Upwards of 10-30% of married husbands (32%) and wives (24%) have had or are having extramarital affairs (Playboy:1974). The experiences of Edwards, Vitter, Sanford, Ensign, and Pickering raise the awareness to the potential for straying outside of marriage. If interested, see different types of extramarital affairs, prominent wives responses to infidelity , forgiveness and suggested attack plan.
Adultery/2 laws penalize women but not men
Professor of Physiology at UCLA Medical School, Jared Diamond, author of ‘The Third Chimpanzee’ and winner of the Los Angeles book prize contends that previous Hebraic, Egyptian, Roman, Aztec, Moslem, African, Chinese, and Japanese adultery laws were established for retribution for committing an offense against one’s husband. The jilted husband, in turn, was entitled to damages that often included violent revenge, divorce and even a refund of the ‘bride price.’ In fact, Diamond writes further, ‘no criminal law against male infidelity even existed until a French law of 1810.’ But even so, it only disallowed a married man the option to keep his concubine in the home he shared with his wife over her objections. So we are back to square one. Women will find a way to get even. In a passive agressive way, some resort to the use of their offspring as a chit, messanger boy/girl, courier, tattler and pawn.
Hell hath no fury but a woman scorned
In ‘The Other Man the Other Woman, by Joel D. Block, a vignette of the experiences of Peggy Quinn offers this summary of retaliation “I was consumed with getting back. I thought of turning him in to the IRS for tax fraud. I considered blackmail, disfigurement, murder. I settled for giving him a hard time with the kids. I turned them against him by presenting an image of him as a bum; I made it hard for him to see them; I tortured him through them.”
A civilized approach to retribution
At the thought against adding more pain to the lives of children involved (25% of children from divorced families have serious emotional, social or psychological problems as opposed to 10% of kids from intact families), perhaps a more civilized approach is that of Leisha Pickering, the estranged wife of former U.S. Representative Chip Pickering. Yesterday, it was reported that she claimed in a lawsuit filed in Mississippi that his mistress ruined their marriage and derailed her husband’s political career. Ms. Pickering is seeking unspecified damages in the alienation of affection lawsuit she filed against Elizabeth Creekmore Byrd. It would be interesting to see how this story plays out.
Literary Sources
Block, Joel D. The Other Man the Other Woman: Understanding and Coping with Extramarital Affairs, The Wellness Institute, 2000, 196 pages.
Diamond, Jared. The Third Chimpanzee: The evolution and future of the human animal. Harper Collins, New York, 408 pages.
Web Resources
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