The Pro Choice Guide to Cheating.

Rules to follow from Madame Bovary to Tammy Faye Baker.

“The heart, like the stomach, needs variety.” Gustave Flaubert

Cheating isn’t like the days of, say, Madame Bovary, where Gustave Flaubert’s eponymous character, Emma, hopped around the bedrooms of France (or maybe just Rouen) like a hyperactive flea. There was so much hopping going on, Flaubert found himself up on charges of immorality. The charges were dismissed, and the book sold well, even if Flaubert didn’t understand women, and never had an affair himself (preferring prostitutes).

Flaubert was essentially a romantic realist. That’s a tough thing to be since most true romantics are pretty crazy, especially someone like Emma (Madame Bovary). If you’d asked her if she was a natural born cheater, she would have been appalled. “It just happened,” she’d say, which is the excuse nearly half of all couples give today for extramarital affairs.

As one woman explained, “It wasn’t a question of if, it was a question of when.” Flaubert just turned the tables, so to speak. It was still cheating, just, you know, girlie cheating.

Think of the hypocrisy that existed in France back then. Most men in the middle and upper classes had mistresses. As one woman explained, “It wasn’t a question of if, it was a question of when.” Flaubert just turned the tables, so to speak. It was still cheating, just, you know, girlie cheating.

As much as we want to call infidelity a bad thing, we’re no angels. We never were angels. Emma’s problem was boredom. Like so many women, she found her supposedly perfect relationship lacking. She sought other relationships until, surprise, surprise, she found them lacking as well.

The question is, are we hard-wired to cheat when things don’t go our way? Or do we simply cheat because we can?

A study in Psychological Science determined that power increases infidelity. Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s affair with Lucy Mercer lasted over thirty years. The Kennedys were a regular infidelity factory. Both Joe and his son, John, bedded Marilyn Monroe. Power seems to provide opportunity. It’s why Presidents have affairs and rock stars have groupies.

They found that 23 to 33 percent of woman surveyed have been on “foodie calls.” This is where you go on a date just to get free food.

Again, the question is, are we hard-wired for infidelity, especially now that women hold more power than ever before? Dating, for instance, isn’t just dating anymore, according to a study out of Azusa Pacific University. They found that 23 to 33 percent of woman surveyed have been on “foodie calls.” This is where you go on a date just to get free food.

One 26-year-old food blogger, Brooke Pankhurst, ran up a tab of $30,000 by going on over 200 dinner dates. The fact that she had over 200 dates is pretty impressive. Should the rest of us — especially men — concentrate more on our stomachs, and less on getting laid?

Anyway, the Azusa study concluded that women who do “foodie calls” tend to have narcissistic personalities and engage in deceitful behaviour. Opportunity still has to exist, which means finding someone who’s just as narcissistic and deceitful as you are. Either that or you have to “turn them.”

Infidelity doesn’t come naturally for most of us (or Flaubert, for that matter, if all he was doing was sleeping with prostitutes). Do you just bump into someone you can “turn,” or are there enough dissatisfied people out there?

If nearly half of American couples have had — or are having — affairs, the dissatisfaction quotient is higher than any time in history.

Well, hell, we can’t all be dissatisfied, yet it seems enough of us are. If nearly half of American couples have had — or are having — affairs, the dissatisfaction quotient is higher than any time in history.

Even the Wild West had an unspoken rule of “no touchin’ another man’s woman.” You could rape a woman, providing you had good reason. Raping for no good reason got you hanged. Raping for good reason got you hanged, too. A lot of men were hanged because their good reason turned out to be dumb.

So what is it that makes cheating bad? Maybe it’s not bad. Maybe we just think it’s bad because society says so. Let’s imagine for a second we fall into two groups: The Pro Life and Pro Choice Cheaters.

Pro Lifers think cheating is a sin. Since they still cheat, they make a big deal about other people cheating. This draws attention away from themselves. Remember Jim and Tammy Faye Baker? They both cheated, but they could talk hellfire and brimstone every time the subject came up. Any time you feel guilty about fooling around, think of the Bakers.

You’ve got a fifty percent chance of being forgiven, which is more than the odds on most Laker games.

Then there’s the Pro Choice Cheaters. These folks aren’t saying infidelity is okay, but it’s not the end of the world. Either fess up to your partner or don’t. You’ve got a fifty percent chance of being forgiven, which is more than the odds on most Laker games.

This also brings up the question of what’s a true monogamist? Mark Twain said that a monogamist is someone who’s too chicken to cheat. I’m paraphrasing, of course, but you get the idea.

Monogamists shouldn’t put themselves up on pedestals. They’re likely to run into the Pro Life Cheaters. Both are chickens by nature, but at least Pro Lifers taste the forbidden fruit. Monogamists take too much credit.

Okay, sure, you’re loyal, you’re a decent human being. So are Boy Scouts. Do you really want to be a Boy Scout? I think Jim Baker was a Boy Scout, or Tammy Faye. One of them wore a uniform and walked old ladies across the street.

Find a couple that’s been married for fifty years and ask them about infidelity. You’ll probably get the same answer I got from my aunt and uncle. “We didn’t want to miss our programs.”

That’s the thing, though. There’s nothing wrong with being loyal. Some marriages last. Find a couple that’s been married for fifty years and ask them about infidelity. You’ll probably get the same answer I got from my aunt and uncle. “We didn’t want to miss our programs.”

Again, that’s not a criticism. You don’t have to cheat. You don’t have to go out on “foodie calls,” either. Yet one third of all dating women do, and don’t feel the slightest bit guilty about it. “I didn’t have anything else to do when he called,” one woman explained, “so I thought, Why not?”

Is it possible online dating has turned us into wanderers, more interested in new experiences than finding true love? Or is “wander lust” aptly named to reflect our thinking today. Women have more power. With power comes opportunity. Men are falling behind. With self disgust comes, well, cheating. In either case, maybe the whole thing is societal.

Between online dating and the club scene, it was like she was in a Big Box store.

I remember a psychologist on television telling a young woman something similar when she admitted her own infidelity. Between online dating and the club scene, it was like she was in a Big Box store. She was surrounded by stuff, and the more stuff she saw, the more stuff she wanted.

“Don’t you think you could be happy with one thing?” the psychologist asked. Well, sure, we all could, but we’re in a Big Box store. Who goes to a Big Box store for one thing?

Variety is a killer if we have too much of it, and we’re surrounded by variety every day. Even yoga. There has to be twenty different types of yoga. Imagine if Madame Bovary had twenty different types of yoga. She’d probably be more of a mess than she was already. She left her husband deeply in debt when she died. That could have been from yoga lessons.

Which is why The Pro Choice Guide to Cheating is so important today. We’re adapting, we’re experiencing new technology, new ways to meet, new ways to even be married. Some of our relationships, like our friends on Facebook, aren’t even real. Who has two hundred friends?

You get to decide, not the government, not the courts, not some evangelist in Kentucky with more guilt shine than Bill Clinton.

Scott Alexander once said, “Cheating is easy.” So are a lot of things. If it’s attainable with little effort, we go for it. In a way, that’s what Pro Choice means. You get to decide, not the government, not the courts, not some evangelist in Kentucky with more guilt shine than Bill Clinton.

“Freedom is just another word for nothing else to lose,” Kris Kristofferson wrote. Perhaps that’s what Gustave Flaubert was thinking, too. Maybe that’s why his immorality charges were dismissed. At the end of the day, he was saying what everyone was thinking. When you’ve got nothing else to lose, freedom is an interesting concept. It explains a lot of things.

I don’t know if it explains “foodie calls,” but a girl’s gotta eat.

And as that one woman said, “Why not?” These girls are definitely Pro Choice, and it’s very possible we’ll all be going on “foodie calls” if this keeps up.

Robert Cormack is a novelist, journalist and blogger. His first novel “You Can Lead a Horse to Water (But You Can’t Make It Scuba Dive)” is available online and at most major bookstores. Check out Skyhorse Press or Simon & Schuster for more details.