MRP/TRP says it's my fault if my wife cheats on me. What does RPC say?

rocknrollchuck · 2019-07-10T03:16:15+00:00

Every person is responsible for his or her own sin. Period. That's what God will judge each of us for. So the spouse who cheats will be judged for adultery.

When one spouse cheats on another, the cheating partner bears the brunt of owning the majority of the blame. Not only did they choose to ignore or downplay the existing problems, behaviors and conditions that made the relationship vulnerable to cheating, but they actively made the decision to betray their spouse instead of facing up to those problems and working through them.

I could see how a wife cheating on her husband be "his fault" in that it will allow him to take a good look in the mirror and have God refine him to reach the ultimate goal of holiness as He did many times in the Scripture.

Sure, there's that aspect there - God certainly can and will use all circumstances to draw us toward holiness. But the truth is, since a relationship is the creation of what two people put into it, when cheating happens, both partners must take a serious look at their own responsibility and contribution to the downfall of their marriage. An affair is really a loud wake-up call to both partners that there is something seriously wrong in the relationship in the first place.

Rifleshoot · 2019-07-10T03:40:27+00:00

Full stop, the cheater is held to account by God. That is their sin that they are guilty of. So no, you aren’t actually responsible in God’s eyes for your spouse cheating.

However, you should hold yourself accountable. After all, if she was indeed happy with the relationship, she probably wouldn’t have cheated. So while this doesn’t absolve her of blame or responsibility, it is helpful for your own growth as a man to shoulder some of it personally. If you look at the reasons a woman might cheat on you, you will be able to see your flaws and weaknesses as a man and fix them.

Deep_Strength · 2019-07-10T03:47:31+00:00

The husband and wife are each responsible for their Biblical marital roles and responsibilities. Within these there's 6 different things that you need to understand (3 sets of 2 pairs):

A husband is responsible for his own sin.
A wife is responsible for her own sin.
A husband is responsible for influencing his wife
A wife is responsible for influencing her husband
A husband is responsible for how he responds to his wife's sin
A wife is responsible for how she responds to her husband's sin

Let's say a wife cheats.

The wife is responsible for her own cheating to God, but
a husband may have some culpability in influencing his wife to cheat if for instance he's harsh with her constantly which can influence her to seek attention of other men or constantly denies her sex or things like these.
both the husband and wife are responsible in how they respond to the sin. The husband must call his wife to repent (fire and brimstone or kindly depending on the situation- whichever one helps her repent better), and the wife is responsible for repenting

There's a lot of personal accountability and responsibility for the husband and wife, even though they are in different roles and positions of authority.

One big thing you see in modern "Christianity" is that if a husband sins the wife suddenly "gets out of acting respectful and submitting to him" which is totally contrary to the Scriptures in 1 Peter 3. This is where a lot of the Church caves to culture much like you see in the secular RP- the man bears 100% responsibility and the women have very little blame. In the Bible, God holds each person accountable.

AntiWarr · 2019-07-10T13:10:08+00:00

You are a single guy and worried about your future wife cheating on you?

I think a more probable/realistic worry is sexual incompatibility, where the wife won't have sex with anyone, her husband included.

ReddJive · 2019-07-10T14:34:31+00:00

There's been some things in MRP/TRP that are more hardline in the last year. The idea that it's your fault, that it all falls on you is being taken a bit too far. It's never said but over time one comes to understand what is really being said. In the past it wasn't so direct and hard. There are success stories more than not of Married men turning their marriages around. It just gets lost in the noise of those that decided or failed to do otherwise.

Though if you haven't completely unplugged then it would seem too much.

The idea is to get an unplugging man who refuses to see what is and is not his problem to understand that the only thing he can control is himself. This is why in some ways Stoicism is a core philosophy of RP and as such we can only control our responses and emotions. So accepting your (the generic you) role in what has happened is essential.

Blue Pill men love to discuss emotionally so going indepth with them is never beneficial and we don't have time nor inclination to go in-depth as to what is and is not their fault. We even challenge them to understand that if they are indeed that upset, angry, or feed up with things they can walk away.

All too often BP want to be the tragic hero of their own self created problem. We hit them with all the truth we can in order to accept what it is they can and cannot do.

RStonePT · 2019-07-10T14:53:30+00:00

Children are more worried about blame and fault then they are for deciding what to do.

I'd be more worried that you're still concerned for fault, then answering the main question 'what am I going to do about this?'

But the rule of thumb, from an accountability perspective, is when you look back far enough, there's always a decision you made that rippled through all the rest of the happenings. That's your accountability point, or fault as the kids say these days.

So yeah, everything is your fault, your problem your solution and your responsability.

Also, if dad tells you no, so you run to mommy hoping for a yes? Why not just tell the sub what answer you're looking for so they can give it to you and send you on your way?

Red-Curious · 2019-07-10T15:19:50+00:00

it's your fault. Wait, WHAT? How?

Fault really matters very little. We can play the blame game all day and it won't get us anywhere. I think what /u/ReddJive was referencing was the fact that blaming someone else is pointless because you can't control them. AWALT. You can control yourself, so that's not pointless.

There is no such thing as a one-sided conflict. Both people have always contributed to an issue, even unknowingly. The "you're to blame" attitude in on TRP/MRP is not a statement that it's 100% on you. Rather, if you contributed 5% of the problem and 95% is on her, then you're better off working on the 5% you can actually do something about than twiddling your thumbs wishing she didn't do what 95% of women would do if given the chance without moral constraint.

What does this sub say?

For purposes of Judgment Day, God holds each person accountable for their own actions. Period. There are no exceptions.

For purposes of improving yourself, your sexuality, and your relationships, blaming her will only increase your resentment and decrease your attraction, and also hinders you from working on yourself when you aren't willing to acknowledge your own contribution. So, as a practical matter, while it's not technically accurate, it's idiotic to focus on her blame when you could actually do something about yourself.

It did not say, "You shall not make your wife commit adultery."

It does charge husbands with a responsibility to lead in the home, though. A guy's got to be a pretty crappy leader if his first officer is quick to jump ship when the opportunity comes.

Is this the extent I am to see it from a RPC perspective? And what other takes (if any) I should have on it?

It's just a matter of different wavelengths.

Anyone who wants to talk about philosophical truths and technicalities will readily come to the conclusion that the wife is primarily to blame for her actions in cheating, and the Bible makes it clear that God will agree on Judgment Day.

Anyone who wants to talk about what will actually solve problems and keep a man's wife from cheating will need to be FORCED to stop blaming her because as long as he's doing that he'll never work out his own issues. The easiest way to get him to stop looking at her fault is to get him to look at his own need for improvement.

It's like when the secular community calls people "faggot" and "autist" all the time. They don't mean that they believe these people are actually faggots and autists. They're communicating something that's untrue in order to force a mental shift to get the person to have the reaction they need to start making progress.

I'll also note that most men who hear the "if she cheats, it's your fault" line are guys in failing marriages whose wives have not actually cheated yet. As such, there's no actual fault to go anywhere. But if a guy could have done something to prevent it and declines to do so, how should we take that?

Suppose there's a mountain of candy on my street that smells wonderful. But there are alligators swarming the area. My kids love candy, but have no clue how dangerous alligators are, and they're too young to understand it even if I tried. If I:

let my kid play outside without supervision
fail to put a fence around my yard
fail to call an alligator control facility

etc. ... then when my 4 year old wanders off to get some candy and is eaten by an alligator:

Yes, it's technically her fault. She chose to go over there even when I told her not to.
But I'm also an idiot and to blame because I knew it was in a child's nature to go after that candy and I didn't do my role in preventing it.

AWALT. Women have a nature. If you know RP, you know their nature. While it may be different for spiritual purposes, for pragmatic reality, if you know women are prone to cheat and you have the means to prevent it, but you turn a blind eye, that's on you. She's no different than the child with candy.

"But they're grown adults and should be able to control themselves. The 4 year old child doesn't have that same mental capacity," is probably what you were thinking, right? There's a reason we call wives "the oldest teenager in the house." This type of response demonstrates a lack of understanding of hypergamy and the power female emotions to control their decisions. While women are capable of thinking logically quite often, when emotions are strong enough logic goes out the window and they're back into the same mental state as the 4 year old who sees a pile of candy.

We talk about how "hamsters" run wild in their brain to create logical rationalizations for emotionally impulsive decisions because that's what women actually do.

"God wants me to be happy."
"If I'm this unhappy with my spouse, maybe it's because God is leading me to another man."
"I haven't felt close to God since I've been distant from my husband, so maybe he's the one holding me back from being closer to God."
"When I had sex with that hunk who wasn't my husband, I felt incredible! God wouldn't let me feel so good about something if it really were wrong. The Holy Spirit would convict me. So my good feelings about this must mean that God supports the decision."
"This other guy is so much more godly than my husband. Yes, we had sex outside of marriage, but that isn't what determines godliness. He's engaged in so many other ministry things and doing God's work that I think I could make a much bigger contribution to God's Kingdom if I kept having sex with him instead of my husband. He needs my support and help more than the deadbeat I'm with now."

Yes, these thoughts are idiotic. They're also things women actually think. How do I know? Because I'm a divorce attorney and they've told them to me. While not exact quotes, I have heard each of these rationalizations expressed to me from various clients.

Women will always do what's in their nature, even if it defies logic. Expect them to be like a 4 year old child when temptation comes to your door. That's why, as /u/Deep_Strength often points out, the whole point of Ephesians 5's bit on marriage is that the husband is responsible for sanctifying his wife - not that he's to die for her happiness, but for her holiness. She can't be trusted with her own sanctification any more than the church can be trusted with its own sanctification without Christ.

So yes, a responsibility is created. Yes, the husband is in some biblical respect responsible if his wife is so unsanctified that she cheats on him. Yes, she will be held primarily responsible. But for practical purposes ... come on. What did you expect her to do if the guy is an overweight porn addict with no real direction in life?

SteelSharpensSteel · 2019-07-10T23:35:43+00:00

Interesting. Reminds me of WNS's favorite post - https://www.reddit.com/r/marriedredpill/comments/45v64p/the_trope_of_the_beta_male_married_husband/ - which is more really a kick in the butt to take action... or not.

Personally, I see it as a perspective shift. Imagine a naive young man coming in and finding out that "if your girlfriend or wife cheats on you, then it's your fault". Well now, that doesn't seem right. How is it YOUR fault if your spouse or girlfriend cheats on you.

Picture this though - you have some ownership on your life, and responsibility for your choices. You chose to vet or not vet. You chose to eat that fast food day in and day out. You chose (by your lack of action in going to the gym) to get fat. You chose to be unattractive. You chose to ignore the obvious red flags because she was hot. Etc.

Really though, you have to take a hard look at the part you play in your relationship.

Let me spin another scenario. Say you have a newly married couple, and over the span of 10 years, the man gains 80 lbs, loses his job, and let's say addicted to porn. The wife decides enough of this, starts working out, loses 30 lbs, and has a affair with her personal trainer Raoul. Who's fault is it - is it the wife's fault for cheating, or is it the man's fault for letting everything fall to shambles. And of course it's easy to say "Well, it's the wife's fault. She made the decision to cheat." But there are many shades of gray in these scenarios. At least for me, I don't judge (Matthew 7).

Personally, I think men AND women have agency in their lives. Free will and all that. And yes, there are women out there who have BPD (my brother dated one once, that was horrible for our whole family). You can't control people. If someone is going to cheat on you, they're going to cheat on you. Perhaps it might be better said that you should strive to become a man that doesn't get cheated on (and who has their stuff together).

helaughsinhidden · 2019-07-10T13:48:28+00:00

Yes, you are complicit and are going to be held accountable.

I think what you are looking for is to vindicate men from the sins of failed relationships.

Natural things are created by God and reflect spiritual truths. Cause and effect are His design. Every action having an opposite and equal reaction. There are consequences for everything we do. Every sacrifice and every sin has an effect on the world around us. All of the sins of the husband harm his whole family. The bluepill man causes pain and suffering to his wife and children. If you look at the DEER vs DARE page for example, it goes into amazing detail to show how being defensive, excusing, explaining, and rationalizing bad behavior (sin) ultimately punishes and therefore harms the wife.

If I have a garden and I neglect to pull weeds, water it, fertilize it, aerate the soil, guard it from pests, and plant healthy seeds then surely the plants in there will be worthless and will not bear fruit. Can I then shake my fist at God and blame Him for my failed garden? In a marriage, the wife is to be accountable for her actions and of course a plant is not, but we are called to be the head of the household. In my case, my wife tolerated my bluepill actions and handled it with grace and forgiveness as did I her compliance testing and nagging. As the God appointed leaders of the household, it is our responsibility to watch, protect, correct, encourage, discipline, and love our families just as a gardener or a farmer does his crops.

Biblical examples:

Genesis 3:17 And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;

Adam's first sin was to stand by passively and watch Eve become tempted by the serpent, then allowed her to eat it, then to listen to her advice to eat also, then to eat himself. It is a huge mistake for men to not take their role as the protector of the family and of his wife seriously and it doesn't simply mean to protect her from bears and burglars, but from sin itself. God placed Adam in charge of the garden and of Eve so if he allowed anyone to eat that, he knew he was going to be held accountable. When Eve ate, she surely sinned, and God judged and punished her, but the first words God says to Adam during his sentencing is "because you listened to the woman and ate". See how God FIRST mentions the bluepill lie Adam followed BEFORE eating?

His passivity would be called "weak" or "unattractive" in RP language, but all things that a man does that are weak or unattractive are sin to God. Having a lower standard of what is and is not sin is a real problem in western culture today and honestly, you have to look at all the bluepill concepts as lies and following those lies as sin.

Proverbs 15:1 A soft answer turneth away wrath: but grievous words stir up anger.

See what God is saying here? If a person is found in a state of wrath, they are in sin. Vengence is the the Lords, not ours. We are called to love one another, even our enemy. We are to be forgiving, so to be in a state of wrath in the first place is a state of sin. However, God calls upon us to not further entice this person to stir up more anger. We disobey God, sin, when we cause people to be filled with more anger, which is more sin. We are complicit.

Red Pill recognizes that these weak behaviors (sins) of the husband have direct cause and effect on what God calls the weaker sex, women, therefore wisely places the responsibility of a harmonious and healthy household squarely on the shoulders of the man. That is why when the victim puke starts out saying "my wife cheated...." the knee-jerk reaction is to say "it was your fault" without even needing to hear the rest of the story.

“House and riches are the inheritance of fathers: and a prudent wife is from the Lord.” - Proverbs 19:14"He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the LORD." Proverbs 18:22

God is no different, in fact He actually says so. Having a good wife is a gift of God. Literally, her "wisely acting with or showing care and thought for the future" is " overgenerous preferential treatment, goodwill, and kindness" that is gifted to a husband. We already know that when we sin, we remove ourselves from His protection and abandon his favor like the prodigal son who left his father's home to seek his own way.

Bluepill is a deviation from God's plan. It is sin. It has consequences. One of them is to lose God's favor and stir up sin in the heart of your wife to which you are complicit for.

Title	MRP/TRP says it's my fault if my wife cheats on me. What does RPC say?
Author	dgd_mobius_centurion
Upvotes	10
Comments	26
Date	July 10, 2019 2:39 AM UTC (4 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/RPChristians
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/RPChristians/comments/cbaty2/mrptrp_says_its_my_fault_if_my_wife_cheats_on_me/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/RPChristians/mrptrp-says-its-my-fault-if-my-wife-cheats-on-me.301209 https://theredarchive.com/post/301209