[nessus42]

I'm not as impressed by this letter as others seem to be. Reagan's only advice is don't cheat and say "I love you" every day? Who goes into a marriage expecting to cheat? And if you even have the slightest inkling of wanting to cheat at the start, you're almost certainly marrying the wrong person. The letter provides no insight that I didn't already have by the time I was ten.

The true challenges of marriage come when the other person doesn't support your ambitions in life, or you don't support theirs. When you feel that they are constantly critical of you, or you of them. When they gain 100 pounds, or when you do. When for no particularly good reason you become engulfed with jealousy. Or they do. When infatuation gives way to whatever deeper feelings lie beneath. Or maybe you discover that the deeper feelings aren't there and you need to cultivate them if the marriage is to survive.

The challenges and joys of marriage are so much deeper than this letter conveys. This letter is like the "Just say no" to drugs campaign. Everything is boiled down to meaningless simplicity.

[aggronn]

I think you glossed over the deeper meaning of the letter, which addresses exactly what you're describing. Its not a how-to on the various problems you may or may not face, written during a time when the only problem with marriage was male infidelity--its a overarching philosophy where he only used one example for illustration.

You get what you put in.

The context implies that there is another side the coin, and that this isn't a scientific destruction of the institution of marriage. It, and I think this is implied, assumes that the other person is also putting in what they hope to get out, and that you're marrying the right person.

[nessus42]

I didn't gloss over any deeper meaning to the letter--it's not there. It's a very focussed and on-point sermon on remaining faithful. He barely even touches on why men sometimes cheat, other than to prove their manhood. But without addressing the real reasons, the message is just a lot of hot air. The real reason that most people cheat is because they don't feel loved, not because they just need another notch on their belt. They feel like they've already given 110% and their efforts are not appreciated, and the other person doesn't love them for their true selves, only for whatever tangible benefits they provide to the other person.

If I got such a letter from my father, I'd think, Pappa don't preach, throw the letter into the trash, and mark it down to yet another way in which my father didn't bother to get to know me or understand me at all.

[jhermsmeyer]

You kinda did gloss over, well, everything that makes this letter good.

The letter is powerful because of how it said what it wanted to say. The examples and imagery are vivid; the message consistent.

What you wrote: "The real reason that most people cheat is because they don't feel loved" is right there, wonderfully articulated, in this letter.

The hard part of being married, and the hard won wisdom contained in this letter, is the realization that most of the time people fail us because we've failed them first. It's a recursive nightmare and the only escape is to forgive and continue to commit.

Easy to boil down to a tl:dr of "don't cheat" and dismiss. Knowing is not the same as doing (day after day), though.

[nessus42]

I never said that the letter didn't say what it intended to say. Nor did I say that it doesn't say what it intended to say well.

My point is that it's not a message worth saying, just like the message, "Just say no" is not worth saying. It's a pointlessly simple message that is not likely to affect its target audience or change any outcome. This message is, in fact, insulting to its intended audience, Reagan's son.

Maybe, just maybe, the part about the wife always knowing when something is going on, would have an effect down the road, but the bulk of the message is, "Men are dirty dogs. You're a man and consequently, you're a dirty dog. All men want to do is dip their wicks, and therefore you will want to dip your wick. When you do, you will ruin your marriage, even if you think you won't, and then you will blame your broken marriage on your loving wife, just like all dirty dogs do. If you want to be happy, refrain from being the dirty dog that you know you are."

The fact of the matter, however, is that most men are not dirty dogs. The reasons that they cheat (which are the same as the reasons that most women cheat) are largely not due to just a desire to dip their wicks. The reason are much more complex, and by the time they do cheat, their cheating is a symptom of something deeper that is wrong with the marriage, and not the root cause of the marriage going bad, as is portrayed in Reagan's letter.

[aggronn]

But the article wasn't about cheating. It was clearly an allegory to support what he said he was going to talk about in the opening statement.

You're entitled to your on interpretation of course, but I think its disingenuous to look at a letter with this context and say his great concern, which he took time to write a letter about during the age of telecommunication, reminding his son that cheating isn't part of marriage.

[nessus42]

> But the article wasn't about cheating. It was clearly an allegory

Oy.

[jonstjohn]

I was moved by the simplicity of the letter, even if it was from a different era. I felt there was more to it than just 'go through the motions' and you'll be fine.