More Infidelity: now it's John Edwards

Now it's John Edwards who we hear has been having an affair. What the heck is with these guys?

On the one hand, one might think that what politicians do in their private lives is just that, private. Or maybe that line of thinking starts with an assumption that it should be. I have found this view quite attractive and apparently logical for many years, but I am starting to wonder.

All moral, ethical, and pragmatic relationship reasons not to cheat on your spouse aside, . . . if you are a public figure you are going to get caught.

And, if you have taken on a public trust, if you have said you were willing to take a leadership position in championing the interests of groups of people, then you had better not do obviously dumb things to lessen your ability to do that. It isn't a breach of trust just with your partner, but also with all the people who supported you.

So here's Edwards, who was arguably one of the most articulate and effective spokesman for groups of people who aren't doing so well in society today, going out and making it easy to devalue not just him as a person, but also the issues, ideas, and ideals that he expressed.

Does this apply to all the rest of us who walk around in relative anonymity? Does it matter less if we do stupid, destructive things?

I used to think that it didn't, at least not in the same way, but giving our trial lawyer-millionaire-friend of the disadvantaged bad example of the week, John Edwards, some more thought I have changed my mind.

The only thing that is different in the size of the circle of damage. And, to each individual within the circle of that influence affairs, cheating, infidelity is just as hurtful. In fact, the smaller that circle, the more concentrated the hurt.

If your level of moral development hasn't progressed far enough to consider the interests and needs of others, for crying out loud be smart and keep yourself out of trouble!

ps - and if you think you can just not get caught and stay out of trouble that way . . . WAKE UP!! and while you're smelling the coffee notice all the cell phones with cameras built in, the IP addresses with your web activities, the reverse phone number services. Even without all that stuff your odds of not getting caught were never that good, but now the deck is stacked against you even more.

For more consideration and resources on this topic, check out the infidelity section of my website, www.better-relationships-over-50.com