Jealousy is a moral evil? I would have to disagree. I view jealousy as a positive character trait. I would see the lack of it as, at best, indicating a very low-value relationship or, at worst, indicating a possible mental disorder.
“Jealousy is a disease, love is a healthy condition. The immature mind often mistakes one for the other, or assumes that the greater the love, the greater the jealousy - in fact, they are almost incompatible; one emotion hardly leaves room for the other.”
― Robert A. Heinlein
I didn't realize Heinlein had fallen victim to that kind of disrespectful thinking!
On the contrary, it's not disrespectful at all. Indeed, quite the opposite. Claiming to own another person is the vilest disrespect you could show them.
I don't see anything disrespectful about expecting people in an exclusive relationship to be exclusive, nor about valueing the relationship highly enough that one feels badly if the other does not faithfully hold to that part of the deal. And I don't see how that would imply ownership. People may pertain to each other in an exclusive way and even use the word "my" without implying ownership, e.g., "My father," "My wife," "My boyfriend," "My teacher," "My friend." None of those relationships grant someone a right to control another.
Indeed they don't. And in an agreed-upon exclusive relationship, it's perfectly acceptable to feel bad, if the other party breaks that agreement. But jealousy is not the emotion one would expect from someone who values the other person as a
person, and not a possession. Jealousy is a desire to control the other, to
force them back into the relationship. Disappointment, depression, anger, all of these are valid and expected responses. Jealousy is the fear that you're going to "lose" the other person - typically to another. Accept that the other person is, in fact, a person, with a will of their own, and that they strayed because they were not happy. Be angry, or disappointed, or sad, that they chose to hide this unhappiness from you, and instead chose to seek happiness elsewhere without first breaking it off - or better yet, working out the problems - with you, but not jealous. They are not your possession to be held closely and guarded from others. They are a fellow human being, and if you do, indeed, love them, then their happiness should be a prerequisite for your own.
So, in an exclusive intimate relationship, if my partner is unfaithful and I feel awful about it (jealous), I think I am not the one with the problem. And in such a case, I am likely to ignore any terms of the contract, exit clause or not, and exit, seeing as how the contract has already been violated. And I am even more likely to do so if the person disrespectfully rakes me over the coals for feeling "jealous."
Ah, indeed, what most people who cheat call "jealousy" is in fact, righteous anger, and completely justified. When they cheated, they did indeed break that contract, and you would be entirely correct in considering it null and void. Anger at someone breaking an agreement like that is expected. But if you're yelling at them that they are "yours," then you are indeed exhibiting jealousy, and viewing them not as a person, but as a piece of property.
But now I am so amazingly far afield of Bitcoin that I think I better ignore the politics subforum before I continue to get sucked up in this forever!
Well, this is the Politics and society board, so we tend to go pretty far afield from Bitcoin. Not much else to do, if you're just riding the roller-coaster until it stops.
In a libertarian sense, yeah. They don't own each other. But in reality? There is a legitimate sense of ownership, though it won't be enforced outside of the church. (The church being designed to function as a private governmental body, independent of any government.) For instance: husband has the right to the wife's body for happytime. The same is true for the wife's happytime needs. But can the husband take hold of her by force and have his way with her? Not unless she's into that kind of thing. Yet he has an objective basis upon which to point out that she aught to be getting jiggly with it. If she doesn't, then she's in the wrong, period, no contest.
I'm curious. Since enforcement of that "happytime right" is ruled out, what recourse does one party have, if the other party refuses? Can it truly be called a right, if it explicitly cannot be enforced?