Cheating: The Cardinal Sin of Relationships?

collage by Grace Kwon

There's no doubt about it: cheating is wrong. It signifies not only a 'lapse in judgment', but a disrespect for the boundaries established in a relationship. As someone whose parents’ marriage broke down thanks to an affair and whose first love cheated on them (twice), I am all-too-familiar with that betrayal of trust — the no-going-back effect that infidelity can have on relationships.

From the ripe age of 10, I was vehemently told by my mother to 'never trust men' and — you know what — I haven't since. The fear of being cheated on (and of cheating) loomed heavily over my teenage relationships, manifesting itself in ugly jealous outbursts. No matter how loyal, how 'in love,' how “nice” someone was, I'd feel nauseous every time they went out-out without me and would struggle not to anxiously text them with a 'casual check-in' or — worse — a tidal-wave of insecurities ('do you still love me? Are you sure?'). Naturally, this blatant lack of trust would result in the inevitable alienation of my perfectly good partner.

With that in mind, I would like to stress that this essay does not condone cheating; it most certainly doesn't endorse long-term extramarital affairs which — to put it lightly — fuck a whole load of shit up. I merely want to examine more closely our attitude towards cheating, how we define it, and its wider implications when considered within contexts of non-monogamous relationships.

'Once a cheater, always a cheater';  that momentary 'flings' can have long-term effects on an otherwise healthy relationship is what gives cheating its sting. But what if this doesn't have to be the case? What if we can learn to trust again? It seems that an unspoken rule of dating is once someone cheats — no matter how big or small the act — you must terminate the relationship immediately in a valiant act of self-respect. It was this kind of thinking which prevented me from telling any of my friends when my (now ex) boyfriend confessed to me that he'd had sex with someone else while I was sunning myself in Barcelona.

Similarly harmful discourses around cheating include the idea that a partner cheating on you means they cannot possibly love you. Now, I'm not saying that snogging a stranger in a club while your honey sits at home, alone and blissfully unaware, comes from a place of love. But yelling this sweeping 'they don't love you' statement into the void does little in holding cheaters accountable and does a lot in making the cheated feel all the more miserable.

If we think less about cheating and more about having sexual/romantic relations with someone other than our current partner, what does this equation mean for open or polyamorous relationships in which relationships with others are part of the package? Does this mean people in non-monogamous relationships cannot love each other? Sometimes, in our understanding of good and bad relationships, true versus fake love, we let monogamy rule our definitions — mistaking 'devotion' for 'love' (when they are not the same).

What it does mean when a partner cheats is that they don't respect the boundaries established by you or your relationship type. For example, if I'm in an open relationship and one of the agreed-upon boundaries is that neither of us dates other people (beyond coffees/drinks as a prerequisite to happy casual sex), but my partner goes ahead and dates then that would constitute cheating — even though sex with whomever they took out for a romantic dinner wouldn't. 

This boundary, I suppose, draws the line in the sand between the distinct physical and emotional facets of relationships — and thus the different kinds of cheating. When discussing types of cheating with friends, they often say that emotional (i.e. texts, dates, elaborate ruses) cheating stings far more than physical, particularly if the physical cheating came about as the result of a drunken night out (which it often is). Emotional cheating, and longstanding affairs, naturally do cause more harm because they require more lying (something my mum identified as the worst part of my dad’s affair). Plus, the defining component of a romantic relationship is the emotional bonds and companionship that exist beyond the bedroom. Otherwise, it’s just friends with benefits, right?

At the core of cheating isn't necessarily active malice or a total absence of love, but a disrespect which can and should be checked with an honest conversation as well as a pragmatic plan on moving the relationship forward, whilst regaining trust, if that's what both parties want. A drunken slip-up, or stupid mistake, doesn't have to mean the end of a relationship (a long-standing affair complete with strings of text messages, piles of restaurant receipts, and a generous helping of lies might signify the end, however). It doesn't mean they don't love you anymore. However, it is important that we hold people accountable for failing to respect simple relationship boundaries and it is in this light — rather than through dramatic clichés — that I think cheating is most healthily viewed and dealt with.