While reflecting on the recent issue with Tiger Woods, I was going to write a blog about how people should stay out of his business and just let the man play golf.
But then I remembered- didn’t I just write two blogs about how I felt personally involved in Rihanna and Chris Brown’s relationship? Wouldn’t I be a complete hypocrite if I went off for paragraphs about them, but then urged you the readers to back off when it comes to poor boring Tiger?
While Tiger did not engage in such vicious behavior as Chris Brown did, I feel like this issue needs be recognized as well.
While cheating is not as fierce as domestic violence, it still has major consequences.
People are saying that Tiger had a few “transgressions,” meaning he was unfaithful to his wife, and that is why he drove into a fire hydrant and has facial cuts and a smashed back window on his SUV.
Now I cannot condone violence, but I can understand getting a little upset at finding out about a husband’s alleged “transgressions” may inspire a person to act irrational. Granted, we do not know for sure what went down, we just know something did.
The funny thing about this, it’s not all the surprising to me. It seems like every single week a new person is coming out, saying they have cheated on their spouses- Jude Law, David Letterman, former Senator and Presidential candidate, John Edwards, Mel Gibson, Leann Rimes, and so forth.
Cheating is fairly common not only with celebrities, but with average folks too.
According to a 1997 paper in The Journal of Research in Personality, it is estimated that roughly 30 to 60% of all married individuals (in the US) will engage in infidelity at some point during their marriage. What’s going on here?
The issue with cheating is, we don’t know much about it. People can cheat for a variety of reasons: for the adventure, a moment of weakness, for revenge, for lust, etc. Owing to the secretive nature of infidelity, both in married and unmarried couples, there is not a lot of research behind it.
We know a lot about domestic violence- the cycle of violence and so forth, but we really do not understand what drives people to cheat. Since we do not know what inspires cheating, we cannot know how to fix it. And fix it we must, because it does affect so many relationships, and it can cause damage to individuals, families and ultimately communities.
I remember when President Clinton was caught cheating years ago, and after he lied about it to the American people, his last year in office became a complete joke!
He wasn’t able to fully use all his power to pass through certain laws, because his enemies could always throw back the infidelity in his face. Cheating can ruin your relationship, your reputation, your self esteem, and many other things- and yet so many people do it.
Are we ever going to have a national dialogue on how to have healthy relationships that don’t drive people to smashing windows? What’s the point of my ranting?
While we do not know as of yet why people cheat, we do know what to do to avoid situations life these.
- Make expectations clear about your behavior and your partner’s behavior- never assume they know what you mean by “hooking up” or “being in a relationship” and all those things between.
- Make sure you want to be in that particular relationship-don’t do it because you want to impress your friends or get free things out of it.
- If you find it very difficult to talk to your person, ask yourself why. Having those conversations can be really awkward, but being on the same page with another person is more than worth it.
Just ask the mechanic who will reinstall Tiger’s back window.