Will she or won't she? Leave her husband, that is. Sandra Bullock is under the microscope. Elin Nordegren has reportedly finally thrown in the towel and is said to be leaving Tiger Woods for good. And Channel Ten's fictional character Alicia Florrick from The Good Wife appears to never want to leave her husband for his indiscretions, no matter how many seedy mistress tales come out of the woodwork.
Either way, a man by the name of Noel Biderman believes that infidelity can actually help a relationship. A preposterous notion by anyone's standards, but since he's the founder and chief executive of a dating website aimed specifically at married people looking to cheat, one can't exactly blame him for attempting to peddle such codswallop.
"Life is short. Have an affair" is the advertising slogan for his website AshleyMadison.com. The site boasts 5.5 million users worldwide and was launched in Australia this week to big numbers - mostly (and most surprisingly) comprising women. Single women at that ...
"It's clear that if you look around at married male celebrities and politicians, women prefer attached men!" says Biderman. "But it also rings true with the guy in the next cubicle or the guy next door. There's the truism which says good men are hard to find."
His theory is scientifically proven by what evolutionary psychologist have dubbed as "mate poaching". According to Psychology Today magazine, one in five couples actually meet when one or both partners are involved with other people.
The theory goes that women prefer an attached man as he has been "pre-approved" by another woman already. So she knows he's capable of commitment. And isn't a psychopath.
But back to cheating. Biderman says that no couple should have to suffer through a miserable relationship, nor should they have to break up either. "I think that it's impossible to ask someone to be miserable in their relationship for the rest of their life," he told me over the phone this week. "But what our service offers is the opposite of break-up."
To me, the opposite of a break-up is working on the relationship together, not getting naked with someone else.
But Biderman's point is that it's just sex! And that if you are just meeting up with someone other than your partner for a casual sex arrangement, it's not as hurtful! And that all of it is better than a break-up! Hmph. Could have fooled me.
And let's be honest here. Once the trust is broken - whether it's because of a physical or an emotional affair - can a relationship really survive the aftermath? And I'm not just talking about it getting flashed across the media (along with the breasts, torso and sex tape of the other person involved), but I'm talking about in everyday relationships. Can you really forgive and forget a partner for going behind your back and doing the dirty with someone else? Or will you forever be reminded of it all when you look them in the eyes, sit on their couch or take a peak at their underwear drawer?
"Studies to date have found that couples do survive infidelity more often than people realise," Biderman says. "The real problem is divorce not infidelity. My service is a marriage preservation tool. It is a tool for people to use to stay in the relationship. The research from my site shows that affairs can actually repair their marriage."
While I'm not quite sure how he collects this sort of data, Anne Hooper, a sex and relationships counsellor and author based in Britain, concurs. She told The Independent newspaper that nowadays with 60 per cent of people having a sexual relationship outside their marriages, "if relationships couldn't survive infidelity, I don't think anybody would stay together".
Her advice?
"If you are going to play away, don't do it in a rude and obvious way. As long as enough love has been put in over the years, there should be enough to see them both through the crisis."
In these sorts of debates I'm often slapped with many erroneous arguments such as, "It's not in our DNA to be monogamous!", and "But I wasn't getting enough sex from my wife!" or "I can't divorce because of the kids, but I need my fun!" And I wonder what was going through their heads when they got together in the first place. If they knew it was in their DNA to stray, did they ask permission at the alter if they could fool around down the road? Did they request permission from their partner to have late-night cybersex with someone else? Or if they could use their frequent flyer miles to rendezvous with strippers and nightclub hostesses in other cities?
I doubt it.
Open marriages are something entirely different. It's like a business transaction that has been pre-approved by both parties. The terms are set, the conditions are made and the rules are stringently followed. I know many couples like this and it works swimmingly. For them. For a certain period of time, too.
Yet, when one party thinks it's open season while the other is fully committed to just one person and they discover what's been going on, I'm not quite sure if they can ever forgive and forget. Especially if it lands up on the internet ...
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