Imagine you are married to someone rich/famous/powerful, and you read on the front page of the New York Times that your spouse has been running a tab with very pricey whores. Do you stand stoically by while he/she admits to the world to spending thousands of dollars to do what you thought was an exclusive part of your marriage contract? If so, why; if not, why not?
For myself, the humiliation would be so overwhelming I’d crawl into a hole somewhere and die. If I were the cuckolder, I’m pretty sure I’d need help getting my wife’s hands off of my throat. Hell, I’d be permanently moved to the doghouse for a $50 standupper! In any event, either of us would be facing the music alone.
Good Lord, no. Break our marriage vows and then expose me to public scrutiny and pity over it? I would be the Ex Mrs. Rich/Famous/Powerful before you could say “Lorena Bobbitt.”
I don’t think I’d stand in front of the cameras, but I don’t think I’d divorce him over it either. It would depend on the circumstances and how often it happened.
(I can’t really envision my husband going for a hooker, so it’s hard to really know what I’d do if he did.)
If my spouse was enough of a jerk/bitch to sneak around instead of, you know, actually having the gonads to say, “I’m not satisfied with how things are going. Can we make some changes?”, divorce papers served in public might not be a bad idea.
Especially in these very public cases I wonder if the thinking is “if I stand by him (or her) now, during the worst of it maybe there will be more that can be salvaged from the burning wreckage than if I don’t.”
Maybe Mrs. Spitzer is doing what she thinks will ultimately be best for her children. She hasn’t really spoken out or even altered her facial expression in any of the coverage I’ve seen. My mom, who lives in NY and is getting even more coverage of this than we are elsewhere speculated to me that Mrs. S might be fairly heavily sedated.
By keeping her thoughts to herself, but still being visible maybe she’s putting herself in a better position for a six figure book deal. It seems like everyone’s intrigued by her. People weren’t this interested in Mrs. Gary Hart when she went into seclusion when his “scandal” broke.
But, holy crow, if it was revealed in the national media that my husband had spent $80,000.00 on hookers/call girls/sex workers I’d have a hard time keeping it together for a press conference.
I think I’d support him for the cameras for a press conference, and then deal with the issues later, off-camera, possibly but not neccessarily resulting in divorce.
I have a hard time picturing myself married to someone rich/famous/powerful–let alone someone r/f/p who is involved in a sex scandal.
But if I married someone who decided to pursue political power, I assume we’d talk about that, and somewhere in there, I think we’d agree not to air our dirty laundry in public, and if our dirty laundry got hungout in public without our prior knowledge, we’d still deal with it in private. So I might appear supportive at a press conference, even if in private I was devastated by the betrayal.
Nope, not even for the sake of the children. Maybe especially not, for the sake of the children. What kind of example does it set for them?
A caller on NPR this morning, discussing Spitzer and legalizing prostitution, had this to say (paraphrased): “Men can’t say no. Women have a choice, they can say yes or no to sex, but men can only say yes.” Gimme a break.
If, on the other hand I were fem, I’d tell him that I was standing beside him. Then when we were on stage in front of the cameras I’d calmly turn to face him and kick his nads up into his throat.
I hope I’d stand by his side through the blow up, and then work out our personal issues between us, in private. In the middle of a media shit storm is NOT the time to try to make rational decisions about our future together.
Actually, my husband and I had this conversation last night. I said, “Just for the record, if you ever get caught cheating on me in a sex scandal, I’m sending you out there to face the press all by yourself.” He said, “Likewise.” Would I divorce him? I don’t know. But I’m damn sure not humiliating myself by eating shit on national TV.
As I pointed out, if you stand there, you avoid having to answer reporters questions and harassment. If you’re not there, they’ll camp out trying to get a statement, which will only make things worse.
Yes, I would. If we’re not divorced, then we’re married, which means I vowed to stand by her whatever comes. Her violation of one of our vows gives me no license to break another, no matter how angry I’d be. And I’d be angry. But I’m her husband; I’m the one who’s still there when she’s wrong.
Interesting point. As I remember it, however, there was wild speculation as to whether Lee Hart was even in the family’s Kitteredge home near Evergreen. The Hart scandal broke a little more slowly, however, starting with rumors in Florida. Lee stood by Gary during those weeks with little trouble. It was after Donna Rice was seen exiting his apartment, and the almost immediate publication of the infamous Monkey Business photo that Lee Hart disappeared from view. (I remember all of this because I was a newspaper reporter here in Colorado at the time.)
Political scandal trivia: Anybody remember the Harts’ ironic address near Evergreen, Colo., at the time?
I was just ranting about this to a friend, how women like Hillary and Spitzer’s wife continue to stand beside their men in public after they’ve been utterly betrayed and humiliated as wives and women. IMHO, I as a person would come before my husband’s career. I would never sacrifice my pride and dignity to support someone who was willing to sacrifice me long ago, and repeatedly!
I can’t respect Spitzer’s wife after this, nor can I respect Hillary for doing the same thing. Selling out one’s pride for a book deal is just as sleazy as going to a prostitute. Both are equally worthy of being scorned.