Adultery: Legal or Illegal?

[Talon87]

I was reading a BBC article on the Petraeus extramarital affair scandal that rocked the CIA this past weekend. In that article, I came across something interesting that I did not know before:

Originally Posted by BBC

Adultery is illegal under military law, and correspondents say Gen Petraeus could face military prosecution if evidence is found to challenge his claims that the affair began after he left the army.

Under civilian law, adultery is the sort of thing that often results in a divorce and messy litigation regarding how to split up the formerly married couple's property. But it's not illegal. If a man cheats on his wife, or if a woman cheats on her husband, it's not a criminal offense. You can't take them to court (well, divorce court you can, but not a criminal court) and try to have them charged for some crime. I've often heard people casually weigh in on whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. Some say it's good that adultery isn't illegal. Others say it's wrong and that the law should be changed. So imagine my surprise to discover that military law doesn't match up with civilian law on what seems to be a greatly civil (i.e. non-military) matter!

Feel free to discuss whether you think adultery should be legal or illegal under civilian law. (And if you live outside the United States and adultery is illegal under your country's civilian law, feel free to still weigh in with your thoughts on whether that's appropriate or not.) I don't expect this to be an academically rigorous debate but rather a bunch of people vote-posting with their feelings and armchair philosophical beliefs. That's fine so long as people don't take it too seriously. If things start getting heated, I'll ask the involved parties to try (hard though it may be) to graduate the discussion from e-opinions to something a bit more academically sound. (For example, someone who believes that adultery should remain legal might point to empirical data in countries where adultery is illegal if it shows similar rates of adultery to those seen in the United States, thus supporting the argument that anti-adultery laws only serve to further punish the criminals but do nothing to deter the criminal acts from occurring in the first place.)

[Amras.MG]

I think the penalties for cheating are legally tough enough already, so I think adultery law should stay the way it is. /literally two seconds of thought

[Princess Ana]

Exactly what kind of adultery are we talking about here? I can think of at least three things that someone more conservative might put under "adultery" while I may not.

1. Where the husband or wife has an affair outside of the marriage without the others consent.

2. Where the husband or wife has an affair outside of the marriage WITH the others consent, and it does happen.

3. Where both the husband and wife are engaged with someone outside of the marriage together. Think threesome.

We really cannot go into this debate without defining what adultery is. I personally do not see 2 or 3 as adultery, but others might.

[Talon87]

For the purposes of this discussion, I intend people to discuss #1. There's no legal trouble at all with either #2 or #3. The question about "should it be illegal? Y/N " only comes up with #1.

[Doppleganger]

It should be a crime. I look at it from a contract/economic point of view; the government gives benefits to married couples but an affair is a violation of the contract, and goes against the intent behind promoting marriage and monogamy. To prevent exploitation, no matter how small, then, there should be extra penalties levied against the violating party. To terminate the contract is to unjustly punish everyone who isn't in direct violation of it.

This is the first I've heard of Petreaus having an affair. It's disappointing to say the least, since his entire history is now tainted, but thaaaaaaaaat's America!

[Princess Ana]

Originally Posted by Doppleganger

It should be a crime. I look at it from a contract/economic point of view; the government gives benefits to married couples but an affair is a violation of the contract, and goes against the intent behind promoting marriage and monogamy. To prevent exploitation, no matter how small, then, there should be extra penalties levied against the violating party. To terminate the contract is to unjustly punish everyone who isn't in direct violation of it.

This is the first I've heard of Petreaus having an affair. It's disappointing to say the least, since his entire history is now tainted, but thaaaaaaaaat's America!

But how exactly is an affair a violation of the contract? I have been trying to wrap my head around this for the past half an hour or so. Is it because that an affair does not promote monogamy? Does that make polygamy wrong then? Does that make options number 2 or 3 wrong, despite that being the choice of the married couple? If it is a matter of honesty, then you cannot punish someone for that. You can't be 100% honest to your wife everyday. In a court room setting, you kinda have to be, but obviously it is for a much smaller amount of time. Punishing dishonesty is a whole can of worms in itself. And, may I add, that not every affair causes a divorce? Married couples do stay together even after one of the members commits adultery.

Marriage, quite frankly, has pretty much always been about the benefits. Truthfully, there is no reason why a couple should just have sex with each other in a moral sense, as long as dishonesty is not involved. But people have been getting married for millennia for purely selfish reasons:

To have sex without being scorned or outcast by the community
To obtain some sort of dowry or create some sort of business arrangement that while it may not benefit the members of the marriage it benefits other people
To create political alliances
To end feuds between families
To evade drafts

And I'm sure there are other benefits and reasons, I just can't think of one. And while people are getting married more often than before because of love and things like that, it was not an uncommon occurrence in the past for a marriage to form purely for selfish reasons and not to promote monogamy or provide a stable household for children.

[Mercutio]

Yeah if you take the original definition of marriage and call it a property thing, a contract, it should be a crime.

[Doppleganger]

Originally Posted by blazeVA

And while people are getting married more often than before because of love and things like that, it was not an uncommon occurrence in the past for a marriage to form purely for selfish reasons and not to promote monogamy or provide a stable household for children.

Note the distinction between government-recognized and religiously-recognized marriage. Talon's topic is about civilian law, so we have to look at the issue from the government (benefits-oriented) perspective.

Government contracts evolved out of religious ones, and are necessary because of legal recognition of kinship with regard to stuff like property claims. But marriage benefits? Some of them are codifications of what we'd see as basic rights, but others (particularly the tax incentive) are outright incentives.

Just to clarify, purposes behind incentives (monogamy/genetics) are mostly retrospective. The tradition came first and the purposes behind it have fluctuated throughout history.

I don't know how the government contracts are written up, but I can infer they're done in such a way to prevent fraud, like two male room-mates pretending to be gay and engaging in a sham marriage to reap government benefits. If the government expects an obligation/commitment between the entrants, an affair is definitely a blow against enforcement of that obligation. Thus, we could infer the government is being de-frauded in a way, as the violating party is enjoying the benefits of a marriage contract while not assuming the full duties of it.

[Concept]

I actually agree with Dopple on this one, to my surprise (I came in here expecting to post lol legal). Not that I've ever thought marriage should bring anything like tax breaks or whatever, but since it does he has a point.

[Slash]

I think cheating is wrong, but not necessarily adultery itself, however, if adultery is broadly-defined. However, not to the point it should be a criminal offense.

[Loki]

Adultery is only illegal under military law if the act somehow discredits or embarrasses the military/government or somehow disrupts order in the military/government.

When we take that into account, regular civilian adultery pretty much means nothing.

I also disagree with Dopple's idea that a marriage is a contract. I see it as more of a status. i.e. Single, Dating, Married is a status on social websites. What happens in a marriage is private and purely up to the married couple as to how things are handled. If adultery is committed, they can choose to divorce and end the status of married, thus ending marriage benefits. They can also choose to ignore it, allow it, or forgive the offender. The extramarital other gains no legal benefits of an affair and ultimately has little effect on how the government handle the married couple.

Polygamy I can consider an abuse of government benefits. But an affair is entirely up to the married couple how they wish to handle it.

[Amras.MG]

Actually Doppel, you have a really good point there. I guess I tend to view state marriage as so watered down I didn't even really consider it a thing. It is a sort of legal obligation.