Ok, went to that link and tortured myself reading it.
Silly, just replace ‘her’ with ‘him’ and the dialogue would hold more value. This is as nonsensical as stating all men cheat. It’s individuals and their own choices, NOT women or men as a whole. She is full of crap.
As I said, I have unfortunately seen way to many marriage breakdown examples around me that fall into pretty much the exact pattern that Langley outlines….and even if these ultimately did not result in adultery per se in all cases as she would seem to imply, they certainly involved infidelity (using the more comprehensive definition of the word). I will agree that Langley is way too sweeping in where she heads with the general premise because it makes it sound like it is inevitable that ALL women fall into this category of initiating an adulterous relationship outside their marriage and that clearly is not the case…..first off, she is only talking about marriage failure cases and secondly, there are obviously other failure mechanisms as well. How about a slight modification to Langley’s suggested seven steps?…..
1. The first step stated was “They push men for commitment”. I think that this step is basically true but it could go even further to state that “They use their sexuality quite effectively in being able to push their men for commitment”. Any disagreement with that as a general rule? If not, what would you suggest as more likely driving forces for either men or women to make the commitment to marriage? And which one of the two are typically pushing for the commitment and what is the mechanism….either overtly or underlying?
2. The second step was “They get what they want”. Any problem with that? I don’t… under the guise of a promise for the guy receiving unlimited sex for the rest of his life, a women can get anything, no? What most couples (young ones at least) don’t realize going into a marriage is that this physical reality has the potential to be highly abused. I think that Langley is on track with this concept even if she takes a wrong turn later.
3. The third step was “They lose interest in sex”. Whether they actually lose interest in sex or they just state that this is the case, it’s so typical that somewhere along the line, the statement and position of “sex is not a priority” starts to be made…..and it doesn’t seem to take very long into the marriage for that to happen. Why is that and who is making that statement? Well, we know the answer to the who part of that and it isn’t the man.
4. The fourth step was “They become attracted to someone else”. The way this is worded, it makes it sound like there is another specific person (and maybe that is the way it was intended)… but what if the someone else is just a mythical person or just a concept? How many women at this stage just simply start to lose their emotional commitment with the sense that “I made a mistake, this person is not my ‘soul mate’, I could have done so much better…… and they start to tear down the person they are married to as not meeting ALL their needs and expectations, even if the person was totally faithful to her sexually and other ways, was a good provider and really for all intents and purposes was a good husband to her? I would submit that this happens enormously more often with women as opposed to men and is a common denominator to virtually all marital breakdowns.
The fifth step was “They start cheating”. There is something that Langley is seriously missing at this point… some women might go into an adulterous relationship but more likely, they start to believe that in going from step 3 (‘losing interest in sex’) to step 4 (losing their emotional commitment), they are fully justified in a step 5 which is to engage in infidelity….. not adultery per se but infidelity. During steps 3 and 4, they still might retain their marital commitment and have sex with their husbands but at some point, they start to refuse and they withhold sex using whatever mechanism they want to convince themselves that what they are doing is fully justified i.e. “why should I participate in sex, he is not meeting MY needs” etc. At this point, it would seem that what the women has done is take the man’s vulnerability and use it as a total control tactic (see step 2 above).
The sixth step of “They begin telling their partners that they need time apart” is probably the case regardless of whether there is an adulterous relationship going on (IA – infidelity adultery) or if she is just committing IW (infidelity withholding) as manifested in step 5.
Similar to the sixth step, the seventh one of “They blame their partners for their behavior…and eventually, after an unusually long time of vacillating back and forth; they end their relationships or marriages.” is likely the case regardless of whether the woman has committed IA or IW.
If you don’t agree with Langley (or the above suggested revised steps), you might consider these questions:
- From a sexual perspective, who is the more vulnerable party in a marital relationship?
- Who in the marital relationship is more likely to use sex as a control tactic?
- Of all the cases of material breakdown that you are familiar with where IA was cited, how many of those were ones where IW occurred first? Based on what I’ve seen, it’s virtually 100%.
One more question was intended.... What other reason would you propose as to why it is predominantly women who initiate divorce?