When I was in the service there was a guy that was getting a divorce and his wife literally had hundreds of sexual liaisons while he was deployed, she confessed it to him, to her psychologist, her family... all knew about it when the “big news” broke, and despite the fact that she was totally unfaithful to anything, even her decency, the court still gave her half of everything, the house had to be sold and this poor fellow was nearing the end of a good career, with no place to live, no investments left, and on half rations.
He felt blessed, he told me. Blessed because with all of her sexual trysts, he never got and STD. He doesn’t know why that is, but he feels blessed. He was devoted to his marriage until he was hit upside the head with the lie of it all.
Sadly he’s emotionally ruined, he will never trust another woman, and time is such that he will never have a normal family. If there even is such a thing.
Sadly, the law doesn't care whether a spouse has cheated. Whether the husband cheated on the wife, or the wife cheated on the husband, makes no difference in divorce court.
The judges don't want to hear all the details or listen to arguments, either.
So, today, all divorces follow this formula (at least in my state):
- Whichever spouse earns more is the one who pays alimony. Alimony stops if the one collecting it remarries (or moves in with a partner, but good luck proving that).
- Whichever spouse stays in the house gets the house, but must fork over half the equity to the other spouse (or they must sell the house and split the equity 50/50).
- Unless one parent is dangerous, both parents share joint legal custody, but whichever parent stays with the kids gets primary physical custody, whereas the parent who moves out gets visitation. (The courts don't care why the parent moved out.)
- Child support is calculated based on the parents' incomes and the number of nights the kids spend with each parent.
It's not a perfect formula, and there's much more to it. But it has nothing to do with gender.