admit it. And there's no trusting other men to leave her alone, either. It has meant being unhappy about certain things and having to live a little differently, feeling like there's no one you can really trust. But if our relationship was going to grow stronger, that's what it was going to take. We've had those hard conversations and we're a better couple for it. If THIS is what we want, THIS is what it's going to take, and there's no room for compromise. Either we are a couple or we're not.

Getting back on track...you're asking about women blaming each other instead of the cheating man...

One of the problems I have as a husband is I feel that there are sometimes ways wives cheat that's much more dangerous than cheating with another man--and that's cheating with the best female friend. By that I'm not talking about a sexual relationship. I mean that spending time with the friend becomes more important than time with the husband. It might start out as a girl's-night-out. Fine. No problem. But then it becomes about the friend placing demands that keep her and her husband apart. Then it's about man-bashing. Then it's about pointing out everything that's wrong with the husband. Then it's about undermining the relationship. Then it's about getting a divorce. In my particular experience, it's all come out of this friend's unhappiness in her own relationship. She's miserable and wants every other couple out there to be miserable, too. It seemed to take FOREVER to get my wife to see what was going on, and I'm so grateful she did.

I bring this up in relation to the topic question because it's fascinating (and personal) to me how much it seems women are only out to destroy each other. I think it's sad. And when you see women fighting over a man, it's only a symptom of such inward pettiness. You can destroy a woman and her relationship by sleeping with her man, or you can attack her psychologically. It's more frightening to be the man caught in the middle of this, because if you feel helpless thinking you can't fend off other men from hitting on your partner, just wait until the "best friend" shows up. My wife and I have the kind of relationship we can deal openly with each other about these kinds of things. If I'd just started dating my wife and I found out the same kind of thing with the girl friend was going on, I'd have quickly ended the relationship early on. As it stands, there's too much at stake at this stage of our relationship for me to deliver ultimatums. But one way or another, women are quite often (not always, though) horrible to each other. If you want things to go well in your relationship, it's best to have a good handle on dynamics.

That might be helpful in explaining what you see in the media, in fiction, since those kinds of shows often have a largely female target audience. Men are stupid. Of course they cheat. You didn't have to be the girl he cheated with. The focus becomes on female relationships since it's assumed she's not going to try to salvage her relationship with her bf. It's pretty much done. So how do the female characters move forward? That's the real point of the story--not defining oneself as a woman based on whether there's a man in the picture, but as having an identity as a woman in relation to other women. We all share the same struggle, so we owe it to ourselves not to betray each other.

Cause us guys are just so wonderful than women have to fight over us! /sarcasm

I’m sorry to say I don’t agree with any of this! I’m saddened by your comments. Especially “men are expected to cheat”. No. Just no. I expect my partner to be faithful. I hope that I raised my son to be honourable. Men are much more than their hormones. My father was habitually unfaithful to my mother. Even with that example I never thought men were expected to cheat. I don’t think my brothers did either. While I don’t know if they cheated on their wives, I know that they have each been married for over 40 years and appear to be in love.

I believe that men and women can be friends. I know that they can be alone together safely. I know that work colleagues of opposite sexes can travel together without jumping into bed together. As can same sex. If something ever did happen, I think I would place the most blame on whoever started it.

I feel no special sisterhood, with higher expectations or obligations and standards for other women. “Out to destroy one another”, just because we’re women? Another no. No cat fights.

Yes, I think that there are aspects of almost all men and women that are nature and not nurture. You see someone attractive you’re going to feel a physical twinge of interest. But in civilizations we are equal people first, equally deserving of beginning and continuing relationships with a starting point of decency and trust regardless of sex and gender. Women can be friends with each other, or neutral acquaintances, even when men are involved.

Men can be faithful, but naturally they are strongly polygamous (having threesomes is a very common fantasy among men), like the case of every other primate species, it's the women they care for who usually keep them 'at bay' per say.