Scarlet Letter - Infidelity - Part One of Four

I have friends, both married and divorced, where their spouses, or ex-spouses, cheated on them. I have also seen this in the work place, with customers, with friends, family and in churches I have attended. The frequency of this subject in the news with politicians, movie stars, athletes, ministers and executives is shocking. Also the amount of time given to this subject on television and in movies, surprisingly given in a positive light, sickens me.

I can't imagine the heartache this causes the families involved. I am also amazed at the ability of these married people to find willing partners. Just today an aspiring politicians career was shot down by a past affair.

Today's post will be from my articles and statistics file, collected on adultery, some of the below saddens my heart:

Newsweek quote, August 11, 2008 issue:
"In a divorce filing, Alex Rodriguez says his wife's claims that he is a cheater are "immaterial." Legally? Maybe. In the court of public opinion?, nope"

Fox News 08/08/08 reporting on John Edwards infidelity with Rielle Hunter:"He told ABC News that he didn't love Hunter, 42"

Depending on the study, the percentage of partners that stray has been around:
Men: 25%
Women: 15%
A recent study said the average for both men and women is now 23% so the incidences are rising.

Literary lady Jessamyn West: "For a woman, there are no 'great' lovers. there is only the man she loves. And she does not have to be a mathematician to feel that the more he is a 'great lover' the less he is hers"

In a twin study, if one twin exhibits infidelity, the other twin strays 55% of the time, higher than the national average.

In wives that stray, 42 percent of them commit their extramarital misdeeds during less than one year of their marriage.

Multiple scholars say that primitive man was promiscuous.

Decades of research say that infidelity healing is very difficult but a wife recovers more quickly than a husband in the same straits. It is almost invariably more difficult for a husband than for a wife to recover after learning the spouse has been unfaithful.

When a husband or wife is unfaithful, "it's the husband who's most likely to admit the infidelity later"

If a mother needs help with the kids, the father tends to stay with her to give that help. If she doesn't, he doesn't. It's a scientific claim about all animal species: The male is usually monogamous, if the woman is reliant, and usually polygamous if the female is self-sufficient".

Adultery has been taboo and severely punishable in almost every society for one simple reason, says a sociologist. In an uninhibited free-love culture, it's difficult - sometimes impossible - to fix responsibility for the care of the children.

The writer Ben Hechtsaid said he has known a lot of men that chased women, and he has concluded that most of them were looking not so much as more bedroom activity , but for more masculinity in themselves. He said, "they were fellows of dubious lust."

More information coming in part two, three and four