FOUR BOYS for Steve McNair. Four boys for Mark Sanford. Four children for David Vitter. Three daughters for Eliot Spitzer. Three children for John Ensign. Three children for John Edwards. Three children for Kwame Kilpatrick. Those two dozen children are enough, without even reaching back a decade for Chelsea Clinton, to demonstrate the impressive swath of psychological destruction for the dalliances of dads.
The words are those of Derrick Jackson of the Boston Globe. I have borrowed the titled of his column today for this diary.
He explores the impact of the unfaithfulnessn of (male) politicians upon their families, especially their children. That is probably a worthwhile topic. I will explore it some.
But I also want to explore the entire idea of unfaithfulness in general, and not merely from the perspective of sexual activity.
Jackson admits to puzzlement about politicians in particular and their inability to turn off the switch controlling carnal passion. In an earlier day, before it was common for us to find out about such escapades of our political figures, perhaps some were shocked by the scene in "The Candidate" where Bill McKay, played by Robert Redford, the idealistic young senatorial candidate, is coming out of a hotel room pulling up his zipper, and the political aide merely offers a wry and crooked smile. Many Americans did not know about Lucy Mercer or the many escapades of Jack Kennedy, although speculation did exist - it was certainly not part of our regular political discourse. Perhaps we can trace that changing to Gary Hart daring the press to follow him, the Miami Herald taking him up on the challenge, and thus being able to inform us about his all night tryst with Donna Rice.
Jackson writes
Here we are, a human race that can peer billions of light years into space, communicate in a click with someone 12,000 miles away, and cure all kinds of diseases, yet cannot find the carnal off-switch. In the normal course of parenting, trust between children and fathers is a devilish ride. So why some dads go all out to be Satan is an enduring fascination.
He explores the impact of the escapades upon the families, and quotes Janis Abrahms Spring, "author of several books on family relationships, including extramarital affairs, and a former clinical supervisor in Yale University’s psychology department" in several paragraphs, including this one:
Spring, who has spent three decades specializing on infidelity issues, said the seemingly nonstop stories of powerful, public men cheating on their wives in very spectacular ways, including deadly results, serves to demonstrate how affairs carry "the power of a crack-cocaine high. They don’t think clearly, they don’t think of the consequences. The attraction often is not necessarily the person they are having the affair with but how they are experiencing themselves in that relationship, which can be intoxicating.’’
Jackson notes that one in 5 American males admits to an extramarital affair, and posits
we really need a fresh 12-step program for thinking with the upstairs brain before sneaking into life’s basement.
I said I wanted to do an exploration of unfaithfulness in general, more broadly than merely sexual infidelity. And I would like to examine it both in terms of politicians and apply it in general, to all of us.
I know people who avoid "unfaithfulness" by what some have termed serial polygamy or serial monogamy - whether in a relationship (married or other) they remain monogamous in that relationship, but spiral quickly from one relationship to another. Some marry multiple times, others never formalize the relationships. Officially they are not being unfaithful, because they terminate the first relationship before sexually consummating the second. And yet mentally they may have already moved on - that is, they have already transferred their affection and their passion to a new target even before they terminate the previous relationship. It is that transferring of the passion that leads to the termination of the earlier relationship. Such a person may be within the letter of the relationship but is clearly violating its spirit. Is that person truly "faithful"???
There are also people, including politicians, for whom sexual fidelity in marriage is not a major issue. They have a firm commitment to one another, but are willing to accept the partner having sexual relationships with others, perhaps on a mutual basis. I do not think I am telling tales out of school to note that the marriage of the late Senator Jacob Javits of New York and his wife Marion was widely believed to fall into that category, and it had no bearing on his standing among his constituents during his long public service. Yes, she was more than 2 decades his junior, although I am not sure such an age discrepancy necessarily implies a lack of marital fidelity.
Certainly there is an element of hypocrisy on the part of some, who portray themselves as paragons of conventional morality, who advocate for "family values" but whose personal behavior contradicts the messages upon which they base their campaigns.
And there are other kinds of unfaithfulness that may be far more damaging, both within the personal relationship of marriage and in the relationship between political figures and their constituents and supporters. If a marriage is more than a legalization of sexual activity, one presumes some sharing of a set of values. For one partner to walk away from a shared commitment can represent a betrayal. On the other hand, it is also true that people grow and change, and for one partner to attempt to retard the growth of the other by accusing the other of betrayal might itself represent a sense of unfaithfulness - to the wellbeing of each other.
Let me explore this point a bit, because I have lived it. When Leaves on the Current and I began our relationship, we were both members of the Episcopal Church. When I decided to join the Orthodox Church in America, it was not a betrayal because she had leanings in that direction and was already exploring the possibility for herself. She came down from college to see me officially join the OCA near Philadelphia. When we married, almost a decade later, it was in the Orthodox Church in America, in which I held a number of leadership positions.
When I decided to leave the Orthodox Church, while she could understand the hurt I had experienced (which I will not revisit here), it still hurt - it represented for her my abandoning something we had shared, which had been an essential part of our relationship. We had to work very hard to overcome the hurt she felt and sustain our relationship. It was something I had to do, and loving me and wanting the best for me it was something with which she had to wrestle. The marriage could have foundered on my decision to change. With love, friendship and hard work we were able to work through it.
What was not in doubt was our commitment to one another, and to what might be best for the other, even if there were costs and hurts that had to be addressed. And there was never any doubt about sexual fidelity, or even emotional commitment to another person. There was trust, and that trust ultimately was not betrayed.
Let me now return to the idea of political faithfulness. I am far more concerned by a political figure who abandons a previously held point of view for political gain or position - and this applies not merely to the likes of Arlen Specter. I can accept that all of us can in the light of experience and new knowledge decide to change positions. I can think of several of my own that have changed over the years. I used to support, at least in theory, the death penalty. Ultimately I came to realize I could no longer maintain that position, and wrote about my changing point of view in ... no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death. Similarly, when younger I believed I had a responsibility to serve my country and as a result of the belief when I dropped out college in 1965 I enlisted in the Marines. During the 4 decades since my position has very much changed. By the time I entered service as a public school teacher in 1995 I had come to a point of view that while my country could demand of me my life, it could not demand that I take another life - that action was too personal, and the decision to take a life was one I reserved to myself. As a Quaker, I will not make that decision merely to preserve my own life. I might do so to protect others. But it will be a personal choice, made on the basis of distinguishing between what I perceive as degrees of evil.
I am no fan of Phil Gramm, and there is much about his political career and his actions since leaving public office that I abhor. I do want to commend him on one thing. When he decided to formally switch his party affiliation from Democrat to Republican, he resigned his House seat and ran in the special election. Granted, he had been being unfaithful by reporting on the inner discussions of Democrats to Republicans, and he was being disciplined by the Democratic caucus. In a sense he had little choice but to change party affiliation. But having been elected as a Democrat, he then gave his constituents a choice of whether they still wanted to keep him as a Republican, and he did not wait until the next election. Granted, that is far easier to do as a House member than as a Senator in most cases, but it is worthy of note.
I mention Gramm because I think elected public officials have a duty to explain to their constituents, clearly, why they change positions. It is a matter of trust. Situations will change, more information may require one to rethink her/his position. But since one serves as a representative of the people, those people should be included in the thinking process. And too often we the people are not so included. We are not asked what we think. And that is a form of betrayal as great as the betrayal within marriage of the sexual commitment that has been so much a part of our recent political news.
And yet, sexual betrayal carries a huge impact. When a politician is sexually unfaithful within his marriage, it does raise real concerns, and those concerns are beyond the matter of private behavior, certainly in the case of the politicians who use their families as part of the argument for why we should vote for them. If a person can so violate what many view as the most important commitment he makes, how can we trust him in the commitments he makes on our behalf? That is a legitimate question.
Further, when there are children involved, the situation is far more serious. When one's gratification, sexual or otherwise, becomes more important than one's preexisting commitments, how willing are we to trust that person with things that matter to us?
Yes, there is certainly a salacious interest in the peccadilloes of others, particularly those who are public figures of any kind. And for some there is a set of vicarious pleasures. On the one hand, we may imagine ourselves living such a libertine lifestyle. On the other, it can give us the opportunity to consider ourselves superior.
"Collateral damage" - a term we so often use in military matters, when those we do not target get damaged in our efforts to go after those we think are legitimately a focus of our military might. It can be on a large scale - firebombing Hamburg, Dresden and Tokyo; nuclear annihilation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki; over half a million Iraqi children dying as a result of economic sanctions - but as we should know from Stalin, a million deaths are a statistic, one death is a tragedy. When the collateral damage is those who should be near and dear, that can invoke a particular kind of revulsion. It is that which Jackson attempts to address in his column.
One additional quote from Janis Abrams Spring:
"There are often two losses for the child,’’ she said. "The hurt partner is often filled with anxiety and depression and is not available to the child the same way as before. The unfaithful parent is off with the affair person and not available to the child. The family blows apart.’’
Jackson closes his pieces by speaking positively of seeing Chelsea Clinton on the campaign trail with her mother. She is an example of a child who survived the damage of her father's sex scandal. Jackson then concludes with this
But we will never know the private hurt. Of the freshly-scarred 24 sons and daughters from the affairs named at the top, only time will tell which ones will rise above the hurt and which ones will be haunted forever.
I am a teacher. I cannot tell you now which of my students I have helped and which I may have harmed by thoughtlessness or insufficient attention or simply lack of skill. That haunts me.
Those are "my children" since we lack biological children of our own. The kinds of betrayal about which Jackson writes have impacts that are yet unknown - those 24 sons and daughters, and the lives with which theirs will intersect.
But I will disagree with Jackson's title. That collateral damage is not, and can never be, cheap. It is very expensive in that it effects the lives and psyches of human beings, and potentially can shape how they act in their own personal relationships, what they learn from this experience of their own childhoods.
I offer no final conclusions. I do not think sexual infidelity is by itself a disqualifier from public service. I also do not think that it is entirely a private matter, and not merely because some of the politicians involved have portrayed themselves as paragons of "family values." There are possible misuses of office, of public funds. There are real possibilities of serious legal violations as well as any ethical or moral violations.
Where I will agree with Jackson is that there should be no doubt of the damage done to the families, and particularly to the children. And that should raise a legitimate question: if the politician in question can be so cavalier about the impact upon those who should be near and dear to him, what level of trust are we willing to give him with respect to that which matters to us in issues of public policy?
Peace.