Does anyone think that having an affare should be a crime?

[Wanttofly]

It used to be and still is in many countries.

If you stand up and say vows and then lie to the other person and have sex with someone else why is it ok?

The affare hurts the other person more than someone steeling their stuff or taking a car and that is a crime.

So why is it not a crime to break up a family, to make children grow up with only one pereant?

When did it become ok to have an affare?

Sorry for spelling i'm dyslexic

nooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! uabvu

C'est la vie

Not really.The law is actually very consistent here. Civil and criminal law are completely separate. If an affair (treated as a breach of contract) was seen as a criminal offence then to be consistent all breaches of contract would have to be treated as criminal offences which would be ridiculous. It would mean that if your builder didnt turn up on the day he said, you could theoretically have him arrested. More scarily, you could be arrested for defaulting on a personal loan or mortgage as that is breach of contract.

Also, money in a joint account is joint and severally owned. That means that all account owners own all the money in that account. So anyone withdrawing money from a joint account is withdrawing their own money. The person cant defraud themselves. It's a risk of a joint account.

Civil law might I suppose make sense, but thinking about contract law it is all about what is actually written down and signed up to. The wedding ceremony (with vows etc) is not the legal contract, you need a registrar for that, and when you sign your name there is very little text there, certianly no mention of sexual fidelity.

It's nice to think someone could get whacked upside the head with some kind of blunt object for adultery, though. It causes so much misery for so many.

Unfortunately, all there is left is the hope of karma.

I'm sure somebody's already said this, but the only legal contract in marriage (England & Wales) is the bit about being free to marry in law, and taking each other as lawfully wedded.

All the rest is a moral and/or religious contract. Those aren't enforceable by law here: not until the Taliban takes over, anyway.

Interestingly, OP, you can have a fidelity clause put into a financial & service contract - there wouldn't be a prison sentence for breaking it, but there could be legally enforceable penalties.

I'm recruiting for my Fixed-Term Exclusivity Contract campaign!

"I'm recruiting for my Fixed-Term Exclusivity Contract campaign" ItsGraceActually

ItsGraceActually, but if adultery can be cited as reason to dissolve a marriage then surely by default sexual fidelity is deemed to be part and parcel of a UK marriage.

OK, they may not say it is when a couple marry, but the unsaid text is: "You do realise if either of you cheat and the other wishes to make a thing of it in court and reasonably prove the adultery, it will end your marriage?"

It's there by default IYSWIM.

Not only adultery but other behaviours, too.

OK, you may not sign to be faithful, reasonably behaved etc- but if you're not the marriage ends.

And I don't think a judge should set out with the idea of punishing anyone for the break-up of a marriage, he should just set out the division of assets according to the reasonable needs of -primarily- the children (if any) and the divorcing couple.

Of course, a man who's told that his wife and child must stay in family home and he must move out because children's interests come first may feel aggrieved by this (and punished in a "karma" sense) but no judge should set out with punishment in mind when it comes to divorce.

My mum had an affair (with my stepdad, they've been together for 27 years now), and my dad was devastated at the time.

Should she have been punished for it? In what way could she possibly have been punished that wouldn't penalise her children?

Women have affairs too - if it's all about protecting the children then I can't see how to punish adulterers without hurting their children and making a bad situation even worse.

I wasn't hurt or upset by my mother's affair btw, it was sad that my dad left but he would have left anyway as their marriage was breaking down.

Would be impossible to police as well, the crown prosecution service are already crazily overstretched with stuff like shoplifters and murderers, they would never have the time to even come close to dealing with affairs as well. Also would be very difficult to prove - can you ever really know if the "innocent party" didn't know and didn't consent to the affair? The cheating husband could just say that it was an open relationship.

it is a crime. adultery is . not premarital yhough

As someone who is an atheist I don't have any time for any religion but I have to say that those who marry in church do risk the wrath of their god if they're adulterous.

So perhaps their god may punish them when they die.

If you make your vows in front of your god I think you should be prepared to take the punishment your god may dish out to you if you cheat.

Or do people not actually think about what they're saying these days when they marry in a church?

It's very sad and shameful that this OP is not a joke and that it's being seriously considered.

you could combine this with ID cards initiative by installing Chips and Pins in adults. So only your DP can enter a PIN to free you of being tracked by the Central Control Dept

I was going to say Orwellian TDiddy: but you have more or less said it for me

Just to clear up the legal points, as I understand them:

there is only ONE ground for divorce which is the "irretrievable breakdown of marriage". We have a no fault system now in the UK where the court will not divide assets according to judgment on behaviour (who committed adultery, who picked their nose at breakfast, who was frigid) thank goodness.

BUT there are only five ways to demonstrate the irretrievable breakdown of marriage:

adultery
desertion
unreasonable behaviour
2 years separation and both parties consent
5 years separation even if one party objects

Unfortunately, unless you want to wait 2 years and can afford 2 homes in that time, you do seem to end up having to prove "fault" of some kind under one of the first three heads in order to get your divorce. It's best to discuss this beforehand and agree what you are going to put so that it is not a shock (and red rag) to the other spouse. This fault DOES NOT affect the pay out.

Secunda, unfortunately if you are not married when you split, you do NOT get 15% of the assets. You get nothing that you did't buy in the first place. NOTHING. This is such a common misconception. Women, do not give up or downgrade your jobs until you have a wedding ring. If you contribute to the household budget, pay the mortgage not the food bills - this makes the BIGGEST difference.

goldenlife I don't see it as "unfortunately" myself. If a couple wish to be tied legally, then they can marry or draw up own legal arrangements between themselves (joint mortgage etc).

The idea of marriage by default is repulsive-I don't want the state to deem a couple to be defacto married because they've lived together. It would give them (the state) too much control.

It's only right that the law is involved when a married couple split- after all, the couple did invite the law into their relationship by getting married. Fairy nuff.

If you want to apply contract law to marriage then you have to do it properly. The enforcement of contracts is totally about what is written down (hence "the small print") so anything implied or said but not signed up to is almost totally irrelevant. This is a reason for pre-nuptial agreements after all - they are legal contracts, although I think there is some question as to how much they are permitted to influence divorce proceedings. The religious side yes, could be enforced by your god if he/she so chose, but they are in truth just a ceremony, and the state should not be enforcing ceremonies (how many godparents woudl be liable if it did I wonder).

Have you recently been hurt very badly?

I do remember thinking that it was ironic that somebody could steal your car or your money and be punished instantly, but if they dumped you or cheated on you or were horribly cruel to you, there was no punishment whatsoever. That seemed unbelievable when I was badly hurt.

I think philanderers rarely 'get away with it'. It does seem so unfair when they do but nine times out of ten they seem to get their comeuppance one way or another.

People who are infected with an STI due to a partners lack of sexual loyalty may have a case in civil court, apparently.

"Fixed-Term Exclusivity Contract"

Any further thoughts on that since, Grace?

(I felt the need to name tweak after purging my deepest and darkest so absolutely on your thread. Grace, TD, WWIFN, etc, I do apologise.)

auto response: SGB is on holiday

nooka When people marry they're creating something called a marriage, right? (sorry if this sounds a bit silly, but I'm trying to express myself- sorry if a bit clumsy in tone)

So although nobody actually signs a legal contract to be sexually faithful upon marriage, NOT being sexually faithful is seen as good reason to end that marriage (that's a given, I think).

So isn't sexual fidelity seen as implicitly part of a marriage?

I suppose a person could claim in their defence that they had no idea that they were supposed to be sexually faithful IF they didn't explicitly say they would, but if it could be somehow shown that they were aware that infidelity was grounds for divorce, this wouldn't wash, would it?
Just rambling.

I mean if they are mentally capable of understanding that infidelity is grounds for ending a marriage, the idea that they can "get away with it" and say they didn't sign up for sexual faithfulness seems daft to me.

The idea of monogamy is relatively recent and also culturally contextualised. Even in Georgian times it was common for couples to have affairs - males and females, especially as often people married for social status reasons and not for love. Marriage since Biblical times is largely for keeping track of paternity and keeping assests in the family.

In many cultures 'marriage' only lasts as long as it needs to - when one party (usually the woman) has had enough of behaviour they class as unreasonable, the otehr party goes (often but not in Europe historically, the kids stayed with mum).

It would appear that genetically we are predisposed to serial monogamy; although women often want a good provider for a hubby but a good genetic match for daddy (are rarely are these the same guy).

Adultery hurts; my ex-H is married to his long-time other woman and is much better off financially than me, and I'm still single too. But I'll not grind an anti-affair axe. They happen and it's generally the symptom of a marriage not being right for both parties... some people can work through the upsets, some not, but they are a fact of life and should be accepted as such.