A poll: Blackmail or tell spouse?
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Anonymous
| I've been struggling with whether or not to tell an acquaintance about her husband's cheating. I think MYOB is the right thing (for a lot of reasons, including, you never really know about someone else's relationship). But, each time I've seen the wife since stumbling onto his cheating it is really hard to be around her. We're together at the bus stop and I can hardly look at her. I feel like I'm part of the lie at this point. Still, I don't think its my place to get involved, but I feel quite conflicted about it. Not sure exactly what's right. |
Anonymous
|
My ex was cheating on me. He and I had split up, got back together, did the counseling thing, he cheated again. It was his Aunt who told me.
If you're friends with the spouse, if you are someone they would trust, I would tell them. It would likely end your friendship, at least for a while, especially if she isn't ready to believe it, but woman to woman, wouldn't you want to know? Money would have no role in my decision making. |
Anonymous
| OP, how much were you thinking? |
Anonymous
MYOB. You're making this about you, not her. |
Anonymous
|
Nothing. Blackmail is morally wrong, not to mention illegal. Why borrow someone else's bad karma? And as for telling the person, I still say no. If my spouse were cheating, I think that's something to work out between him and me and nobody else. I really trust him and just don't even think about someone ever telling me he's cheating because I would not believe them. And the people who WOULD believe a friend about this, probably already have suspicions of their own. (I think it's pretty hard for someone to cheat for a long time without the other person even having slight suspicions / doubts). But some (many!) people do not want to have their suspicions confirmed, for whatever reason. And if you say you know, then they may be forced to confront something they're not ready to confront and it may not be the way that situation should unfold.
And if they know and are working it out, and you let wife / husband know that you know, you've injected yet another person (you) into the situation that will make it harder to heal. You can't unsay what you said, so years later, when they are still married, they will always lump you in with their feelings about the cheating. I don't think it's a good idea. What if the wife knows and is only trying to get through her kids' childhood (and doesn't want to divorce her spouse and lose partial custody of her kids?) and you say something? Then you've outed her. You won't be her friend anymore, but she'll be hurt by it. And what if it forces the issue and she then does get divorced and loses partial custody of her kids? There are literally THOUSANDS of serious scenarios that could be going on, and you have no idea about any of them. So why would you even want to mess with that? |
Anonymous
| OP here, so I'm not going to do the blackmail option. I doubt I ever seriously would have done it, but it did cross my mind once or twice and I was just curious to hear others' thoughts. But I don't really want to go to jail or commit a felony. So now I'm torn with do nothing or tell the spouse. I'm not sure I can live with either scenario. I am not close friends with the spouse but I do know her, and I KNOW I would want to know if I were in her shoes. |
Anonymous
The cheater is a millionaire, with at least 500K in liquid cash. |
Anonymous
I call bullshit. - but you are close to the cheater? And you know how much money is in his account? You're fucked up. |