Why do women have affairs with men with young children

[Thegreenpotter]

As the title says. Why?

Do they have no concept of the toll that having young children can take on a relationship?

How can they feel ok playing a part in breaking up a family?

This is not to suggest the blame lies with the other women, far from. Just more a curiosity as to why and how they can do so from a moral perspective.

Morals are a difficult area that aren't always clear cut. Moral dilemmas are real and morals are complicated. Even the standard "do as you would be done by" isn't simple. I, for example, wouldn't want to be told if my husband was cheating but I know lots of other women would. There are plenty of things that you can't just state as "moral" without debate. The world is complex and so are people.

You think it is moral that every woman on earth should be responsible for a married man's penis.

I think it's moral for married people to stay faithful, and ideal not to sleep with them.

But I actually don't think it's moral to hold uncommitted people responsible for married people's personal pledges. It makes the commitment pointless, it presumes upon the bodily autonomy of people who never consented to it, it dilutes the married person's responsibility and, as is always the case with sexual ethics, it always results in double standards for men and women.

@DrSbaitso yes I'd say it's moral to stay away from MM's penises. It's immoral to knowingly have an affair with a MM. It is moral to stay away from MM/MW and it's moral to choose not to have sex with MM/MW. It's immoral to have an affair if you are the MM/MW. There are far more options open to people who don't want the standard marriage to one person for the rest of their life or be single and it's becoming more and more socially acceptable to practise ENM or be footloose and fancy free with one or more NSA partners if that's what people want.

I find this obsession with referring to pledges weird, as though we are only talking about people who are married, not people in relationships at least one member of which believes to be monogamous. The morality of this has f* all to do with any contract. Thinking your right to have sex with anyone you want, whenever you want (your “bodily autonomy”) should trump any effect this may have on others is a clear indicator of your view of accepted morality, imvho. And to keep your behaviour secret from the injured party is a clear indicator that you understand very well what the accepted morality is on the matter and also that you understand the potential harm your behaviour will cause.

I think, or hope, that the majority of people who have affairs actually do consider the potential pain this may cause and don’t unthinkingly do whatever they fancy, whenever they fancy it. It they do the latter, then they really are sociopaths, imvho. Most people are just selfish and prioritise themselves, or justify behaviour to themselves that they would not be happy about if done to them.

I find this obsession with referring to pledges weird, as though we are only talking about people who are married, not people in relationships at least one member of which believes to be monogamous.

I'm sorry you find it "weird" or obsessive to refer to pledges a lot when discussing the issue of sexual fidelity.

I use it a lot precisely because not everyone who is committed is married. But they will have made a pledge, a promise, a commitment. I can't think of that many different words for it. If you can, great, but I'm sure you know what I mean and can understand that it's inevitably going to be mentioned a lot since it is central to the issue.

Thinking your right to have sex with anyone you want, whenever you want (your “bodily autonomy”) should trump any effect this may have on others is a clear indicator of your view of accepted morality, imvho.

Indeed, which is why it is so awful to promise/pledge/marry/commit/insert preferred word here yourself as exclusive to someone, therefore creating an expectation and a duty upon yourself as the person who opted in, and then crap on it.

Of course, if you don't want to create that duty or expectation, don't opt in to it. Then all you're doing is having sex as a free agent.

@RandomForest No, just calling her out as a hypocrite.

@DrSbaitso - it’s not a pledge, it’s a default position in a largely monogamous society. The majority of people don’t expect their partner to be sleeping with all and sundry without telling them they are in an open relationship.

And sorry to disappoint, but I would not have sex with someone who was in a relationship with someone else, because I know the default position and don’t want to be that arsehole who shits over others’ reasonable expectations, just because I am not the one who promised to behave like a decent human being in a society which views monogamy as the norm, unless agreed otherwise by all concerned.

I have no idea why you think that would disappoint me.

it’s a default position in a largely monogamous society

I think most relationships these days start off casual and there comes a point where monogamy is agreed. It may cause trouble to assume it's the default from a certain point without discussing it with your partner first. At any rate, a free agent hasn't got any default position except adult and consensual. You are applying the supposed defaults of people in relationships to someone who isn't in one.

At the end of the day, the OW deciding to shag your partner really means nothing. She wants him, so what? It doesn't become a problem until he decides to shag her. He's the one who took an expectation and duty upon himself to you that would devastate you if he broke it. Her having sex doesn't mean anything. Him having sex is what it rests on.

@DrSbaitso** not necessarily. If I were a free agent my default for a sexual partner would extend to a sexual partner who was free and available to be in a sexual relationship and had no obligations to others to remain monogamous to them. As a free agent it would be on me to ensure my actions upheld my moral beliefs. How wonderful for MM with a roving eye that there seem to be plenty of people like you who are willing to disregard accepted moral standards.

Her having sex does mean something, though. Even if it’s “just sex” it still has meaning. And if she knows he lives with a partner and has young children with the partner, it would be exceptionally odd of her to assume the relationship was at the “casual” stage and that monogamy was not the expected norm in that relationship.

@DrSbaitso - according to your analysis, then, if a free agent fancies a married man with small kids, it is also not wrong to make it obvious you fancy him and actively to proposition him for sex? Should they take any interest at all in the relationship status of someone before they decide whether or not to pursue them? It is not, after all, always the man who pursues the woman in relationships.

It really does mean something IN YOUR OPINION @Walkaround

Not in mine. Sex has no meaning to me more than going for a run or having a bath. I enjoy it, no more, no less.

Please can you explain this meaning sex is supposed to have, as it sounds like something from a 70s teenage girls novel to me?

I certainly wouldn't expect ongoing monogamy if I had sex with someone once. If I saw them a few times, it would be a conversation for the future to see where they were at. But never expected.

Running involves just you. Sex involves multiple people - you, the person you are having sex with and anyone else who is in a relationship with that person. If you cannot tell the difference between running and a relationship, you make very odd comparisons between unrelated things - a bit like those who equate an affair with murder.

(@Thereasonidid )

@Thereasonidid - I assume you do realise this is a conversation about people who have sex in the context of an afdair?

So no answer then @Walkaround

I'll ask you again. What does meaning does sex have?

As it means nothing to me. Hence my comparison to running, or bathing, as I enjoy them too.

I'm wondering what sex means to you, as your post attributed meaning to it.

And this is where so many people make a mistake.

They think that because their SO says they love them, wants to move in together build a home, have kids etc that they can expect fidelity - wrong ! This is just an assumption.

If you want monogamy/ fidelity/commitment/exclusivity then you need to be sure that you are both talking the same language. And that means asking the correct questions.

I dated a guy and we'd got to the stage where he wanted me to move in with him. I asked him straight if this was what he wanted and if we were 'exclusive', and if he planned for it to stay that way.

His exact response was "I love you Bluebells, don't worry, I'll never take up with another women as long as I'm with you."
So I took that as a "Yes" and put my house up for sale.

Some time later I went round to his house unexpectedly and caught him with another woman. I went ballistic and called him a cheat and a liar "You said you wouldn't take up with another women as long as you were with me"!

His response "I didn't lie, I didn't take up with another woman because I was already seeing X when I met you".

(She knew nothing of me BTW)

He was lucky I didn't punch him on the nose.

I learned after this not to assume anything and to ask very specific questions.

Why was he lucky you didn't punch him on the nose? Why were you outraged? You, after all, didn't ask the specific and right question therefore left yourself open to this misinterpretation.

But this is of course utter bollocks.

You and he both knew he had betrayed you.

What an absolute arse @Bluebellsandharebells

I gave you an answer, though, @Thereasonidid - where having sex is not harmless to others it has meaning. If you are aware of a partner and small children who are under the mistaken impression that their father is not someone who would put their security and sense of trust at risk, along with the mother’s sexual health, trust and understanding of the relationship without any reason other than he fancied sex, then I could not bring myself to have sex with him. I could not derive any pleasure from knowingly participating in another person’s act of betrayal.

Thank you for your response @Walkaround

I completely disagree with you. You're assigning some sort of emotional meaning to a physical act. I don't.

And I would see knowingly participating in someone’s act of betrayal as active assistance and collusion, and therefore something that should make a person feel guilty.

@Thereasonidid - so you are incapable of recognising the meaning it would have to the betrayed partner? Would it also be meaningless if he brought you to the family home and had sex with you in front of his kids and partner in the living room? Or if he took you up to the spare room and asked them not to disturb you both for a while, because he was having meaningless sex?