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| Thu, 01-08-2009 - 3:27pm |
Okay, there seems to be some criticism and negativity about affairs here...imagine that, on an AFFAIR SUPPORT BOARD, but whatever. What I would like to know is, which do you think is the lesser of two evils...two married people having an affair with no intention of leaving their spouses...just out for a good time playing around for as long as they can without getting caught, OR, two married people who are really in love with each other and would like to leave their spouses because they tired of the sneaking around and lying but are trying to figure out the right time and way to end their marriages? What is the difference between the two affairs? :)

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Well, well, shadowz, since you mentioned lazy in your post...
I think you, and tiger, are both on target here, but I would caution directing to All Sides. That is really not a debate board. It's a guarded community committed to assuring that anyone who comes in with a notion that affairs 'might' be right gets thoroughly educated on just how wrong they are...We would be remiss if we did not tell people who wandered into that particular territory to gird themselves with heavy armor...
My issue, as cl, was never about the idea of support (as you so eloquently speak about), as I felt my experience helped me respond positively to many who needed that shoulder. I found that tough love was good, and I know I dispensed quite a bit of that too. Most people get the difference, and appreciate it. What I had such a hard time reconciling was the line that separates support from enabling. No one has yet been able to satisfy me on how that distinction gets lost in these here shadows, so to speak. (And I was thoroughly thrashed on All Sides, and here, when I even brought the subject up). The intimacies section of this board, for example, oozes with enabling, not support. The girly school thread, that still continues, started as a homage, of sorts, to finding ways to better cope with the femininity that was reborn upon the inception of the affair. The subtle nudges in other areas, that affairs can be nurtured, for a very long time, suggests that no one really knows whether taking a moral stance is proper or not, if one is enabling or just supporting. Tiger struggles with that line all the time. My experience tells me, however, that enabling is just as unhealthy as moral bashing.
But TOS says we must be nice. But nice can mean so many things. Perhaps we are faced with the one dilemma that lurks underneath the girding of this entire board....that MAS is an oxymoron. Let the debate continue.
I do believe, strongly, in one thing you said...we can stand people up, we can retell what our experience is/was, but we must be oh, so very careful, not to judge them. That is so very very difficult, as when we do write, our bias and our baggage come with us. The compassionate poster (cl?) knows when the slant is getting in the way of truly understanding and supporting. But that only comes with time and wisdom. I think we are all still working on that.
Lazy:)
mmmm. let me think on that, LOL.
Bears kinda like to smell themselves, decaying carcasses and all. so i hear, not knowing bears personally.
Mrs.
<
Someone I love dearly mentioned this thread to me today. That's why I'm here for the first time in well over a year. (Hell, my old login didn't even work any more, had to use one that's tied to an email I barely remember.) From my time on this board I took a handful of friends -- my best friends, far better friends than the people that populate my face to face life. They love me and care about me and I love them, would happily kill or die for them. None too strangely, we count no less than four former CLs of this board in our family. It is supportive in our network of friends, even when and often because we disagree with someone's choice of actions. And we started out as friends on this board, using those same attitudes of support and compassion.>>
you said exactly what i needed to hear. i love you dearly too. i hope that others have the chance to make such good "imaginary" friends.
Mrs.
LOL - so Scu is cleaning up Mrs cave huh??
Oh Oh OH - thanks for reminding me -
My three very best friends in the whole world are in my life as a result of this very board - and in addition - I have an entire circle of wonderful folks that I am proud to call friends - who I know for a fact I can call on anytime of the day or night - and they are there for me - as I am there for them - and I wouldn't have ever met them if I hadn't joined MAS that fateful day over a year ago.
So yes - damn the torpedos and the reasons for us being here - but I am forever grateful that this board exists.
Love you all -
Lynn ;)
I wish all you
Lazy,
this one will make me think for awhile. and that's a healthy thing and what i like second best about MAS (after the caring support). so thanks for the fodder.
in another post i wrote <> which is somehow connected but i'm having trouble tracing the link.
support: to promote the interests or cause of, to uphold or defend as valid or right (ok, drop that part), to hold up or serve as a foundation or prop for. enable: to provide with the means or opportunity, to make possible, practical, or easy
my first thought: is it possible to support without enabling? there is a boundary somewhere - i'm just not clear on what it is. contrary to what some might suppose, i do not expect everyone to get a pat on the back and a gold star. <> is accurate. we can even share perspectives -and sometimes advice. although maybe that's the tricky part. support suggests to me the poster already made a decision or took an action and i'm here to prop them up when they are down - versus enable suggests the poster wants help to make a decision or determine an action and i'm giving advice on "how to." if i'm getting to the right place, i would say i agree and simply don't participate in that kind of advising. but other posters do and it is what it is.
my second thought: <> i hope you are being serious here about the judgement. i am certain you are right about the bias - as i am aware of my own and tread softly on what i personally find tolerable. because the truth is i have thrown in with those in As and thus given up my right to say some As are better than others - although i can still say this is what i myself would and would not do. My own experience in a somewhat long-term and nurturing A means i land on the soft side and distain absolutes. So maybe i aspire to the CP badge (compassionate poster). but what to do with the non-compassionate posters? obviously i can put them on ignore - but a newbie does not have the experience to exercise that option.
my third thought: <> i'm a little lost here - and prolly tired of typing. what would the moral stance look like in the context of a long term affair?
yep, pooped out at this point. thanks for the mental exercise.
Mrs.
Okay, since I was the one that brought up the whole thing about support and enabling, I am going to respond with only a few observations, cuz this whole support brouhaha is getting seriously old. This board Does Not (or at least it didn't in my time) 'Support A's'. It supports people in A's, individually. And, every CL that I knew, made sure that the board participants knew it. Agreed or not is a whole different issue. But were made aware. And, like I've said before, even though I am severely disappointed with the turn this place has taken, I will defend to my last drop of blood its right to exist…
Firstly, you did not get 'thoroughly trashed' on All Sides cuz as Lazyafternoon you only posted there once and I remember the thread. You are taking advantage of the fact that we are not allowed to post links to other boards and that probably nobody will take the time to go to the All Sides archives to search. Like I said, I remember the thread and I vouch that you were merely disagreed with and questioned and you didn't like it at all and deleted your original post which was a smart move for a future victim playing.
Secondly, can you just let this whole issue go about who is ruling on That board and what it is committed to? I seriously don't understand your harping. You are bringing it up over and over and over again, as soon as the issue dies down, like you can't stand to see it go away. It is especially wrong to bring it up on this board which participants are defensive and prepared to see attacks even where there aren't any and to fight said 'attacks' cuz this state of mind comes with the A territory. 'The whole world is against me and judging me.' And I am not singling any board out, as a matter of fact, I fight tooth and nail when This board serves as an ammo shop for That board.
Thirdly. I cringe when I hear blanket statements like 'A's are wrong', cuz I don't like blanket statements. However, there is no way on this God's green earth where 'an A might be right.' There isn't. It's never right, and with a very few exceptions, all of us having of having had A's know that. This is not something to be stated around these here premises, of course, cuz there is a time and place for everything and this place is not designed for it.
MAS is not an oxymoron, it's just a very poorly thought through and misleading name… However, I feel compelled to mention, just so everybody knows, that you were the first and only CL that I can remember, that flat out advised someone to start an A. I
Support is anything which helps guide a person through a time which is albeit tough. Sometimes what we want to hear, isn't what we need to. I'm a lurker (do post on other boards) and when I have posted, I've always appreciated the time someone has took to respond even if it hurt me to read it, it wakes me up to reality. It's a take or leave it thing though. If you agree with someone's observations, then take them if you don't, leave them. Only you know your situation inside out, so it is up to you which advice and support will benefit you most.If I came on ivillage and just got told what I wanted to hear, I would be pretty disappointed as I can tell myself that daily without switching on the computer. When someone takes the hard line with me, I don't take it as them judging me, I take it as them steering me into the right direction,offering their support in their own way. If I read a post, and a woman/man has basically made themselves out to be doing something which will hurt them, I take the hard line approach. Too often, have I let my friends "in my real life" down by being too soft, and not giving it as it is. So I now just say what I honestly think, and hope the person can take something useful from it, if not, then fair enough, that is entirely up to them. Don't stop posting because you don't like ALL the responses, I'm sure someone will always come on and say something else which could be more fitting.
On the lesser of two evils-both aren't good are they? But if I have to answer, I will answer with what would "hurt me less" (for complete lack of better term) I would say the sexual one. Basically because it is just physical, no emotions involved. It's not like my partner wants to leave me as he is madly in love with someone else, he wants sex with someone else. Ok, I see how that's warped. Most would prefer not to enter into any sort of A at all, and whether you slap on a "we're in love" sticker, it doesn't exactly justify it. I know that's ideal worlds and stuff though. If in an ideal world, there would be no need for affairs and such, and no need for me to be on here.
But I think all advice, is good advice. Unless it is name-calling that is just not called for.
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