Gallimore

One nagging question ails me. Perhaps you can answer it for me.

One of the charms of marriage is that it makes deception a necessity for both parties. True or false?

Pseudonymph

....What?


Please explain your question a little better. I don't quite follow. Are you asking that once people become married, they must lie to keep up the "façade"?

Ab_Normal

I concur with SirenSpeak that the question needs to be explained better.

To answer the question as it stands: False for my marriage, which is the only one I can speak for. My husband is the only person to see the "real" me; everyone else (even other family members) gets the social facade.

Vibr8gKiwi

False. It's neither true nor a charm in my view. Even without further explanation.

[ November 15, 2002: Message edited by: Vibr8gKiwi ]</p>

Glory

Deception makes me nervous. It makes me sweat, it makes me nauseated, it makes me paranoid and ruins my ability to trust anyone else. I don't find it at all charming and it is damaging to a marraige. Of course if you are talking about keeping christmas presents a secrets or misleading someone in order to spring a surprise on them, I think there's a difference.

Glory

Oxymoron

Is deception a necessity? No!

(Of course, I could be lying )

Gallimore

This was my initial reaction: No.

However, I’m beginning to lean towards the idea of the positive of the negative. To illustrate my point: A basketball team attempts to win a championship. At one point during the game there’s a surface feeling of failure in the team. However, (by a lucky shot in the fourth quarter) the team wins the championship. As can be imagined, the sense of victory goes beyond description. Compare this with another team that cruises its way towards the championship without a drop of sweat. They win by, say, ten points. Oddly enough, the victory isn’t as sweet, as memorable. What then? Does it take negative (sense of failure) to appreciate the positive?

A dog trainer once told me that to discipline an English Mastiff, you would have to hit it with a stick. When it whimpers, embrace it with affection. It’s inevitable that the dog becomes intensely loyal to you.

As Alexander Pope so aptly asserted, “Order springs from two opposing forces.” Perhaps a perfect marriage depends on the equilibrium of honesty and deception? A wife discovers her husband has been having an affair. Of course, one becomes nervous, sweaty, nauseated, and paranoid. These are normal symptoms of emotional insecurity. But there are many instances (when all’s well) in which the relationship becomes twice stronger than ever.

What do you think?

Vibr8gKiwi

There are plenty of negatives in relationships to set the positives apart without purposeful deception.

Oh and the dog comparison was offensive in my opinion.

Philosoft

Perhaps the deception is that there is actually something called a "perfect marriage."

<strong> I think I don't know how you get from 'adversity due to deception sometimes brings couples closer together' to "is deception a necessity?"

tronvillain

*shrugs* While I favour honesty in a relatioship, the occasional deception can potentially be beneficial.