| > But I’m not at all sure that the people who do cross it are any less self-respecting. I get that. It's just that their idea of what's "respectable" and mine differ. That's not to say either of us are right or wrong, but I stand by my version of respect and self-respect amongst the people I chose to spend timer with and I will judge them and the people they cheat with accordingly. If they've got a circle of friends who share their views, they won't give a flying fuck about my judgement of them. In my view, and amongst my friends, cheating is a demonstration of untrustworthiness. The same as stealing. It doesn't matter to me if you've stolen from me or from someone else, if I know you've stolen at all, I know I can't trust you not to steal from me or my friends. If you're happy to fuck around with someone else's wife or girlfriend, you'll probably be happy to do the same with mine if it suits you. We will not be friends. You will, at very best, become an acquaintance that I do not trust. > If someone cheats on you and you never find out, does it mean anything? Yeah. It means they lie to you and are untrustworthy, just you don't know about it yet. Maybe you'll never find out about that specific instance of cheating, but you still have someone you should have been able to trust who'll break that trust and lie to you in your life, and these attitudes will eventually reveal that, even if you never find out she fucked the best man at your wedding (or whatever). Thats what I meant when I said "I don't need that sort of complication or grief in my life." (I will add though, that this was not nearly as strongly a developed outlook on life in my 20s, and I will cut some slack for "kids being kids", but if you're still fucking around on your girlfriend/wife in your 40's, you will be judged harshly and very firmly moved from "a friend" to "an untrustworthy acquaintance that I probably need to warn other actual friends about" in my life.) |