We sometimes enter a relationship with sentences prepared before the first meeting:
“Men always cover for one another.”
“Women inevitably support one another.”
“A mother-in-law always ends up hating her daughter-in-law.”
These sentences spare us the uncertainty of observing each person, waiting for a track record and accepting that reality is less simple than one side against the other.
They can bring a collective trial into an individual relationship.
Our partner is not the official representative of all men or all women. They are a specific person, with a history, actions and a particular way of building a life with us.
The gate, my wife and the little stool
I remember a neighbor who came to ring my doorbell after I had done her a favor.
I am Cameroonian. Some say Cameroonian men are very handsome. I will let you decide whether that detail explains what follows or merely serves my very personal brand of humility.
This neighbor insisted on coming in. Since I barely knew her, I suggested we speak outside, near the gate.
At the same moment, my wife drove out. The woman therefore knew that a woman lived in this house.
Then she announced that she already loved me. She explained that her husband was not present enough and that I could help her regain a sense of balance.
I reminded her that we were both married and that there was only one place for a spouse in my life.
She replied that a little stool alongside it would be enough for her.
The phrase may make us smile. The reality, much less so.
This woman respected neither her husband, nor my wife, nor my refusal. But telling this story to conclude that “women are like that” would repeat precisely the mistake the story should teach us to avoid.
This woman did this. Not all women.
A true story does not become a rule about an entire side
Real stories show what can happen. They reveal mechanisms and sometimes help us recognize danger.
But a possibility is not a collective identity.
Some men cheat; others remain faithful. Some women exploit others; others work, share their resources and support their partner during difficult times.
Replacing “all” with “some” does not diminish the seriousness of a wrongdoing. It requires us to look for evidence in the right place.
We do not need to accuse a crowd to take one person’s action seriously.
Solidarity ceases to be noble when it protects injustice
Genuine solidarity helps a person get back on their feet, see the facts and stop accepting what is destroying them.
Partisan solidarity first chooses whom to support, then looks for a justification.
A woman may advise her friend to leave her marriage immediately while trying to repair her own in the face of the same difficulty. A man may excuse his friend’s infidelity in the name of male nature, then demand outright condemnation when the same wrongdoing affects his sister.
The rule changes with the person affected.
The issue is no longer woman against man. It becomes justice against hypocrisy.
Fair solidarity protects the injured person even when they are not on our side. It also acknowledges wrongdoing by the person who is like us.
The reversal test reveals double standards
We may advise a female friend to hide money from her husband, then experience our own spouse hiding their resources from us as a betrayal.
We may find it normal for a mother to intervene in her son’s relationship, but call the same behavior manipulation when it comes from his wife’s mother.
The test is simple: apply the rule in the other direction.
Imagine that the person concerned is our brother, sister, child or partner. Does our advice remain the same?
Reversing the roles does not prove that two situations are exactly alike. It prevents our mind from automatically using context as an excuse for our own people and an accusation against others.
Sometimes, “it is not the same thing” is true.
Sometimes, our ego has merely changed the costumes.
Advice is not right merely because it resembles our pain
We sometimes give an opinion enormous weight because it comes from someone older, a family member or someone who shares our anger.
Yet belonging to a group creates neither competence nor consistency.
A person may have had several relationships without learning how to build one. They may speak of respect while humiliating their own partner. They may defend an independence they do not practice.
Before allowing advice to turn our relationship upside down, let us look at what the person giving it knows how to build, the results of their reasoning and their ability to accept the same rule in their own life.
An opinion gains weight when it considers the facts, stands up to reversal and offers a direction consistent with our actual relationship.
Solutions do not transfer unchanged from one couple to another
Our female friend tells us about her husband. Our male friend tells us about his wife. We recognize a scene and import the whole solution.
But resemblance is not identity.
It is not the same person, the same frequency, the same efforts, the same commitments or the same trajectory.
A boundary that is useful elsewhere may be disproportionate in our relationship. Reasonable patience with someone who is making progress becomes empty waiting with someone who wants to change nothing.
When we apply a partisan solution, we stop consulting our own relationship.
The person who will live with the consequences of our decision must remain more real than the slogan that recommended it.
Shared dignity does not erase the value people build
Two people have the same human dignity, whatever their income, beauty or results.
Relational value answers another question: what do their actions produce within this particular bond? Peace or tension, loyalty or betrayal, help or exploitation, joy or repeated suffering?
This distinction never authorizes contempt. It simply prevents us from pretending that all contributions are equal because people belong to the same side.
The category identifies a group someone belongs to.
Actions build the couple’s experience.
Fundamental rights are shared. Forms of contribution may vary according to agreements, skills and the period the couple is going through. This difference must never be automatically inferred from sex.
Let us also look for facts that disturb our story
Our mind readily collects examples that prove it right.
Honest thinking also looks for what might correct it: commitments kept, situations in which the partner could have taken advantage but did not, efforts that contradict our fear and changes lasting enough to deserve an updated view.
Conversely, a few positive gestures must not erase serious, repeated facts.
The complete file contains the positive, the negative, the frequency, the developments and what we still do not know.
If the person shows loyalty and effort, their actions must carry more weight than stories gathered elsewhere. If they lie or exploit others, belonging to our side must not protect them.
We do not have to choose between loving blindly and suspecting collectively.
We can look at the actual person.
No side can know our partner for us.
And no side will live with the consequences of our decision exactly as we will.
Is my relationship or my side making the decision?
- Which rule changes when the person affected belongs to my side?
- Would this advice honestly stand up to the reversal test?
- What does the person influencing me actually know how to build?
- Which imported solution does not fit our history?
- Which fact about my partner must carry more weight than my side?
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