Since learning about the inability of many of Bill Cosby’s alleged victims to file lawsuits against him (statute of limitations), I’ve contemplated the concept of justice. How do people achieve peace of mind and a sense of justice in the world when there is no legal system to turn to? The Ashley Madison leak has me wondering the same thing.
The court of public opinion has come down hard on Cosby. It has also been coming down hard on people who owned Ashley Madison accounts. There have already been a couple of suicides reported. The men who died were outed on the hack list. A public shaming is too tough a punishment for some to take.
Public figures have been revealed to have or have had profiles on the site. Some have denied cheating but admitted to opening an account; others have claimed to have had their identities stolen and blamed identity thieves for creating profiles with their e-mail addresses attached; and then there are those who have manned up and confessed to both opening an account and cheating. Simply the existence of an account, with no evidence of cheating, is enough to cast public suspicion.
Should there be a court of public opinion for cheating? Maybe families deserve a little privacy when it comes to infidelity (personally, I wish the hackers had sent the relevant information to the spouses of the cheaters) This may sound too hardcore, but maybe it’s time to replace the court of public opinion on cheating with an actual court. I don’t mean giving people jail time; I mean making adultery illegal and having legal consequences for those found guilty.
People were using Ashley Madison to cheat. The only way to bring these cheaters to justice are for the hackers to out all of the users. There is no legal court, at least in America, that will put you on trial for cheating on your spouse. But there is a court of public opinion, and the majority of the public condemns cheating. By removing the incentive to go public with a cheating scandal, having an actual cheaters’ court might help these kinds of things remain private.
In a "Dr. Phil" rerun from Tuesday, a couple of women named Ashlee and Kandi faced off. Ashlee was married to Emmett (now deceased) and Kandi is married to Rob (now in prison). Once upon a time, Kandi and Emmett began having an affair with each other. Ashlee was in the dark, but Rob had his suspicions. When Rob, Kandi’s husband, found out the two adulterers were at a drug store together, he showed up outside the store with a gun and shot Emmett dead. Rob claims it was self-defense, but he was sent to prison on a murder charge. On the show, Kandi complained that Ashlee was blogging about her. Kandi wished Ashlee would finally stop posting negative things about her and move on. Ashlee wished Kandi would have stopped having sex with her husband.
That’s when I realized…Ashlee can never formally seek justice from Kandi. Ever. Technically, Kandi did not commit a crime, because all she did was have sex with Ashlee’s husband Emmett (who received a death sentence from Kandi's husband). Ashlee chose to exact justice against Kandi by talking about the affair and how it impacted her life. Ashlee turned to the court of public opinion, and that is at least better than turning to a gun.
The point is that cheating is extremely harmful. Because it is such a damaging act, maybe it does warrant the use of the legal system. Again, I’m not talking about overloading the jails and prison system with cheaters. But there should be some way for a spouse who is wronged to seek justice outside of just the court of public opinion.