Maybe there’s no easy answer to this question, but what really makes a married or unavailable man cheat? Are there some guys out there who are happily married, content, etc. and found themselves cheating when they never thought in a million years that they would? There are those that say that all men cheat at least once regardless of how happily married they are. I wonder if this is true. Any thoughts on this?
I don’t think it’s true. I’m not married, yet, I am engaged and I have never cheated. I don’t plan on cheating either.
I’m sure a fair number of married men cheat. But ALL of them? Hardly.
My wife and I are coming up on anniversary #11, and I haven’t kissed another woman since I first kissed her.
Why do “some” married/unavailable men cheat?
Well, I think you had the right answer with “there is no easy answer”. The reasons are probably limitless. Some I guess would be, Different Enviroment, Boredom, Mid-Life crisis… etc.
BTW - Since it’s IMHO, my humble opinion is, cheating on someone you’ve made a commitment to is just plain flat out wrong.
Heck, I’ve turned down offers in the last year or so. Anyone who spends any time on the road gets them.
Some guys just can’t resist (for myriad reasons, I’m sure), I’d guess.
There’s also the “hey, you only live once” and “what she don’t know…” attitudes. There’s also the revenge angle for some real or imagined wrong committed by the wife. In some cultures, it’s accepted behavior though I assume your question was directed at americans. I know one guy who cheated on his wife with another man. Apparently he was going through a crisis regarding his sexual orientation and they have since divorced.
Btw, I’m married (though currently going through a divorce) but I’d never cheat on my wife. I don’t even believe flirting with another woman is appropriate but I seem to be in the minority there.
So for you guys who are saying “No way no how” to cheating, are you saying that there is no conceivable scenario or situation that would even tempt you to cheat? I realize that being tempted and acting upon it are two different things.
I just find it hard to believe that if A married man had an attracive woman and the opportunity right in front of him that he would not act upon it, especially if he thought he would not get caught! Anybody Agree?
Some married men probably wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation you just posted but I’d be willing to bet that a good majority of them would walk away from it. Even if they wouldn’t get caught, what they had done would always be in the back of their mind and they would have to live with that secret for the rest of their lives. How many people can do that? I would think that the guilt would drive them crazy. Eventually they’ll either 'fess up or continue cheating until they get caught.
I think the want variety. They have a Playboy magazine for married men-same centerfold each
month of the year. It’s like that, some like another centerfold.
Fluffy, If you’re convinced any man will cheat given the right circumstances, then I’m not going to waste energy arguing with you. You are always going to have problems in your relationships if you don’t learn to trust.
Getting away with it isn’t the issue. Being with an attractive woman isn’t the issue. I made a choice that that kind of behavior isn’t acceptable for me and that’s all there is to it. I happen to like monogamy. I’m sure a situation could be contrived that would tempt me but given that my wife is willing and able to have sex with me, that’s the only person I’m going to sleep with.
I think another reason has to be that some women, although not many of them will admit to it, see a married man as a kind of “challenge.”
I had a run-in with one of these women when I was married. My wife and I used to go to this cafe every week, and one week this waitress started really flirting with me, right in front of my wife. I knew how obvious it had to be because my wife, who usually didn’t notice this kind of thing, almost had smoke coming out of her ears. I tried to defuse the situation by making a specific reference to “my wife,” and eventually the waitress left. Next week, though, the same thing happened, with the waitress becoming even more persistent. It started happening every week–even when we sat outside of her section, the waitress would still make a beeline to our table. Our attempts to politely tell her to get lost–seeing how many times I could work the words “my wife” into a conversation, putting our arms around each other when she came by, literally waving our wedding rings in her face–only seemed to encourage her. Finally we ended up going to another cafe.
Now that I am divorced, I never get approached in cafes. Some of my more deviant female friends have suggested that I wear my old wedding band when I go out…
breakrun- I’m not necessarily convinced that any man will cheat on me. I was married for 14 years, have recently divorced. Infidelity was not the reason for my divorce and I can say that I really dont know if My ex cheated or not. Arguing with me or trying to convince me that not all men cheat is not the point of this thread. I trust plenty of people!! Having said that, I know that there are many, many women out there who do believe that “all men are dogs-all men cheat.” This thread is merely to get feedback from men on this topic to see how realistic this attitude is!
Having discussed this with many people of both sexes, IMHO:
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Most men will cheat given the opportunity. It is sort of the old, “You most want what you can’t have” syndrome.
More specifically, it is harder (generally speaking) for a man to have sex with a new woman than for a woman to have sex with a new man. Almost every woman is at most 5 minutes away from getting laid whenever she wants. A man (unless he is rich, famous, or both) has to make an effort to get laid. A woman just has to accept one of the dozen offers a day she gets, or at most go down to the corner store and pick up a guy.
Now, when does your nose itch the most? When your hands are full and you can’t scratch. When are you just dying for a drink? When the water isn’t working. Same thing. Men know that they can’t get it just whenever they want, so they are more likely to take the opportunity when it presents itself. Women can pass up 100 offers because they know that they’ll have 100 more tomorrow. As Chris Rock said, “No man in the world can outrun p***y when it’s chasing him.” -
When men actively search for women to cheat with, it is usually for one or both of the following; a) To get something that they are missing at home (which covers the “variety” thing), or b) To stroke their ego (“I still got it”)
A long time ago three (male) friends of mine were married in three consecutive months. Within a year all three were divorced. There was infidelity in all three marriages. In two out of the three it was the women cheating on the man. In both cases they’d put the moves on me (and others). I really didn’t know what to do with this information (tell my friends?). As it turned out it was unnecessary, they found out or were told anyway by their wives. In the other marriage the guy was cheating on his wife, he’d been cheating on her when she was just his girlfriend. I think she knew or suspected this all along. But I don’t think that was the main reason for their divorce.
So, at least in my experience, this is not a one way street.
A friend of mine in Cleveland told me once, “I could have the most beautiful woman in the world in front of me, on her knees and I wouldn’t do it. My kids mean too much to me. I wouldn’t even think of risking them finding that out.”
I don’t think he’s unhappy in his marriage, it’s just that his priority has shifted. I dunno tho, the response itself sounds kinda odd. (Not ‘I don’t want to hurt my wife’ or something along those lines) Can any other parents relate to it?
Fluffy, when you say things like:
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it makes it hardto believe you when you say:
It looks to me like you are invested in proving that vitually all men cheat, or only don’t because they have no chance to. I don’t know if that’s true–all we have are your words–but you might think about why you seem to at least have tendencies in this direction. In my experience, women want to prove that “all men cheat” for one of two reasons: either someone cheated on them and they feel like it is “their fault” and that the only way they can escape the blame is by proving that all men do it (there is some middle ground here that these women are ignoring) or they cheat/are thinking of cheating and need to justify it: “I’m sure he’s cheated on me before. All men do.”
Whenever a guy says this, I am convinced that the mental image he has in his mind is of Cameron Diaz waltzing down the street, men falling all over her. Sit down and list all the woman in the office. Use the phone list so you don’t skip any of them. How many of them have you solicited for sex? How many of them would you have sex with? Make sure you include the fat ones, the ones over 45, the ones with annoying voices, the ones that just get on your nerves, the ones that have funky diseases, the cleaning lady, etc. When men think back over the “women they know”, they tend to exlude all the women they wouldn’t have sex with automatically, and then think they’d have sex with every woman they thought of. Let me assure you that the bottom 50% of women in America, charisma wise (and looks and general approachableness of personality all figure into this) do not get solicited for sex “dozens” of times a day, a week, or a lifetime.
I’ve been to a few business conferences. My observation is that only a few guys mess around. Most will go to the gym, watch TV, get drunk, but no women. (Look, but no touch.) A normal husband loves his wife and won’t do things to hurt her. A normal guy gets tempted, of course, but fear of cooties will dampen what slips by the consience.
I’ve seen lots of statistics on the other side, but I remain skeptical of them because of what I see.
Manda JO, that was a very refreshing post! Your candor is most welcome, albeit offensive. …the ones over 45…!
I’ve been married for 17 years and haven’t had intercourse with another women in all that time. But have I cheated? In some respects, perhaps. I’ve fallen in love and chosen to walk away from it. But did I cheat or did I choose?
Are all men cheaters at heart? In some sense, yes. My wife and I recently conducted an informal poll of the married men we knew, asking whether they would have sex outside of their marriages, and if not why not. The responses I got were generally “because my wife would kick my ass.” The responses my wife got were closer to “I wouldn’t hurt my wife.” In my view we were getting the same response, just phrased differently on account of the audience.
What was interesting to me was that not one single man responded with anything remotely like “I value monogamy as an enriching mode of life.”
Monogamy in our culture has become a rather feeble method of avoiding our insecurities.
Well I haven’t cheated on my wife, but I did cheat on a girlfriend. Several times. I’m not proud of it, but I did it. And I can make up all sorts of “reasons” to rationalize why I did it, but at the end of the day I know in my heart of hearts that I did it just because I could. There was an opportunity, and I took it.
I have never cheated on my wife. I’d like to think I wouldn’t, but the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior, and I’ve done it in the past, when given the opportunity. I’d like to think that the circumstances are different now and that I wouldn’t do it. But that’s pretty easy to say when the opportunity isn’t there.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say all men will cheat. All I know is that in the past, I have.
I don’t think its fair to make it seem that men are the only one’s who cheat. A good number of my female friends (and several exs) have had the attitude of “Out of sight out of mind”.
I think the issue of if someone will cheat has a lot to do with how the individual views sex. Now I’m all for sex and trying out anything my parnet is up for grabs, so its not prudishness. For me its about the emotional part of sex…
Then again I very obviously don’t share the same view point as a lot of people. For one I don’t give a damn about my ego any more. Who cares if “I still got it”, I don’t and I’m the closest person who gives a damn. If its an issue of you wanting something you’re not getting at home… you had a good idea what the sex was like when you got married and if you weren’t happy with it at the time then DON’T MARRY THAT PERSON! If sex is such a big deal in the relationship that you’d betray your partner over it then you shouldn’t be in a serious relationship.
And Fluffy, in response to one of your questions: There is no cirumstances where I’d cheat on my gf/wife. When I’m dating someone every female I meet falls into the only friend catagory. Sure I may see someone out jogging who’s absolutly perfect to look at, but damnit she’s just some random person on the street and not the gal I care about.