Should adultery be re - criminalized?

[SlowFJH]

There's been a plethora of threads from OW in recent days. The general feeling on MN seems to be "cheating is always wrong". Yet most "civilised" countries have removed "Thou shalt not commit adultery" from their statute books many years ago. Was this a mistake?

Of course in those same countries it is still a legitimate grounds for divorce.

I did just google, but all I got were links to what was happening in USA (where adultery was definitely a crime).

Can you recommend links about Britain? Thanks.

No.

Just have Fuck all to do with them. Anyone who lies and gaslights their partner is not someone you want in your life.

Are you insane? Of course adultery shouldn't be illegal.

I saw a 'true movie' based on a case in North America where the wife sued the OW for $1million for 'alienation of affection' and won

articles.mcall.com/1999-08-25/features/3262512_1_joe-hutelmyer-affection-alienation

Adultery Act 1650

It would be a serious infringement of human / civil rights.

The state had no role to play in policing consensual sex between adults.

Why on earth would anyone even contemplate such an idea?

Thou shalt not kill.
Thou shalt not steal.

All the rest.... We said "Not so much too"

There could be a natty line in hand crafted As available in Cath Kidston.
No, it's a bonkers retrograde Puritan idea (generally based in religious extremism) that would end up punishing women. Remember, Hester Prynne was the one punished.

I've found a link.

Death for both parties under 1650 Act (unless spouse had deserted for 3 years, or was commonly believed to be dead). The same Act also criminalised fornication (3 months prison), incest (death, any children illegitimised) and keeping a bawdyhouse (whipping, branding, imprisonment; for both male and female proprietors).

(Hope that's not TMI on the punishments, and thanks for help in this. Amazed at what I can learn from reading round topics of MN threads)

Hi OP and welcome to Mumsnet .

That's an interesting first post- why do you ask ? Are you having an affair right now or thinking about one ?

Sorry, slow x-posting, TheBestChocolate (hadn't seen your extremely helpful link when I started typing)

The anti-OW and anti - cheating sentiments often expressed here seem to have quite a Puritanical zeal.

Not having an affair nor contemplating one. Married 18 years and have not (AFAIK) been cheated on.

I have coveted my neighbour's ass in the past.

I feel like a crime has been committed against me. It would hurt less if he'd hit me or stolen something. It's hard to see the perpetrator carrying on without consequences, and hear the legal system telling me that the courts aren't interested in punishing, or compensating, just being fair to each party.

Of course adultery should not be a criminal offence.

It shouldn't be a civil tort either.

The harm caused is not tangible or serious from plain adultery.

Domestic abuse should be illegal, for serious harm against the public it should be a criminal offence. Perhaps more use should be made of civil law to make domestic abuse a civil tort.

The harm caused is not tangible or serious from plain adultery
Ruined lives aren't tangible or serious?
I remember the poster who said her mum sat and looked out of a window for three years after her (the mother's) marriage broke down. That's not serious or tangible?

I definitely don't think it should be criminalised. But I think there should be some provision in civil law to recognise and remedy the fact that when a partner is sexually unfaithful, that alters the conditions under which consent within the marriage is given.

IMO if a cheating partner knows that their spouse wouldn't consent to sleep with them if they knew they were cheating, that blurs a big boundary.

It is serious, it is harmful, but it's not necessarily more serious than "I just stopped loving you", "I never loved you", "I was gay all along", "I don't fancy you now you're fat/old/ill/boring", "I've fallen in love with Doris, we're not shagging yer, but I will move in with her the instant we get a divorce"

"Thou shalt not commit adultery" is one of the ten commandments listed in the Hebrew Bible (Exodus 20 1-17) and has never been on the statute books, but adultery when committed by a married woman was a felony in English common law at one time punishable by death and subsequently penalised by payment of a fine.

Recriminalising adultery would serve to reinforce the concept of marriage as being akin to ownership and may place an additional burden on prisons that are already full to bursting with those who have been incarcerated for crimes against property.

Unless you and your spouse mutually consent to have an open marriage, I suspect you will become infected by "Puritanical zeal" if you discover that he has committed adultery another woman, OP.

This Guardian book review published in 2001 has relevance to this topic:
www.theguardian.com/books/2001/may/12/extract

I'm not a specialist in jurisprudence (and hoping that saying that might sum,on one of MN's legal specialists), but are you sure that our legal system was ever 'based' on the Ten Commandments? I always understood our common law was derived from Roman legal practice. (And just to be pedantic, any legal system which did decide to use 'the' ten commandments as a basis would have to decide which ten they meant - there has historically been disagreement on the subject of their division, numbering and distinction.)

No it should be a criminal act.
Often in a marriage adultery ends in divorce and any children from that marriage do suffer as they have a changed relationship with both parents. If you make adultery a criminal act you could further affect the children relationships will again change as earning potential could be affected, parent might have to do community service restricting the time with children.
Imagine the court cases the wrong wife hearing all the details of the affair.
Criminalising adultery will make co-parenting more difficult than it already is.
I say all of this as a divorcee whose Ex had an affair that has already destroyed our lives.

Sorry it should not be a criminal act.

Op what so because I would think a cheaters a twat and a bit scummy then I should also think it should be illegal? Erm no. There's lots of things that people do that are shit but not illegal. Doesn't stop it being shit.

No the harm is not serious or tangible as far as the law is concerned. There really is no excuse for being so dramatic as to say it 'ruins a life'.

It does not cause serious and long lasting damage in the way that domestic abuse does.

Infidelity however often goes hand in hand with domestic abuse. I would say it is the abuse that causes damage not the infidelity.