By Emma Dakin
With media outlets stacking up headlines about Stormy Daniels’ alleged affair with Donald Trump, what’s more interesting to me is Melania Trump’s complete lack of a reaction to the entire situation. While Melania has always seemed content to stay in the shadow of her larger-than-life husband’s persona, her decision to say nothing whether in denial, defense or support of her husband actually says everything about our current culture of cheating. Because it’s not just our country’s POTUS/FLOTUS couple that have caused headlines about cheating. Most notably, the country’s actual first couple (the reigning Queen B and Jay-Z) rocked headlines when Jay-Z’s infidelity came to light, and more recently, Grammy-nominated rapper Cardi B’s relationship with her fiancé Offset has suffered because of cheating.
Among Melania, Beyoncé and Cardi B, three women of varying backgrounds and influence, there is one thing in common: they chose to stay with their partners. Of course, the argument is always that things aren’t black-and-white, especially when it comes to infidelity. “Not condemning does not mean condoning, and there is a world of difference between understanding and justifying,” said psychotherapist Esther Perel in her book, “The State of Affairs: Rethinking Infidelity.” As the general public, we’re not privy to the details and nuances of these womens’ relationships or the factors leading to their decisions to forgive their partners. Indeed, while Cardi B admitted in a 2018 Cosmopolitan interview that she didn’t approve of Offset’s actions, she defended her decision to stay as her own saying, “I want to work out my s*** with my man, and I don’t got to explain why.”
But regardless of the details, the underlying message these women are sending is that it’s OK to cheat — a message that’s echoed in pop culture, from the television love triangles we follow from week to week, to catchy tracks about two-timing lovers, to page-turning memoirs of illicit affairs. While the theme of cheating is certainly nothing new, there seems to be a shift in society’s portrayal of infidelity — we are no longer reflecting a culture of cheating, but endorsing it.
“I feel like we are tolerating cheating more nowadays than in older time periods,” said Gracen Barrett, a second-year graphic design student. “It is more acceptable for some people today than it used to be.”
According to data from a recent General Social Survey (GSS), 20 percent of men and 13 percent of women said that they’ve had sex with someone other than their spouse while married. Those numbers only increase when the definition of cheating is broadened from sexual encounters to any kind of intimate/romantic physical contact (kissing, hugging, holding hands) with someone besides their partner, or further still to include forms of “microcheating” such as lying about your relationship status, regularly checking an ex’s social media or heavily flirting with a cute barista.
There are certainly forms of cheating that hurt more than others, but they all hurt. Cheating on someone who you made a commitment to shows a serious lack of respect and often signifies larger problems in a relationship. Unless your relationship is non-exclusive, and that was a mutual understanding from the start, cheating on your partner is breaking a contract of trust and commitment.
So for those of us who still believe in closed relationships, in which each partner dedicates themselves equally and exclusively to the relationship, what can we do? What can we say to an offending partner when they defend their infidelities, citing a countless number of people (Bill Clinton, Kevin Hart, David Letterman, Kobe Bryant, Josh Duhamel — to name just a few) who have seemingly escaped the consequences of cheating?
Barrett suggests having an open and honest conversation about cheating with your partner — before it becomes an issue. “I think you should talk about what constitutes cheating,” said Barrett. “Some people don’t see emotional cheating and physical cheating the same way. I think it’s important to clarify that with your partner.”
Especially with the current trend in pop culture, it’s more important than ever to have those kinds of conversations, and to keep cheating from becoming the new normal.
“Kids nowadays are basically being told to turn the other cheek and always be willing to forgive, but the thing is you can forgive someone but you don’t have to stay with them,” said Barrett. “If you’re willing to commit to someone they should be willing to commit to you.”
Ideally, if each relationship discusses the parameters and consequences of cheating from the very beginning, the entire mess might be avoided. However, you can have this conversation and still get cheated on — but I hope if you find yourself in that situation, you make a different choice than what seems to be the pattern these days, and leave instead of staying.
