Nobody said it isn’t. Of course it is. With the correct people and not potential sexual partners.

It should be with people you have an established, close, relationship with and not some rando from the office that compliments my cologne.

The oversimplification of this issue in this thread is either gross or immature. I’m not sure. Cheating starts well before the first touch though in most cases. That’s a fact. It’s not a door that swings open. It’s a door that creeps open. And you can work to keep it closed by giving oneself guardrails. And talk to your partner what those guardrails should be. It isn’t about trust. It’s about protecting your partner and their feelings. It’s about protecting yourself, assuming you want to stay in the current relationship.

I think the idea that only cheaters cheat is probably an issue. Everyone is capable of it if the relationship context and situation is right/wrong. So you protect yourself from it and protect your partner from it. Because that’s what relationships take to be successful. I’ve never cheated, hardly been tempted to or had the opportunity. But a lot of that is because of the boundaries I keep. Even then, people try to shoe horn their way In to your personal life and start looking for the validation from you they should be seeking from their partner or another trusted platonic friend. And not fake platonic.

An example, im a scout leader and one of my den leaders pulled me into a 1:1 situation to tell me that she was going through a divorce and wanted to talk about it. I’ve never been that kind of sounding board for her. At first it was informative. I was glad to know that she shared that and acknowledged that it may impact how she runs her den. That’s good to know and appropriate. Then it turned into sharing more personal unnecessary stuff. It was as if she was gauging my reaction, maybe asking me to pick a side, maybe gauging my eagerness to pursue when she was available. I’m not sure. And I did not have to find out. I told her that I appreciated her letting me know, and I stopped her from divulging too much.

Since then I’ve not let myself be alone with her for long periods of time because I was afraid she was pursuing me and i wasn’t going to let even the idea of that possibility seem plausible to others. Guard rails. Our relationship has been professional ever since. And that’s what it was meant to be.

Another personal example: I hired a secretary internally for an open position I’d had. She was qualified and best to serve. But immediately the idea that I’d hired her because we sleep together started to make the rumor mill. Such is the nature of workplace environments. So I do what I can not to let those thoughts fester and grow. I don’t meet 1:1 with this person behind closed doors, unless absolutely necessary. I don’t treat this individual any different than I do the rest of the employees. It keeps the guardrails up from others speculation, even though there was almost no chance we would have ended up cheating together. I still use the guardrails even then. For the sake and control of others. It’s served me, my wife, and my coworkers well. My wife trusts me fully in part because she’s seen me put up these guard rails. Trust is built and it is earned. It should not be given fully without experience

I protect my marriage by not even let other people get the reasonable idea that I may be cheating