SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I was surfing the internet and discovered an article listing a bunch of smartphone apps to help facilitate cheating without discovery. Scary how many resources are out there! Social media and sites like Ashley Madison, private messaging on FB, cheating apps, etc. I'd be willing to bet that the rate of infidelity has increased dramatically since the advent of social media and smartphones. I know there was infidelity back in the day, but it seems they had to work harder at it and had more opportunity to "check yoself before you wreck yoself". Some of my wife's EA was taking place with me no more than 10' away. Even though it was an EA, the POSOM was IN OUR BEDROOM! Your thoughts?

Edited for grammar

[This message edited by outside4me at 11:50 AM, February 18th (Tuesday)]

I posted about this exact same thing about 3 years ago and no one believed me

I still think the internet, cell phones and social media sites are a gateway towards facilitating cheaters. Certainly not implying that without those things, cheaters wouldn't cheat...they just make it a little easier.

It's also harder to check up on them. I have the passwords to computers, cell phones, FB, etc, but how do you know that they don't have a secret email address? How do I know that he doesn't delete messages before I can check his phone?

I HATE FB private messaging. At least with texts, its on my phone records.

Face Time calls don't show up on my phone records either...

I don't know...yes, these apps make it easy--but before the technology, other things made it easy (cultural expectations for one). Maybe more people now start out 'dabbling' or 'curious' though and then fall down the rabbit hole. And of course it is easier to reconnect with exes...blegh. I'm just thinking of Mad Men era business men with city apartments and how divorce was a bit less common before, and it seems to me that it's really human nature (i.e. broke people with bad boundaries) that should take the blame.

I am pretty sure I read somewhere that there has been a measurable increase due to technology.

I hate it.

My grandmother used to say that computers would be the ruination of us all. I used to laugh at that.

My SAFWH used all the old fashioned ways to cheat. And it wasn't all that long ago.

Technology is a tool. I'm the tech geek in the family. He's sort of all thumbs. I still think it's about boundaries and morality.

Every time.I mention this, I see responses like, if they are gonna cheat they will find a way or people have been cheating forever, before the web. I disagree. I know beyond a doubt my ws would not have gotten as far as he did without a cell phone. He was braver, he was available even while working to chat, he could not have pulled it off without his cell phone.and facebook. I'm not saying people couldnt cheat without it, I'm.saying it makes it easier. I doubt if ow would have walked up and handed him a nude pic but after months of texting, sexting, she felt comfortable to send him a nude pic and he reciprocated. I know he's much more daring in a text than face to face. Ow wouldnt have been able to call our landline 300 x a day because.I would have intercepted. It's also not so easy to find an old gf or bf from your past without facebook or the web. A few messages back and forth and pretty soon you have an EA going. Jmo

I'd bet money Facebook has increased affairs. I personally know a few folks whose spouses reconnected with high school flames.

Infidelity is such a new thing that:

The story of Don Juan was first written in 1630.

Shakespeare's plays are chock-full of infidelity.

The Book of Exodus (1400 BC) has the 10 Commandments, which includes the 7th. Would this have been necessary if it wasn't common behavior?

Does technology make it easier? Of course. Easier to do, and easier to get caught, sometimes, too.

I'm just not convinced that making it easier makes it more common. It could just shorten the cycle from idea to thought to plan to execution, or the number or choice of partners.

And really, is the thought here something like "Well, my WS would have been faithful in the 60's, 70's, and 80's, but all this high-tech caused him to cheat."?

Not sure about rates, but it definitely has increased ways to cheat. Cyber sex, sexting, sex cam, hand held porn, skype, it goes on and on. It is easier to cheat, no doubt about that. I worry about new generations of kids vegging out on porn and the difficulty they will have connecting in real life. The fake life that many aspire to on FB trying to keep up with others who are creating fabulous, phony lives. The computer and cell phone absolutely escalated the EA and PA into overdrive. Would he have cheated? Maybe, maybe not, but the path was sure fast and easy thanks unlimited talk, text, and media.

To clarify: nobody is saying there wasn't infidelity before the internet, nobody is saying that broken people with bad boundaries shouldn't take the blame. We all agree on that.

I'm not saying technology is bad. In fact, I consider this website to be a profoundly beneficial resource, and can't imagine where I would be right now in my journey to heal without it.

TrustedHer: "And really, is the thought here something like "Well, my WS would have been faithful in the 60's, 70's, and 80's, but all this high-tech caused him to cheat."? Where are you getting that? What we're saying is that it POSSIBLY makes it easier. Yours is the first post I've read here that wasn't at least respectful in disagreement, but that's cool... to each their own. At least pay us the courtesy to read carefully what is being posted and not assume you know what someone else is thinking.

Yes it makes you wonder how callus they really are. The SOB was texting that whore next to me at our daughters soccer game, when she was in the ER and countless times at home next to me or in the computer room.

What a fucking asshole.

I guess I'm still not sure about R. It pisses me off to no end and when I ask him how he felt doing that and how could he.. Crickets and blank stares.

Whatever dude fuck off!!

IMHO, the screen based lifestyle lends itself to facilitating (NOT CAUSING) A if you're inclined to cheat. Compartmentalization was easy for my WW and for Dreamland's WH. They could scratch the itch in relative safety while in the company of the BS, and then simply close the screen to put AP "back in the box". In this case the illusion that the screen isn't "reality" helps explain the audaciousness of it. The screen allows a disconnect from reality. How many acts of violence do you witness on TV in one evening? Would you have the same dismissiveness if you witnessed the same violence in your driveway or workplace? The disconnect from reality is what makes it so insidious.

IMO...If Ashley Madison was just one person instead of the thousands of whores and whoremongers on that site, I'd be kicking "her" ass into the next county. But since she is just "cyber" I wish for her a "bug" that is 1000 times worst than all the STD's "she" has caused. And that's just me being nice

My guess is that the internet and technology generally does lend itself to more of the "I'm curious, let me poke my head around this corner" aspect of some infidelity.

The WS FB-befriending of an old flame.

The WS saying things via text message and chatting that they would never say IRL that 'upped the ante' on sexual tension.

The sly flirting w/out the fear of face-to-face rejection.

The "I like you" or "I love you", again, uttered without fear of immediate rejection.

I imagine that the internet and phones definitely lends themselves to the first few steps down the slope.

However, it does make it easier to get caught. Case in point: How many of us here have spouses who were cheating at work (or with a coworker), where it may have been kind of an open secret already? How many of us caught our WS via text records, or keyloggers, or internet histories? If I had to make an actual guess, technology may have increased the infidelity rate a tiny bit, but I think it's much more likely that the rate is near what is historically has been, and now there are just more ways to get caught.

I feel it has made it easier to cheat in many different ways, but also so much easier to discover. When the OW called my house in 1990 we did not even have caller id. So much easier today to trace calls. Also I believe media tells all so we hear about it so much more.

I think technology makes it way easier to cheat. Heck even a smartphone versus a flip phone. There is no FB messaging on a flip phone. My flip phone (which I had until last June, and thank God for the smartphon, read my profile) was good for calls, texts, and photos. Plus, all of the activity was visible on our cell phone bill. The newby stories in JFO almost always mention texting.

FWIW, my IC (also a MC) told me that FB has dramatically increased his client base. That now, a good majority of his client's APs come from FB. He said it's the absolute worst thing to happen to marriages. It's too easy to check up on that old high school flame. The girl/guy you have your first crush on at a time when life was easier (fewer responsibilities, no kids, whatever). Of course it seems "greener". One "innocent" "how've you been" turns into chatting back and forth, and then, BAM! You're having an EA, and then you're planning on meeting somewhere to begin the PA.

But, I've said it before, and I'll say it again. You should be able to trust your spouse with all the technology in the world. I've got access to everything my STBX did/does, and I've not cheated on her.

I can promise you this though: if and when I ever get serious with someone again, and I notice strange behavior with regard to her phone, it's over.

Strange cell phone behavior is the "lipstick on the collar" of the twenty first century.

I don't think people had to work harder at it. If anything I think people have to work harder at it now. Sure, you can be texting someone in an EA with your spouse 10 feet away, but you can't burn that text the way you could a letter. That fucking thing is in there for awhile. Overwrite it, you can recover it. If it's on the Internet, it's preserved, somewhere.

It's a hell of a lot easier to find someone when they're lying about where they are. Getting tagged on social sites, GPS, you name it.

The combustion engine facilitated cheating just as much. How do you know your spouse was driving where they said they were?

The efficiency of a tool is always only as good as the one employing it. Someone with a horse and a good shot with a bow 500 years ago could be a lot more effective at lying and hiding than someone with a cell phone and secret email account today. Everything matches its own time.

Yours is the first post I've read here that wasn't at least respectful in disagreement, but that's cool... to each their own.

Wow, really? TH is one of the most respectful members here on SI. He offered a different opinion, in a question format. There's nothing disrespectful about that.