Wife or the Other Woman?

[beatitude]

27 minutes ago, cruciatacara said:

She didn't apologise to me personally. She just tried to close the argument after being nasty by using a generalised all-purpose apology; that way no one else could have the last word. It's a bit like someone saying cynically 'I will pray for you.' as a way to claim the moral high ground and end discussion.

 

That's honestly not how I read it. To me it comes across as a way to make amends. It may not be worded in the way you'd want, but apologising publicly is an awkward uncomfortable business for most of us, and most people don't sound as gracious as they'd like. Of course, I could be wrong...but then so might you. Trying to guess someone else's intentions always involves a degree of mind-reading. This being the case, what does it cost us to believe the best of people? To choose to think that someone is being sincere even if part of your brain is growling that they aren't? That way, if the growly part is wrong, it doesn't do any further damage, and if it's correct, it...still doesn't do any further damage. It's a win-win situation.

I don't think that personality style is an excuse for being harsh to others, but I do think that sometimes we bring our own soreness and sadness to this phorum, and that they influence our posts in a way that others here perhaps don't realise. You watched your brother going through a very unhappy painful marriage, and as you love him, of course you're sensitive to any criticism of him and how he handled it. You are thinking of all the incidents where he tried to cope as best he could, which we haven't witnessed, and it upsets you that someone who hasn't met him would cast doubt on his character. But in her posts in this thread Lilllabettt has also dropped clues that her family situation hasn't been smooth, so it is entirely likely that her reactions are just as deeply rooted in personal hurt as yours are. Again, I could be wrong, but I have found this a very useful way of extricating myself from hurtful situations online - just to remind myself that I've never met the other person, I don't know why they said things the way they did, and it's better if I just leave it be.

It's not quite the same thing, but at the moment I'm sore because one of my students has told a malicious lie about me in an anonymous course evaluation. As it's anonymous, I have no way of knowing who wrote it. I thought I had a good rapport with all the students in this class, and I've tried really hard with them, so my head has been going over and over the  lie, and wondering who could be mean-spirited enough to fabricate this about me. I wanted to write a really defensive response to the evaluation in question, or to kick up a fuss with the administrator, but then I reminded myself that students are typically under a lot of stress at this time of year and for all I know that person was in such a bad state of mind that nothing I did came across as helpful and they wanted to take this out on me. It still hurts, but it's much better for us both if I can find a way to believe better things of that individual than, "They are a liar." It's Holy Saturday and all our sins are buried, hopefully that student's too, so I'm trying to let them stay buried in spite of my brain's determination to dig them up.

[cruciatacara]

10 minutes ago, beatitude said:

That's honestly not how I read it. To me it comes across as a way to make amends. It may not be worded in the way you'd want, but apologising publicly is an awkward uncomfortable business for most of us, and most people don't sound as gracious as they'd like. Of course, I could be wrong...but then so might you. Trying to guess someone else's intentions always involves a degree of mind-reading. This being the case, what does it cost us to believe the best of people? To choose to think that someone is being sincere even if part of your brain is growling that they aren't? That way, if the growly part is wrong, it doesn't do any further damage, and if it's correct, it...still doesn't do any further damage. It's a win-win situation.

I don't think that personality style is an excuse for being harsh to others, but I do think that sometimes we bring our own soreness and sadness to this phorum, and that they influence our posts in a way that others here perhaps don't realise. You watched your brother going through a very unhappy painful marriage, and as you love him, of course you're sensitive to any criticism of him and how he handled it. You are thinking of all the incidents where he tried to cope as best he could, which we haven't witnessed, and it upsets you that someone who hasn't met him would cast doubt on his character. But in her posts in this thread Lilllabettt has also dropped clues that her family situation hasn't been smooth, so it is entirely likely that her reactions are just as deeply rooted in personal hurt as yours are. Again, I could be wrong, but I have found this a very useful way of extricating myself from hurtful situations online - just to remind myself that I've never met the other person, I don't know why they said things the way they did, and it's better if I just leave it be.

It's not quite the same thing, but at the moment I'm sore because one of my students has told a malicious lie about me in an anonymous course evaluation. As it's anonymous, I have no way of knowing who wrote it. I thought I had a good rapport with all the students in this class, and I've tried really hard with them, so my head has been going over and over the  lie, and wondering who could be mean-spirited enough to fabricate this about me. I wanted to write a really defensive response to the evaluation in question, or to kick up a fuss with the administrator, but then I reminded myself that students are typically under a lot of stress at this time of year and for all I know that person was in such a bad state of mind that nothing I did came across as helpful and they wanted to take this out on me. It still hurts, but it's much better for us both if I can find a way to believe better things of that individual than, "They are a liar." It's Holy Saturday and all our sins are buried, hopefully that student's too, so I'm trying to let them stay buried in spite of my brain's determination to dig them up.

@beatitude I am sorry to hear about your troubles. I ran some training courses a long time ago and was often surprised at the evaluations after a course. Some participants liked what I did, others didn't, but some were really nasty too. So I do understand how upsetting it must have been for you to read lies about yourself, and how unexpected it must have been.

I am afraid that this thread felt like an unexpected ambush to me too, especially since I didn't attack the OP but merely questioned the bias of the article and used examples from my own family to support my conclusion that there are always two sides to any relationship story. Rather than discuss the article, the OP then went on to judge me and my brother in a nasty way.

As you say, perhaps the OP's own hurts and anger came out in her response, but I still don't think that excuses an attack on me and my family. And demanding to know whether I attended the wedding or not just seemed so personally judgmental, as if she were trying to prove something bad about me, as well as my brother. I am being asked to have understanding for her while also being held accountable for my own defensive responses. If that isn't a double standard, what is?

If the apology was real, and sincere, then that would change things. Perhaps I just read it differently than you did because I was the one under attack, and not you. 

But perhaps enough has been said from me by this time. I don't want to get into an argument with a moderator. This whole thread just left an awful taste in my mouth, sort of like the lies about you did. Unexpected attacks often do that to us.

 

[Gary david]

Happy Easter

[Peace]

On 4/17/2019 at 10:49 PM, cruciatacara said:

He was going to leave her at around the 8 year mark because he couldn't take it anymore, but the priest in his case told him that he just wasn't 'satisfying' her as a man and that is why she cheated (never mind all the other things she did). A celibate priest thinks he knows what will satisfy a sociopathic woman.

Yeah this is really where I think Christian churches (not only Catholic) are majorly off nowadays. I think you also see the same thing in the majority of couples therapy. At least to me, it does seem that there is often an unfair bias in favor of the woman in most situations. It kind of seems that the woman is put on a pedestal of sorts, and that the man's job is to please the woman on the pedestal. If any problems arise in the relationship, it seems to be the assumption that they were  caused by his failure to live up to this obligation to please her. The focus usually seems to be on how the man failed in this respect or that respect vis-a-vis the woman's needs, but I don't see much attention at all really given towards the man's needs in a relationship, and how those may not be being met by the woman.

In my view, this overly female-centric viewpoint is a big part of the reason why men for the most part are absent from church today (seems to be a much bigger problem in Protestant churches than Catholic ones, admittedly).

[Ice_nine]

On 4/21/2019 at 5:22 PM, Peace said:

Yeah this is really where I think Christian churches (not only Catholic) are majorly off nowadays. I think you also see the same thing in the majority of couples therapy. At least to me, it does seem that there is often an unfair bias in favor of the woman in most situations. It kind of seems that the woman is put on a pedestal of sorts, and that the man's job is to please the woman on the pedestal.

That's just like, your opinion man.

 

When it's just a matter of perception it's not really solid grounds for an argument either way. It may appear to me, for reasons of bias, filtering, or whatever, that women indeed do get the short end of the stick in these situations. Doesn't mean it bears any truth.

I've known women who treat their mans pretty crappily, and men who are scumbags to their women. I've seen situations where more support is given to the man, and more to the woman. It's really a tossup. And how that support comes in is often a reflection of how we perceive the general unfairness towards one gender or another.

As per the original post, if the actual story is as one-sided as the author claims, then well yeah that's pretty crappy. Good people do suffer injustice. One must wonder how such a wonderful and faithful person was duped into thinking this guy wasn't a turd, but I've suffered the weakness of being taken advantage of so it's not totally alien to me. It still doesn't eliminate my fault. There comes a point where you allow someone to take advantage of you (again human weaknesses and incompetencies, those pesky things). Unfortunately if the original story is true, then it smells of elderberries that the wife only realized her husband was a tool after they said their vows.

But yeah, case by case basis is probably the best way to go with this. And a healthy, objective, get both sides of the story type thing is probably good too. I think people fall victim to unfairness all of the time, but to make sweeping generalizations about who typically gets screwed over more (men vs women) isn't helpful to anyone.