So I’m listening to the radio, and the announcer starts talking about Eliot Spitzer’s resignation and Dr. Laura’s panel discussion of said resignation, and the question comes up: Why do men cheat?  This is what Dr. Laura had to say:

“Men need validation.  When they come into the world they are born of women and getting their validation from mommy is the beginning of needing it from a woman.  And when the wife does not focus in on the needs and the feelings, sexually, personally to make him feel like a man, to make him feel like a success, to make him feel like a hero, he’s very susceptible to the charms of some other woman making him feel what he needs.  And these days women don’t spend a lot of time thinking about how they can give a man what they need.”  (more of her discussion here)

Flat on it’s face, this looks like Dr. Laura is saying that Eliot Spitzer was driven to cheat because his wife didn’t adore him enough.  Because he didn’t have enough “validation.”  The man was the Governor of New York, he was coming down from a very successful career as Attorney General, and his name was bantered around as a possible Vice Presidential candidate.   He lives in a mansion.  He has countless aides.  His wife looks like a mature Jennifer Aniston, with the body of a twenty year old.  She’s given him beautiful children.  Why wouldn’t he feel validated?

I’m not being glib.  I’m serious.  If he had all of that and still carried a fragile ego, there was far more wrong with him than could be cured by his wife saying, “hey, hot stuff, you’re my hero.”  Maybe she did tell him that, and he disbelieved her.  I’m not saying that wives shouldn’t adore and prop up their husbands, they should.  I’m not saying that they shouldn’t have sex until his eyes roll back in his head.  If the relationship is good, go for it.  Have fun.

If the relationship is bad, though, can you really just point to the wife and accuse her of not taking good enough care of her man’s ego?

What about all of the men that never adore their wives?  What about all of the men who never say, “hey, babe, you’re my hero?”  See, I’ve seen what goes down this road, and when a woman cheats she’s accused of not being grateful enough for the husband God gave her.  When the man cheats, it’s because the woman isn’t grateful enough for the man God gave her.  It’s very, very rarely made about the man not being grateful enough for his wife.  If she was withholding sex, what if it was because of him?  Because of how he treated her?  Because of HIS innatention?  What if he wasn’t willing to put in the work to romance her?  What if it was, to put it simply, easier for him to pay a hooker to @#$% off his @#$% than to have a good relationship with the mother of his children?

What if he cheated because he would RATHER CHEAT?

In all of these discussions of why men do what they do, people rarely say, “because they take the shortest route to fulfillment.”

In America these days we’re used to instant gratification.  We have macaroni that you pop in the microwave (no boiling necessary!) we can pick up our entire Easter feast from the local Wal-Mart, we don’t even make our own gift baskets anymore.  That which we need we buy, and that which we can’t buy we tend to do without.  Personal thought and detail are a luxury, and most people are so burnt out on “work” that they fail to work on the things that really matter.  The reason so many relationships fail is because we have the wrong priorities.  If Eliot Spitzer’s priority was a healthy relationship with his wife, I doubt he’d be paying $4300 to a hooker.

I’d say he strayed because he wanted his @#$% to be @#$%ed to all @#$@ by a hot young girl.

I think it’s that simple.