Transcript 2

Hello everyone! I am Claire, and our topic is should extramarital affairs be accepted? And, I’m the one who stand on the supporting side. So, why do I support adultery? I am going to explain two points. First, decriminalizing adultery. I will tell you the reason that laws against adultery should be abolished and also introduce you some inappropriate laws. And the second part, stop stigmatizing adultery. For this part, I will show you a case to make you change your impression on adultery.

And laws against adultery should be abolished because in several countries, umm…they are impose decriminalization and violence on women. For example, in Philippines, adultery is defined as( ok, I will.. Phoebe! Can you red this for me?) ” Adultery is committed by any married woman who shall have sexual intercourse with a man not her husband…”(Phoebe speaks) Yes!  You see that?!  The subject only refers to females. It is obvious that this law shows inequality in gender. And the word “adultery” should not refer to specific sex. Everyone is likely to engage in adultery.

And also, in some Islam countries where laws ban, umm… men and women committing adultery, but! ( Umm… Ivy, can you read this for me?) men are permitted to take more than one wife and also to enter into temporary marriages. (Ivy speaks)Yes! Here, we see the law has defects. It provides men with privileges to avoid being punished. A man who umm… won’t be criminalized if he marries to his mistress in time before being found he has committed adultery.

And, in Pakistan, laws require (Robert! Can you read this for me?) a woman making an accusation of rape to provide extremely strong evidence to avoid being charged with adultery herself. (Robert speaks) This does violence on women because umm…continue! “a conviction for rape is only possible with evidence from no fewer than four witnesses.” (Robert speaks) umm! That means a woman who committed adultery has to find a man to ….make love with her and find more than four witnesses to prove it.

And last In Jordan, there are honor killings. And honor killing is, umm… Cassie, can you read this for me? “he who discovers his wife or one of his female relatives committing adultery and kills, wounds, or injures one of them, is exempted from any penalty.” (Cassie speaks) And this means men can kill or injure women only for maintaining their dignity and reputations. Don’t you think that is unreasonable? Yes, I think it is unreasonable. Because life is the basic human rights, and, umm…but it seems that in Jordan honor is the priority.

Compared with developed countries, umm… there is no country criminalizing adultery in Europe. And in United States, there are 22 states out of 50 criminalizing adultery. And here, I want to make a clarification. Umm… I never say abolishing these laws can fully protect women. But I am pretty sure if they are not abandoned, women are meant to be injured.

And the last part, stop stigmatizing adultery! And that means don’t give adultery discrimination!

So, what is adultery discrimination? Let me ask Phoebe! If I…if I ask you to give me an adjective to describe adultery, which one do you choose? And adjective. (Phoebe speaks) Umm… Ridiculous, umm… ridiculous. Ok, Knot! Which one? (Knot speaks) Satisfied. (laughter) Ok! Robert? Which one do you choose? (Robert speaks) Unacceptble. Yes, it’s close to immoral, right? (laughter) So, when people are asked to give an adjective to describe adultery, they usually pick ‘immoral’ And that is discrimination. But there is a strong case to tell you that you can’t do so!

Assume that your husband or wife had a car accident and has been paralyzed. He is too afraid to lose you, so he demands your loyalty of sex. And when time flies, these years you spare no efforts to take care of him in these years, but he cannot satisfy your sexual needs. So finally,umm…you commit adultery! Should we call it immoral? No! I think the wife has done all she can do. And adultery just a way she pursue her own happiness. Thank you!

Q&A:

[Lin Kuo]: I want to make comment. I think rather than to abolish law against adultery, furthermore, why we shouldn’t dismantle the marriage institution? Because marriage institution…umm…I want to response to Claire, you say, if you want sexual liberty, why do you just out of the marriage? But, many legal rights is attached to the identity, and our marriage system is descriminalize…is descriminate the person who enter…who are not enter this system. So, and marriage…marriage and family…marriage, family and nation is conspired with each other, and act in a way to exploitation of labor. Not(only) labors from works (but also) and from domestic worker.

[Me]: Ok….Thank you!

[Vivien]: I want to ask Claire. You support abortion…adultery. Do you have any premise for committing adultery?

[Me]: Usually it happens when a couple’s marriage is not happy. And when it comes to adultery’s positive effects, the couple wants to solve problems, but they don’t want to get divorced, so they choose adultery.

[Vivien]: And why they don’t just get divorced?

[Me]: Because there are so many reasons like kids. If you get divorced, you cannot… cannot expect…you cannot imagine your kids will be, like in the future, your kids may take drugs or become so… bad, and you can get controlled of them. So, it you don’t get divorced, you can take care of them. That is one of the reasons. There are so many many reasons.

[Cassie]: I want to ask Claire about your point of view because… oh! I want to, first of all, express that your way to interact with audience is very good. Because more attention on your presentation. But it seems that your resources are kind of limited to some religions or countries so I want to ask you about what’s your opinion about adultery in Taiwan because in Taiwan, some of the adulteries seem to not relate to religions or adultery problems, just like a person want to have other relationship.

[Me]: I have seen a news recently, umm…. A news that the minister of culture 文化部長龍應台 She has talked about, umm… when she talked to foreigners, she felt embarrassed because… when they are talking about the laws of adultery. And I think decriminalizing adultery laws is a trend. Umm… in these developed countries because they focus on individual thinking. Maybe for their government, adultery is just individual business.