Why Is the Woman Always the Villain? The Strange Logic of Blaming the ‘Other Woman

[ApriloNeil2026]

Reading a group on facebook about are we dating the same guy etc and a few people were blaming the woman for a guy cheating and being a marriage wrecker.

basically what the hell, in my view if the guy is married etc then why or how is it the womans fault in any way ?

I disagree. I'm afraid I've known more than.one woman who, as a pp on here stated, saw no problem with chasing after a married man quite deliberately...either just for a bit of what she saw as harmless fun and in another a really very deliberate attempt to essentially move herself into the wife's position.

In no way am I excusing the men or women who cheat. Of course they have agency..but all of us are susceptible to flattery, flirting, especially if you're in the trenches at home with young kids and work and childcare and doing the tired Olympics with your spouse and bickering about bins and the mental load. If you have someone who reminds you you aren't just mummy or daddy and represents a carefree, easy life and is quite deliberately doing that, I think its a bit disingenuous to absolve them of any responsibility.

I'm get the original point of the op, that women are often demonised, but I sometimes think the needle has swung too far the other way now and we dont want ANY negativity attached to women. All people, regardless of sex can be manipulative and manipulated.

Both are terrible people. The husband is more “at fault” as he’s the one lying and breaking vows but that doesn’t mean the OW isn’t to blame at all as she knows she’s hurting someone with her actions.

You wouldn’t be ok with someone going up and telling an overweight person they were fat and being unkind to them about their looks (random example) just because they were a stranger. People should not directly do things knowingly which will massively hurt others.

Why does nobody acknowledge that, just as the husband and OW can be bad people, then so can the wife?

I know people who have been cheated on who frankly deserved it

If the husband or wife is a bad person then their spouse can leave not cheat

cheating on a bad person just makes all parties bad people

FFS I mean if the OW already knows the wife and know she is a bad person (and esp if they wife has done something to her directly) then it’s fair game.

The wife is always painted as the saint who had no idea. In reality things are generally more complex than they look

Or do you think the wife never deserves it?

Well marriages are complicated, however, if we are going to go down the 'who's the bigger cunt in this situation?' route:

HUSBAND: 2/3 cunt.

OTHER WOMAN: 1/3 cunt.

So as you can see, while the husband holds double the amount of cuntery then the other woman-and is therefore more worthy of scorn-the other woman is also a cunt but less so.

Hope this helps, OP.
Or do you think the other woman gets a fucking chocolate watch?
Nobody likes a woman who has sex with a man whose wife had just given birth.
She is - rightfully-shown scorn for it.

And nobody but nobody agrees with this faux innocent, mealy-mouthed nonsense about, 'I didn't make the vows' in real life.
Only the Other Woman's dopey friends say they do. But they don't really.

What about
WIFE 33.33
HUSBAND 33.33
OW 33.33

Contrary to popular belief women who are cheated on aren’t all perfect.

I have an example - Woman A (wife) is friends with woman B (future OW). As far as Woman B is concerned, good friendship, she confides in Woman A about a lot of private stuff. Woman A then deliberately shares the info with the wrong people knowing it will cause huge problems for Woman B.

Woman B fucks Woman A’s husband in retaliation.

is Woman A really blameless??

"Male fertility does decline with age, but nowhere near as sharply as female fertility" OK now I know that you don't actually know the science on this as well as you think you do @ValidPistachio

So the newest evidence is showing that the age of a man actually matters MORE for the health of children than the age of women, as eggs don't degrade at the same rate as sperm, and aren't continuously produced in the same way.

Research NEVER USED TO TRACK the age of men when assessing fertility, only the age of the mother. They've looked back at studies retrospectively and found that an older women, with a young man, basically has barely any increased fertility risks. However, if a man is over 40 a woman is three times more likely to miscarry her baby due to issues with sperm quality.

So there's a huge biological advantage for women seeking to have babies with young men - even more so than there is for men having a preference for younger women. There's just sexism in the research/ways studies were historically conducted that makes people think it's the other way round (NB. Men were the ones designing these historic studies! Unsurprisingly...)

I don't know, don't care. The people in your scenario sound like low lives.

The only thing I know is that if a man cheats he:
Shouldn't do it on his own doorstep.

He should make damned sure his wife never finds out about it.

He should not embarrass his wife so that their social circle finds out. Leaving her no option but to take action.

He should use contraception.

He should not be such a pathetic wimp to upset his wife by confessing to relieve his 'conscience.'

He should own his infidelity and keep it well apart from his marriage.

He should be emotionally mature enough to know that his wife and family have a million times more worth than getting his dick wet and enough experience with women that he doesn't fall in lurve cause another woman touched him.

He should know what goes on tour stays on tour.

Trouble is that most men are such losers who don't venture into the next town for months on end that the only women they can cheat with is the pub, er, woman of low sexual boundaries.

"If the wife is so awful, why not just leave?"

I knew a girl who had an affair with a married guy. He was a businessman. He wouldn't leave his alcoholic wife because he said "If I leave she'll take half my business".
So he stayed and she drank the business away.
He turned up at the girl's door with a suitcase when he was bankrupt. The dippy girl took him in and kept him until he died.
If he'd left when he had the chance he would have had at least some assets.

You can't fix stupid 🙄

AGAIN I was talking about the OW being someone who knows the wife personally and perhaps has a good reason to do it 🙈

‘Woman of low sexual boundaries’. Bloody hell the 1950s phoned - they want their moral judgement back

So you can’t even see that some people do deserve the shit that is thrown at them?

The girl I referred to, knew the wife and the husband and felt sorry for the husband because the wife was so awful.
They used to socialise together and the wife always made a show of herself by getting drunk.

I actually dont think that screwing someone else's husband is a good way to 'get back' at someone no. Your example is weirdly specific. If someone else did that to you, you have it out with them, dont lower yourself to shitty behaviour. Cheating is not a tactic in war. Unless you're about 14 maybe.

You criticise my choice of words yet you somehow want me to agree that a woman who has sex with her friend's husband out of revenge is somehow noble?! And that the wife deserved it cause she said some nasty things ?
Good grief.

Lol.

Totally agree.

She ruined the woman’s life. But thanks for proving my point - people don’t accept that, in a situation like this, the wife’s actions mean they don’t deserve anything better

I don't really care. Two wrongs don't make a right.
Nobody gives the other woman a chocolate watch. Ever.
If the revenge seeker wants sympathy, she ain't going to get it. And rightly so.

No it wasn’t me. But I get it completely. I saw the devastation caused and the fact that the people still can’t see an issue is slightly surprising

Most people in RL are aware of nuance - apparently not on MN though, everything is so simple

I see nuance all the time, however, the situation you describe her is simple: revenge cheating is a low life thing to do.

Absolute rubbish. In that scenario the wife did a terrible thing. The way to respond to that is to either either cut her off, confront her or publicise what she did. Involving her husband in a weird sex revenge thing just gives her moral.high ground to the outside wirkd, so its counter productive anyway

A lot of other women are very naive: the vast majority of the time the guy just wants sex and, being a guy, he's not that choosy.
He has zero intention about leaving his wife but if he's a bit of a loser it's usually with somebody local so the wife inevitably finds out.
She then has little choice but to take action because she is so humiliated because everybody now knows.
Dopey husband usually begs forgiveness but she can't give it so Mr Fuckwit leaves with his tail between his legs to other woman who, naively, thinks she's 'won'.

Seen it time and time again.

^ I agree with this. Revenge cheating will just make the whole thing ten times worse. It’s also completely teenage behaviour. People should respond like the adults they’re supposed to be, especially when there are so often children involved, who will be the ones who end up being hurt at the end of it all.