Divorce Blahhhging
I have to be honest: Writing blog posts about nuances of Chapter 50 of the General Statutes is a complete and utter snooze. The only reason I do it, frankly, is in an attempt to creep my website up the Google rankings as cheaply as possible. I wonder who even reads these posts other than that Google-bot thingy looking for keywords and phrases for online searches. I figured going forward, I would use the blog as a place to brainstorm life and law. This seemed to make the practice of blog-writing a bit less, well, blahhh. Here’s my thought of the day:
Recently, I spoke with a friend about the latest Ashley Madison scandal and how it relates to the work of a divorce lawyer. It made me reflect on how my thoughts have changed with respect to extra-marital sex or online hookup sites in general. I suppose, in the past, I would have taken some esoteric moral stance against anyone who might use sites like ashleymadison.com or Tinder, Grindr, Scruff, Adam-for-Adam, Manhunt, name-your-favorite-app—the list is practically endless. I might have even thrown around some fancy, theological-sounding verbiage to support my position.
I think, secretly, my condemnation would have merely been a veiled desire to taste of the forbidden fruit myself (I think that’s essentially what all judgments are at their core anyway). Today, though, I realize it’s unfair for me to make such pronouncements against people curious enough to open this Pandora’s box. Maybe it’s because I’ve come to think these sites might have a usefulness and serve a legitimate end (and because forbidden fruit is delicious).
Simply put, sex is kinda nice, and a lot of folks find themselves in relationships or marriages where sex is a total bore or, worse, altogether absent. Who can blame a person for looking elsewhere to fulfill a legitimate need and desire? No question there may be consequences to getting found out (i.e., you may lose an alimony claim!), but perhaps the fallout from being outed is worth it for them. Only that person can decide. Who am I to say? That’s between them and Ashley!
Takeaway: It’s tempting to think of everything (especially “sins” like adultery) in a simple, dualistic framework as either good/bad, right/wrong, or black/white. Reality isn’t quite so streamlined, however. If law school teaches lawyers anything, it’s certainly this.
