Have you guys heard of Ashley Madison before? It’s an online dating service targeted at married people or people in relationships.
Meaning, it’s like Match.com, but instead of being for singles, Ashley Madison is for people already married or seeing someone. It is essentially a service that facilitates cheating and extra-marital affairs. (It even has a slogan, “Life is short. Have an affair.”)
Ashley Madison’s website, with a model wearing a ring on her ring finger
While I disagree with Ashley Madison (hereby referred to as “AM”) and what it stands for, I decided to park aside my feelings to take a deeper look at AM and the bigger issue that is extra-martial affairs.
Looking Up Ashley Madison
I first knew about AM in 2013, as it was planning to launch in Singapore in 2014 but promptly got blocked by the local authorities as it was deemed as a flagrant disregard of family values. This ban was made public in the local news.[1][2]
I was immediately confused and bewildered by the idea of a business promoting extra-marital affairs — it just seemed really irresponsible to endorse and facilitate cheating — and thought that it was probably used by very few people. Upon some research, I quickly realized I was wrong and the Ashley Madison site actually enjoys high traffic around the world!
Some facts and figures (updated in April 2021):
- According to Alexa (a third-party tool to check a website’s popularity), AM is the 10,214th most visited site globally. Looking up SimilarWeb (another tool to check traffic stats), AM shows an estimate of 10 million visitors a month, which is huge.
- They claim to have reached 70 million users as of 2020.[3]
- It has members in 53 countries including the U.S., U.K., Ireland, Germany, France, Norway, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Hong Kong, and India.[4]
- What’s even more astonishing is its quick growth in places like Hong Kong and Japan. It was the #104 most visited site in Hong Kong and #1,288 most visited site in Japan in Oct 2013, even though it was launched there four and two months prior respectively.
Ashley Madison’s ranking in each country in Oct 2013, in terms of its website’s popularity, according to Alexa. (Note in 2021: I don’t have the updated data as Alexa no longer provides this data publicly.)
So who’s using it?
After seeing these stats, I thought, If their site is so highly visited, that has to mean that many people are using it. But who?
I found this in-depth coverage of Ashley Madison by a GQ journalist, who signed up for AM as part of his assignment to write about AM’s female users.
Here are the profiles of some women he met:
- One is almost 40 and a high-power career female. She has been married to her husband for almost two decades with several children. She describes her household as “really happy and functional,” but has been cheating since two years into her marriage with both men and women. She has been corporeally disloyal in relationships since she was 16. She considers her affairs a favor to her husband because “[her] marriage would be in shambles if [she] wasn’t playing [doing so].”
- One is in her early 30s and has a forensic-science degree. She married young to appease her religious parents, has been married for 10 years, and finds her life and sexually unadventurous husband “suffocating.” The first man she met via AM — a Muslim — had sex with her at her house while her husband was away on a trip. She says, “It’s so hypocritical—all this holier-than-thou stuff.”
- One is in her early 30s as well. She has been with her unambitious husband for around a decade, and is sexually uninspired and no longer in love. She lives by a conservative and professional demeanor that she seems confined by and speaks about liking being a “deviant” and being “bad.” A week after her interview with the journalist, she left her husband; a few weeks after that, she quit her corporate day job to be a writer.
- Another is in her late 40s, had two long-term affairs with male colleagues, and has been with “publishers of magazines, CEOs, politicians, managing partners at law or investment firms” through AM. She wants to fall in love again but doesn’t see the need to leave her husband — yet, as there’s still love that holds them together. She finds lifelong passion extremely rare and doesn’t believe any one person ever fulfills a person’s needs, though she acknowledges feeling guilt about making outright lies (to her husband) whenever she sees someone.
Except for the first one who claims to be open with her husband, the rest are either, by their own admission, deeply unhappy or deeply dishonest with their spouses. Even with the first lady, I’m doubtful about some of her claims as they are contradictory (she claims to be in a really happy household, yet she actively seeks out affairs; she does not take responsibility for her affairs but instead says she’s doing them as “a favor” to her husband.)
General Stats on AM users
Here are some facts from GQ:
- Percentage of Americans who believe that an affair is always wrong: 81.7%
- Percentage of people who have had an affair and believe it is always wrong: 62.7%
- Most common career field of male cheaters on Ashley Madison: Finance
- Most common career field of female cheaters on Ashley Madison: Education
- Percentage of people who classify their marriage as “very happy”: 62.5%
- Percentage of those people who have cheated: 10%
- Most popular day (in 2012) to create an AM account: June 18, the day after Father’s Day
- Second-most popular day (in 2012) to create an AM account: May 14, the day after Mother’s Day
Noel Biderman, the CEO of Ashley Madison, said, “The women’s movement into the workplace was the first massive jump into unfaithfulness. The more financial independence women have, the more it correlates to how unfaithful they’ll be.”[5] (Biderman has since stepped down as CEO in 2015.)
While I can understand the correlation, I don’t think it’s a causal relationship — as women (or men) earn more money, it addresses their basic needs of money and security, where they are no longer dependent on their spouse for security. They are now in a position to explore higher-order needs as a human — like figuring out their self-identity, and pursuing personal fulfillment and happiness. For some, this leads them down the path of cheating. But clearly, financial independence doesn’t turn people into cheaters — something else does.
What Drives Infidelity/Adultery
What is this something else? Well, it depends on the individual. But some reasons could be
- Unhappiness in the marriage
- Feeling neglected, abandoned in the marriage
- Feeling unloved by the partner
- Feeling unappreciated
- Sexual emptiness, frustration, incompatibility
- Mismatch in personality, values, or life goals with the partner
- Falling out of love with each other (if there was even love in the first place)
- Deep feelings of emptiness that are to do with the individual, not the partner
- Deep feelings of self-hate
- Sex addiction — a compulsive desire to have sex
- Inherent mismatch with the nature of monogamy. A constant desire for excitement, change, adventure that a single partner cannot fulfill (that or that they’ve just not met the right person).
For the first lady mentioned above, she may be inherently incompatible with monogamy, given that she has been a serial cheater since she was 16. This may be true for the fourth lady as well. For the second and third ladies, it seems like a combination of being unhappy with themselves/their lives, and falling out of love with their partners (if they were even in love in the first place).
Ashley Madison’s Netherlands website
For the adulterer, there are basically voids he/she is trying to fill, and an affair is being sought out to fill these voids.
Whatever these reasons are, they would be there whether the woman (or man) is financially able or not. In that sense, money is simply an enabler, not the cause.
Cheating = Not the Solution
Yet, whatever these issues or voids are, affairs will never solve them. Sure these affairs may fill whatever gaps are present right now.
- If you are unsatisfied with your martial sex life, seeking playmates outside of marriage may satisfy your sexual appetite — for now.
- If you feel unloved, having a third party shower you with attention, sweet-nothings, and gifts may make you feel valued. As one of the interviewees from the GQ article said, she felt “like an expensive toy.”
- If you are unhappy with life, such as feeling bored or stifled or empty, cheating may give you an adrenaline rush, a feeling of newness.
- If you feel a sense of emptiness, having an affair may fill you up — for that moment.
But these effects are temporary. No sooner do these affairs end, would you be back facing your original voids. Some may look for new affairs to get into. Some may return to feeling empty/frustrated. Some may bury themselves in other things — food, drinks, work, retail therapy — to avoid facing the problem. But these do not change the fact that the voids are there and have to be tackled — not filled with a patch like an affair — for permanent closure.
The Solution
How do they get tackled?
If the issues are inherent to the marriage: Trashing things out with your spouse. Deciding if the issues are salvageable — if yes, working together to fix the issues; if not, divorce. If divorce is not an option due to the marital laws in the country, deciding whether to live as a separated couple, or have an open relationship (where both parties agree to see other people).
If the issues are with you and not your partner or marriage: Doing internal work to address the issues. Taking steps and making the necessary changes, be it a career shift or making a life change. Hiring a coach/counselor/therapist to help you out. Talking to your partner, and working together on the problems. Deciding if your partner and marriage fit who you are today, and who you wish to be, or if being alone or being with a different partner is the answer. Deciding if the nature of a marriage — a monogamy, being with someone for life — is compatible with you and your values.
I have written many articles on addressing inner voids, some of which can be found here:
- How Can I Stop Feeling Lonely?
- How a Relapse Begins: The Key To Removing Bad Habits
- What Are You Running Away From? (Dealing With Escapism)
- How to Create Real Change In Life: Address Root Cause vs. Effects
Whatever it is, an affair isn’t the answer. When someone has an affair, they’re basically committing an act of dishonesty, and lying to the one person they should be the most truthful to — their spouse. This is the one person whom they’ve made a personal promise to — to be faithful, to be with them through thick and thin, and to be with them forever.
Whatever professional or social exterior they may live by, it doesn’t change the fact that they (the adulterer) is lying every single day by having the affair. The lying that comes with an affair isn’t just during the times when the adulterer makes up an excuse to see their lover (unlike what the fourth lady in the GQ interview says) — it’s all the time, from the moment the decision to have an affair was made.
To quote the GQ article,
“Monogamy may defy certain biological imperatives and may not make as much sense for modern eighty-year life spans, but that’s the contract you sign up for; if it isn’t for you, then opt out or marry someone new.”
As for those who are just inherently not compatible with monogamy, then don’t get into a relationship or a marriage to begin with. If that’s too late and you’re already in one, then the next best thing is to break up / divorce and seek a better solution, such as being in an open relationship or to stick to non-committal encounters.
As for Ashley Madison
As a business owner myself, I found it strange and disappointing that there are businesses like AM that are built on cheating and dishonesty. I just don’t find running a business like AM meaningful or something to be proud of even if it is raking in large profits.
In an Australian TV interview, Biderman defended his company by saying, “I would rather see people pursue [an affair] and stay true to their families,” which probably explains his underlying philosophy behind starting Ashley Madison.[6]
But I think this argument is missing the point altogether, which is that (a) having an affair isn’t “staying true” to your family. “Staying true” means to be completely honest and faithful to. Cheating is as far from “staying true” as it can be.
And (b) if someone has to seek out an affair to stay in the marriage, then there’s something fundamentally wrong with the relationship to begin with. Maybe the couple is fundamentally incompatible with each other. Maybe the relationship is not meant to be. Maybe the person is not meant for monogamy.
Whatever it is, it’s more damaging to both parties to stay together in a loveless and unhappy marriage, than to actually divorce and pursue their own happiness. It’s even worse if there are children involved.
As business owners, the answer is to help the person address their internal struggles and achieve a resolution, whether it’s by divorcing or by working things out with their spouse or changing things about their life, NOT create a portal for affairs.
Update: Ashley Madison Hack (Aug 2015)
In August 2015, AM was revealed to have been hacked, with personal data of its 33 million accounts dumped online. Amongst the data are 10,000 email addresses belonging to government officials or workers with .gov addresses.[7]
Sadly, according to the hacker collective that hacked the site, this hack revealed that the site had thousands of fake female profiles, and that 90-95% of actual users are male. Meaning, these are men who signed up to cheat, but never got to. There have also been a separate lawsuit of an ex-employee of AM who revealed that she was hired to type up many fake female profiles.[8] For a business that bases itself on dishonesty, it may not be all too surprising at the end of the day.
It was also revealed that Biderman himself had several extramarital affairs over the course of his marriage[9], despite publicly claiming in interviews that he does not cheat.[10] His wife had previously stated that she would be devastated if she ever found out her husband was cheating.[11] I guess for a person who built a business based on cheating and disloyalty, it is not too surprising that he turned out to have been lying about his loyalty to his spouse.
Perhaps now Biderman finally understands the repercussions of having an affair, and that as much as one may try to morally justify to themselves that having an affair is okay, at the end of the day it hurts the one person whom you’ve pledged to be with, who loves you the most.
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This comes as no surprise that this Biderman idiot fancies himself some kind of hero, “saving relationships” and such tripe. His type is not too dissimilar to Hitler–sociopaths don’t see themselves as villains, but rather as heroes of another film. Whereas Hitler aimed to destroy anyone he didn’t fancy, this Biderman aims to slowly gnaw away at society’s few remaining values. One could say the comparison is a bit extreme but I honestly feel that this Biderman person is the social equivalent to Hitler.
It’s quite sickening that society is decaying so much as to make this “business”, as that sicko calls it, even remotely “successful”. Some people want to watch the world burn and I guess Biderman figures he might as well make money off of people’s suffering too. Let’s face facts, people–cheating is not going to solve your problems. It isn’t a magical “everything is fine now” switch.
To put it another way–if a ship were slowly sinking and you had the choice to attempt repairs, abandon ship, or jump on another ship without telling the captain you were deserting the crew, what do you do?
Common sense would tell you attempting repairs or abandoning ship would be the best options–nobody likes mutiny. To put it simply, if your relationship truly matters then identify and address the problem. If it cannot be resolved, have the decency and tact to properly end the relationship and part ways. This allows potential for both you and your (late) significant other to get proper closure, in time.
Cheating, on the other hand, is likely to inflict devastating trauma to your partner and you will, in the end, not be any better off for it. It is not only wrong, but quite stupid. One of the defining features of humanity is empathy. It seems many people are gradually losing that.
Whackjobs like biderman have this idea that it’s better to ignore the hole in a sinking ship than to patch it or simply abandon ship. It’s too much for people to have some balls and step up to the plate when they have issues in a relationship–they prefer to instead screw around behind their partner’s back and pretend everything is fine and that it’s justified or “he/she deserves it because (insert pathetic self-fulfilling prophecy here)”.
The reality is that this biderman guy is a sociopath who, like any villain, thinks he’s the hero of a different film. The bottom line is simple, people: if your relationship is having problems there are two courses of action.
1. Step up and seek to communicate and resolve the problems
OR
2. If said problems can’t be resolved, go your seperate ways.
“Cheating” is not an option. We are human beings, not animals. It does a disservice to the entire legacy of homo erectus and how far we’ve come when you decide to commit adultery instead of confronting the very real fact that your relationship has problems that need to be worked on. Neanderthals confronted the likes of the velociraptor and the mammoth–people should be able to step up to deal with relationship problems.
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I would add that if someone feels the need to cheat, they should consider if they actually want a monogamous life. And if not, they should talk that over with their partner, even if they risk losing that partner. Sure, losing a partner may seem like a bad thing but it’s the right thing to do and would also open you up to finding another who would agree with open relationships!
I have a polyamorous friend who cheated on a partner for years. The chain of cheatings ended badly but later he married a woman who is okay with him having other relationships. So all turned out fine :)
Hi Jade, what you said! Those who repeatedly cheat or try to break out of monogamous relationships may find themselves more suited to polyamory (or it may well be that they have not found someone who meets all their needs, but that’s a separate discussion altogether). If so, they may want to consider going the polyamory route rather than pigeon-holing themselves to monogamy just because that’s what the mainstream society practises.
I’ve always thought that if you aren’t happy in your relationship you should just leave. No need to cheat.
I guess maybe for some people leaving isn’t expedient.
Hi Paul, you are on point about how some people may not see leaving the marriage as an option/a way out. This was precisely the case for one of my readers, whom I addressed in a past Ask Celes post: https://personalexcellence.co/blog/stay-with-cheating-spouse/. She was asking how she could stay on with a cheating spouse vs. whether she should leave or not. (She also clarified in the comments section that leaving was simply not an option for her, which I understood and respected.)
Perhaps in certain cultures (such as India and traditional Asian societies), divorce is simply not a way out. But then, I always believe there has to be other options than cheating/dishonesty. Even discussing with your spouse about the martial issues and working out your options together is more honest than cheating behind his/her back as a gap filler.
This is the first time I’ve ever heard of such a site. I’ve seen ads for sleazy dating sites before, but nothing like this that actually encourages people to cheat. I guess it’s just a sign of the times. And I hate to sound negative, but the current world we live in is pretty messed up. I mean, there are kids dying of starvation in Africa because their governments are selling all their grain to western countries solely to feed cattle, who are then milked, slaughtered and fed to humans. Many of who die from eating those animal foods, but not before the world medical association take their piece of the pie by get all these people hooked on prescription drugs for the rest of their lives with no hope of ever curing their illnesses.
It’s all about greed and control. Just like the website in question here. Obviously some guy with no interest other than being successful and making a lot of money. He doesn’t care how many lives are ruined by what he’s doing. Just like the meat, poultry, seafood and dairy industries who are clearly only interested in the money with no regard for all the people who are dying of heart disease, strokes and cancers from eating the dead animals they sell to people and lie about being healthy.
And that same greed clearly must resonate with a lot of the people who use that site. Society is telling them they need more and more. Still using an iPhone 4? No, that’s not good enough, they need the latest iPhone 5S. So when it comes to relationships, sooner or later they start believing the same thing. Just one partner isn’t good enough anymore. They feel they need more partners, but don’t want to damage their current relationship because they enjoy the home cooked meals too much when they’re not away cheating.
That’s my theory anyway. And it’s not just websites like Ashley Moron that make it simple for people to cheat. With people living separate work and personal lives, many can get away with it quite easily. I always hear about people going on business trips to other states or other countries. If they’re in high paid jobs whilst going on these business trips, I can imagine that it wouldn’t be too difficult for them to justify having an affair. Maybe they had an argument with their partner before they left, or they feel that because they’re working hard going on these business trips making all this money for the family they’ve left behind, they deserve something extra on the side?
I don’t know what the solution is. Although I do believe that if people learnt to live with less and make the most of what they already have, rather than wanting more and more all the time, the world would be a much better place. And then perhaps sites like Ashley Moron would no longer be as popular.
Anyway, it’s good to hear that the site’s been blocked in Singapore. It would be great if our idiot government here in Australia did the same.
It is rather interesting that someone has chosen to make a business out of this. I can’t help wondering what would have transpired the person to even consider this as a business. I agree that adultery can be committed by anyone who chooses to be vulnerable. I have read before that men who do not have good relationships with their fathers tend to have many partners to fill the void of feeling less of a man and likewise women who are needy tend to be vulnerable to affairs. However, this is subjective for they are exceptions among us.
Hi Thach! What a great point: childhood experiences can definitely shape how one views and treats relationships. I’ve heard about people who are in relationships with a partner who has many qualities that fits one of their parents. For example, someone who had an abusive dad/mom seems to be more prone to end up in a relationship later with someone who is abusive to him/her (possibly because the person formed a perception of, “I’m not deserving of more” or “I deserve to be mistreated”.
I think people who have been scarred by relationships/people or lost their faith in a “perfect” or “ideal” relationship can also treat relationships very frivolously and loosely play around with their partners’ trust, such as cheating behind their backs or treating their love recklessly. This ties in with the examples you have mentioned, about men having many partners to fill their inner voids or women being vulnerable to affairs due to their neediness. Either way it’s important for us to be aware of our own inner issues at all times and to address them in constructive manners, vs. turning to the outside world to fill the gaps (and hurting people close to us in this case).
Celes, why do you think that people reach to this website as a “solution for an unhappy relationship”? I think most people just go there as an -addition- to their marriage. Probably these people are comfortable with their wives/husbands/kids, they just want to add something else to it. I’m not saying it’s a good choice. PErsonally I am in favor of open relationships and I would never cheat against my parter’s will, but the huge ratio of divorces today clearly says that this idea of a life long perfect marriage is dated. As someone else already said, a relationship lives in the present, and you choose your wife/husband everyday. Choice implies that one day you may decide to say no. The classic formula repeated in weddings (we’ll be together forever etc etc…) is a nonsense in my opinion.
Hey Paolo! If people are doing so because they are having an open relationship with their partners AND their partners are perfectly in agreement and support that, then that’s perfectly fine. The article was referring to people who are doing it behind their partners’ backs and being dishonest about it (their cheating).
Also I’d see the dishonest behavior as more of a result of certain voids they are facing, which can be in their relationship or in their life (as mentioned in the article). An unhappy relationship can be one of them; a relationship that’s happy but not entirely fulfilling can be another trigger too (i.e. it meets some needs but not all of the person’s needs).
Celes the stance that you took against infidelity is worth appreciation. Sadly though websites that encourages them are everywhere and more and more people are getting connected to it.
In my opinion being in a community decreases the level of guilt of wrongdoing in the individuals. And websites like AM are cashing this point. Those who are registering with it are not feeling the guilt that they would have otherwise felt if they were seeking for an affair on their own, and not on the internet. Belonging to a community where everyone seems to indulge in the same activity, makes the hideous and shameful act of deceit looks fair.
I am very much against deceit. But I am also not a big fan of marriage.
I don’t think it’s realistic to promise yourself to someone for the span of eternity. You don’t know who you’re going to be a day from now, let alone 50 years from now. Ideally, it would be nice to find someone to stick by you through all the good and bad, but that is very rare (as you can see by the divorce rates – and subscriber volume on AM).
Entering into a contract that binds you to somebody is a horrible idea in my experience. You think you know somebody and then they turn out to be someone else, or they change into someone who you can no longer make a life with. It’s a natural occurrence.
You’re committed until you’re not… You might love someone like crazy, but that can change really quickly, if the offense is bad enough.
I feel the most important thing that any person can do is to truly know and love themselves. If you choose to be in a relationship, do it on a day-to-day basis. Make a choice each day – “I love you and I’m staying with you.” If things don’t pan out down the road, be thankful for the good days you had and release that person to continue on his or her journey… Whether it lasts 5 days or a lifetime – you can say that you willingly chose to stay and never felt coerced or obligated.
Hey amy, thanks so much for sharing your opinions. I hear you about not being a big fan of marriage; I think marriage is a notion that resonate with some, but not others. I don’t think there’s a need for people to buy into marriage just because it’s what’s endorsed by mainstream society at this moment. There are some who are into open relationships (I’ve a friend who is just like that), and I think that’s perfectly okay as long as such expectations are articulated to their partners at onset and no deceit is in play.
It’s really appalling that some people see cheating as a normal way of life. I was shocked the day a girl I considered as my girl friend honestly said she would cheat if she finds someone she likes during a conversation. Its not like I’m not doing my stuff right, so I thought. With a little questions and probing, I learnt that she comes from a polygamous family where father likes and keeps many woman and the mother has a boy friends. What do I do? Judge her, Criticize her or leave her? Well I currently consider the relationship to be an open one pending on when I get a girl with healthier views about relationships. This is just the way of the world. We are all free moral agents
Dear Celes–Well that was certainly a passionate and righteous article. I appreciate how much you’ve idealized the institution of marriage and wouldn’t the world be such a better place if only people would have their act together as much as you? Well, the short version of what I would say is that you simply have zero qualifications to even remark about this–therefore you shouldn’t. Everyone’s life and experience is different than yours. You’ve never been married much less for decades which changes people profoundly at times. That telling the truth is often worse than lying depending upon context. That the rules of law in Singapore (and other parts of Asia and around the world) are selectively pompous and repressive. For example, in Singapore it’s perfectly legal to be a prostitute but not to spit, chew gum, graffiti, walk in your house naked, and you must flush the toilet after each use or you risk being canned, and much more. Again, while I admire your passion on this topic, I wonder why you are so horrified by watching others make choices that are different than yours? Are you that intolerant of others? And lastly, it’s been my experience that those who have very fixed and ridged ideas and no flexibility are prone to falling hard themselves (and even attracting this to oneself) which is natures way of reminding you not to be so critical and judgmental of others life challenges and choices. Bottom line is that AM is neither good nor bad–it’s only what you want to believe, and no one is asking you to partake in it anyway.
I’ve been following Celes for a couple of years now and had a few but valuable interactions with her that happened to test her tolerance …. let me simply say that she’s one of the most tolerant people I’ve encountered!
And as to the life choices that people make, they shouldn’t forget that they live within a community and each choice they make creates a ripple effect around them.
Thank you for your kind words, Nadia! :)
That wasn’t me, but maybe one day it will be, if you decide to explore the Arabian Peninsula :)
Ah ha, never say never, Nadia! :) I may well be at that side of the world one day. :) When you said “interactions”, I thought you meant in-person interactions, and hence my question! Sorry for the mix up.
Thanks so much for being a part of PE, and look forward to meeting one day in the future! ;)
Dear Brad, Your comment makes me think.
First, of course Celes has every right to remark about adultery, just like you, me and every person in the world should be free to utter their opinion. People do not necessarily need to have experienced something before they are entitled to an opinion, although personal experience may (and only may) give them greater insight.
Second, you absolutely have a point saying that telling the truth is often worse than lying – if such lies are based on other lies. How relaxing is life as a whole, albeit sometimes temporarily difficult, if we are being honest right from the start? If we tell the other people how we feel, what has hurt us, what scares us and what would make us happy. However, I believe the first and vital step before we can tell others about our feelings is that we are aware of them in the first place. Know thyself, the ancient Greek recommended. How true. And, dear Brad, I know, how hard this can be. :-) Anyway, that’s also how I understand Celes (see section Solution).
Third, I agree with you that Celes’ opinion is rather rigid. I find her rigid view very refreshing. In our (very much appreciated) tolerant world we indeed sometimes loose sight of what’s essential and what’s only nice-to-have. There is so much choice my impression is we sometimes do not see the wood for the trees. It’s ok to cheat on my partner if the reasons are only sufficiently justified (?) Of course I know that there may be good reasons for doing so, usually it’s that we cannot think of a better solution. That, however, doesn’t make cheating any better. Our partner is hurt. Full stop. The one we confessed our love to. Therefore I agree with Celes that knowledge of oneself and the development of tools for (emotional) problem-solving are the best ways to better solutions – and not cheating.
Celes and all participants in this discussion, I really appreciate that people from all over the world can discuss their opinions here. Thanks for providing this platform, Celes, and for using your intelligence and creativity in such a great way as is PE.
Hi Guest, thank you for your kind words and being a part of this discussion. :) Your comment is very much valued and your opinions, insightful.
I love that PE has become a hub where people from all around can gather to excel in life and grow together. I strive to create a forum where we can share our opinions openly, without judgment and without disregard of others’ feelings and individualities, and this is something I hope to build on in the year ahead.
As I start sharing my personal opinions about various topics now, I’m prepared to face differing opinions, and I celebrate them by leaving them on the site. I do hope this will expose people to alternate viewpoints and encourage more people to share their opinions (without fear of judgment and without resorting to flaming/unsavoury comments, of course).
Please continue to share your views on PE, as I promise to continue sharing more of my authentic views and stances for everyone to read.
Hi Brad,
I agree with you that “Everyone’s life and experience is different” and that makes people behave differently, but I believe because that they behave diffferently leading to their different outcome in their life, and that all matters, do they feel better after cheating or they just live in the circle of misery and guilt? I also believe in the saying “you reap what you sow”, so no one should blame that bad experience forces them to do bad things. If someone feels unhappy or something wrong about their current relationship, they can sit down and talk to their partner, if thing still doesn’t work out, then take some legal action, when they are freed, they have the right to find a new partner. So, I support MDA’s action to ban AM as I don’t think this kind of business will benefit the society at all, I think other countries that allowed AM may rethink their decision as well, lol. Last point, I think there is nothing wrong about Celes raising her viewpoints about this, it helps us think and analyse, and that is a good thing,
Hi Brad, I’m not sure what kind of qualifications one needs to post commentary on a cheating site. I’m simply sharing my thoughts in this article on what I feel with regards to a site that supports adultery, that’s all, and hope that others will get some insight from reading it. If not, it’s okay too — at least they had the chance to hear my viewpoint.
When I got the email newsletter from personal excellence with Ashley Madison as the headline, I was unhappy. It’s hard to find people with principles today, even harder to find people willing to stand up for them and this sleazy site (Ashley Madison) hardly qualifies as personal excellence. Then I discovered it wasn’t an ad but an article and felt better. I’m not one to hide my head in the sand and don’t give a damn about what other people believe in – as long as they’re honest about it. While I think “open” relationships are a crock of self delusion – if people mutually agree, it’s not for me to say. Lying is another story. The cheater is literally stealing someone else’s right to control their own life. It does as much harm as physically beating your partner and should be treated as much a crime as stealing anything else. The ONLY reason to lie, cheat and commit adultery is greed and cowardice. If you don’t want a monogamous relationship, don’t agree to one. In this day and age, marriage is not the only option.
Hi freedomfighter, I definitely second what you said. It’s fine if someone is in an open relationship and his/her partner is aware and agreement of that; it’s another thing if the person is behaving like he/she is in an open relationship but his/her partner is under the impression they are in a monogamy. The latter is definitely being dishonest and it’s the dishonesty that I have issues with here, not necessarily the idea of open relationship or multiple partners. (I’ve a good friend who does just that (have open relationships with multiple partners) and I don’t severe ties with him nor treat him differently as any other friend.)
Dear Celes, Thank you for taking such a clear position on adultery and related websites. You are hitting the nail on the head if you suggest to address the underlying issue that one has rather than escaping into cheating.
Hi “Guest”, thank you for your kind words. :) I do my best to share my stance on opinions that strike close to my heart and this (something in violation of truth/integrity) definitely is. Thank you for posting your comment here.
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