http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2013/01/12/sl-letter-of-the-day-the-good-girl Comments On: SL Letter of the Day: The Good Girl by Dan Savage en-us Copyright 2013 The Stranger. All rights reserved. This RSS file is offered to individuals, The Stranger readers, and non-commercial organizations only. Any commercial websites wishing to use this RSS file, please contact The Stranger. webmaster@thestranger.com (The Stranger Webmaster) Thu, 23 May 2013 00:00:01 -0700 Thu, 23 May 2013 21:45:00 -0700 Foundation http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Posted by mtnlion]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 17:59:15 -0800 The Stranger
No, you don't have to tiptoe. But you do need to be appropriate; so does Good Girl; so do we all. We should all strive to take others' feelings into consideration, even if we don't have a contract or formal obligation to them. That's what makes the world a better place: We think about how our actions might affect other people. A decent person with healthy self-esteem doesn't try to tempt someone in a relationship for their own pleasure. And reasonable people usually do observe some boundaries.

Posted by mtnlion]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 17:52:05 -0800 The Stranger
However, having been cheated on myself, holding the cheater responsible was not mutually exclusive with being ready to beat the fuck out of the guy who tried to steal my woman (more like girl given our ages) away from me.
Posted by seandr]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 10:55:22 -0800 The Stranger Posted by "but the sex is good!" it's rarely THAT good.]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 07:31:04 -0800 The Stranger
I'm not saying that the cheated on person should blame the piece on the side - that's ridiculous - but an accomplice is different from a patsy.
Posted by goddesstio]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 04:37:31 -0800 The Stranger Posted by Annanicoleredpony]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 03:26:41 -0800 The Stranger Great70.com
Posted by mas789]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 03:24:34 -0800 The Stranger Posted by sissoucat]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 02:33:36 -0800 The Stranger
The cheated-on wife should direct 100% of her ire at her cheating partner - he's the one with whom she had a contract with. The mistress formed no contract with the wife. The husband did.

As for your description of the husband and the mistress as respectively "the person who egged the house, and the person who drove them there, handed them the eggs, and urged them to do it", I can't agree with it. As far as my experience goes, when a married male cheats, he's the one frenetically urging the prospective mistress to have sex with him. I absolutely do not believe in the honest, chaste male, straying away from the virtuous path because of the devilish temptress (and/or because of his untamable cock).

When confronted, all cheating males pretend that was the mistress' or the cock's fault. Why should bystanders take cheaters at their word ?

Of course it may happen, sometimes, but I feel that in the vast majority of cases, the husband has already been standing for some time in front of the house, eggs in hands, begging any female happening to pass by to lend him a hand - and to ultimately take full responsability for what he's dying to do.

I know many of my girlfriends turned down my husband's offers before he found a taker. They told me after the separation. The bystanders should only heap disdain on the cheating spouse. Unless the mistress is proven to be a serial "homewrecker" (or a silly "wah, wah, he cheated on me too"), she should get the benefit of the doubt.
Posted by sissoucat]]> Mon, 14 Jan 2013 02:25:36 -0800 The Stranger Posted by avast2006]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 14:05:25 -0800 The Stranger
The only person to whom he was unfaithful was the fiancee. For you to behave as if you were entitled to some sort of monogamy from a man who is betrothed to another person doesn't make you a "good girl," it makes you incapable of basic logic, and a hypocrite.
Posted by avast2006]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 14:01:28 -0800 The Stranger Gals on the big creek
About half grown
Jump on a man
Like a dog on a bone

- Bob Wills

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkjG9-03l…
Posted by Mister G]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 13:00:06 -0800 The Stranger
For those out there in "secondary" relationships with CPOS waiting to be the "primary" relationship, you deserve what you get. You are not the "primary" relationship because he knows he could have you all to himself but doesn't want you. You are being used to bump up his ego. Find someone who wants only you or is at least single for a relationship because a liar like that will never give you what you need.
Posted by grewabackbone]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 11:59:47 -0800 The Stranger Posted by zaogardening]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 10:58:31 -0800 The Stranger Posted by xjuan]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 09:20:34 -0800 The Stranger Posted by Alanmt]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 08:14:06 -0800 The Stranger
People cheat for a variety of reasons, and I would wager "because it's fun when it's bad" accounts for a lot more than "I was on the verge of leaving but so confused, until I found clarity in your pussy. Be mine forever!" There's a reason that things like "his girlfriend doesn't understand him" (so it's a tipping point cheat and ok!) or "it turns out he wasn't just cheating on her, he was cheating on me, too!" generate eye-rolling snickers.

As for your point in 35, it takes two to tango. The two people in a relationship, of whatever form, are equally responsible for its existence. While I think the cheated-on partner should target 90% of their ire at the person cheating on them, rather than the person with whom they've been cheating, the rest of us are free to look down on everyone: the person who egged the house, and the person who drove them there, handed them the eggs, and urged them to do it. The latter doesn't get off on innocent bystanderhood, and the piece on the side doesn't get to claim no responsibility for being the piece on the side because, hey, it's the other person's fault there's a relationship.
Posted by IPJ]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 07:14:17 -0800 The Stranger
@secretchord

Posters who insult the LW are wrong - a "homewrecker" is a fantasy invented by male cheaters to get away with it ; it's misogynists who use that concept. The bad guy is the CPOS, sure. But the girl portraying her as a "good girl" knew she was with a CPOS and hides behind a nice rationalization her desire to hurt the fiancée anonymously. That's not right.

I'm a "good enough girl", and if I were FWB with anybody who has a live-in significant other, I would have made sure before fucking that the significant other already knows her partner sleeps around, and is fine with it. I would date an honest poly, I would not date a dishonest mono.

And if I were dating a dishonest mono, and got dumped, I would ovary up and tell all to the wife-to-be, and expose myself to her fury. And if the fiancee dumped the dishonest mono, I wouldn't ever take him back. I do have some dignity.
Posted by sissoucat]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 06:34:50 -0800 The Stranger If you don't know or care to know someone's relationship status, then there's no reason for you to feel bad. But if you know someone is in what appears to be a monogamous relationship, and you willfully discard that in order to do something selfish - have sex with that guy - that you KNOW will cause someone else hurt, (his gf who thinks they're monogamous) then yeah, you're in the wrong. And notice how she ONLY cares that the fiance know about her boyfriend's bad behavior AFTER she's no longer the one assisting it?

This is not the case of someone who starts hooking up with someone, whether in a relationship or just FWB, and then finding out that they have a partner they are pretending to be monogamous with. If you discover that you are party to helping a CPOS cheat, you should leave them. Maybe you "love" them, but seriously, how much can they love you back if they're not honest with you in the beginning and clearly never planning to be with you?

From what she says in her letter, the way its written, Dan is spot-on about her motives. She wants to kill the current relationship because marriage represents far less possibility for her to win in the end than a girlfriend. She doesn't want to hurt him - oh no, despite the fact that he was "unfaithful" to her (besides the part about him sleeping with his GIRLFRIEND, obviously, even MORE unfaithful!) she wants no blame or repercussions for her actions. It's pathetic.
Posted by goddesstio]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 01:27:27 -0800 The Stranger This letter is one of the 3% where you're off.
The girl gave a guy an ultimatum: marry me, stop screwing around, or we're done.
Guy fell for the ultimatum, and dumped LW.
Simple as that.
Now LW is vengeful, thinks she has a case, thinks she knows something the fiancee doesn't. But she doesn't.
She needs to accept that and move on. And hopefully become a better person in doing so.
Posted by Lose-Lose]]> Sun, 13 Jan 2013 00:07:53 -0800 The Stranger
And yet, OOMOW is proposing to tell the GF/fiance about the CPOS. Her desire to meddle in their relationship (and various other hypocrisies) are why people are jumping down her throat.

If the Q had only been, "Should I keep banging the CPOS?", the focus should be more on OOMOW and the CPOS. But OOMOW wishes to disclose (anonymously) to the GF/Fiancé, so, yeah, her motives and her past and present role get a lot more scrutiny.
Posted by DAVIDinKENAI]]> Sat, 12 Jan 2013 22:52:49 -0800 The Stranger Posted by Mister G]]> Sat, 12 Jan 2013 22:26:36 -0800 The Stranger
And Dan says she's Bad, but the Good thing to do is tell the fiancee as long as the Bad girl shows her face. But she'll still be Bad. Not that anyone is being judgmental about everyone but themselves. And not that the "dilemma" is all about self-esteem and appearances.

Bicycle ride, anyone?
Posted by Mister G]]> Sat, 12 Jan 2013 22:11:25 -0800 The Stranger For godsakes, do I seriously have to tip-toe around anyone I meet and make sure I'm not crossing the boundaries of their relationship if they have one, as if it's a precious and fragile substance that might break if an "asshole" crosses an invisible line and renders the "devoted partner" helpless?
Give me a break.
The cheater is the cheater. They are cheating on SOMEONE. The piece on the side has so much less responsibility I don't remotely understand why they keep getting lectured in this column. A relationship is not a cult religion.
Posted by secretchord]]> Sat, 12 Jan 2013 22:09:35 -0800 The Stranger
That sounds like some weird shit to me.

Why not advocate that anyone who is aware of cheating by a cheater should out the cheater, always, to everybody, just in case? Isn't that what you are saying here?

Everyone has an obligation to make sure everyone else is being honest in their relationships, as long as their own motives are "pure"?

This is the weirdest column by you I have ever read. (the pro Iraq-war solumn was just stupidly following the establishment herd, so it wasn't really that weird, just massively and deeply ignorant)


Posted by cracked]]> Sat, 12 Jan 2013 21:50:01 -0800 The Stranger