Teach Cheats

O kay, so imagine Scenario A – Setting: The Stone Age. Hairy male Neanderthal goes hunting. His female is at home, rubbing flints because they sparked off the last time she’d accidentally brushed them together,and as a result, she discovered fire. She is now preparing a bonfire, working on the next bigbinvention – cooking. Neanderthal male, in the meanwhile, has come across the female of a neighbouring male and is communicating in grunts and gestures that he’s into her. The inevitable ensues. After the adulterous deed, our hairy male clubs a hog and brings it home for din-din. The affair he just had is left unspoken of. The female is glad to see her male come home with nyam-nyam (food in neander-speak!) and goes on to prepare a meal. Life Tech CHEATS goes on as  humdrum-ly as earlier. Smooth, oblivious sailing.
Scenario B – Setting: The 21st century. A husband lies to his wife yet again about being called back to work and goes instead to a night club with his mistress. The mistress takes pictures of them on her cell phone and messages one of the pictures to him the next day with a sexually explicit message. The wife happens to see it. Explosive dialogue ensues and is then followed by a messy divorce.
So what lesson does this teach us? Cheating was easier in the Stone Age, and the modern era makes it trickier to cover your tracks? Oh yeah! Although technology is a boon and has brought the world closer together, opening new avenues and revolutionising communication, it has also narrowed down and complicated certain things. Social networks and websites, chatting platforms, smart phones with cameras on hand, easy and constant connectivity every second of your day… all these make life easier for those who want the attention and eyeballs, and difficult for those who want to stay on the down-low.
Keeping things quiet is not as easy as it once may have been. “At first, I blamed technology for the increase in cases of cheating. But now I realise that the statistics are the same. It’s just that now, thanks to technology, cheaters are being caught out more easily!” exclaims Sanya Iyer, an SYBA student. “Technology per se is not to blame. It’s the mind-set,” adds Hersh Anandani, a lawyer in his twenties. Newly married Shamin Vaz Saldanha agrees: “If one wants to stray, one will. Technology only catalyses the process.”
So what are the various methods frequented by cheater-cheaterpumpkin- eaters?! Well, you may have heard of ‘sexting’… the term is pretty self-explanatory. The nasty version of that is…ta-daa : ‘chexting’, ie an explicit/ adulterous text sent/ received by the cheater. Th is is the modus operandi for several cheating celebrities (and regular folk, of course). Bill Clinton famously got caught on security cameras getting his freak show on with Monica Lewinsky; caught by technology. Jesse James used the Internet in an arguably creative manner. While married to Sandra Bullock, he still continued to post personal ads online, looking for “biker chicks with big boobs”. How do we know this? It’s the Internet. Nothing is private, and therefore, everything can be traced.
Then there are sites that off er tips on how to cheat and remain uncaught, such as AshleyMadison. com, which boasts of millions of married and happily cheating clients. Thankfully, opposing sites that blacklist the morally decrepit ones abound as well, such as CheaterAlert. com, which offers a host of articles to help you catch your cheating fellows/gals. All of this talk makes one wonder if lying and cheating is the currency of the Internet. It sure seems like it might be. Social forums like dating sites that require you to upload profile information depend entirely on your word alone. How easy would it be to put up a facade online and pretend to be what you’re not! “Having a fake profile is very easy, but being fake in real life? Not so much. Experienced users can spot a fake profile right away. And finding out a fake in real life is just a matter of time,” says Seema Gulati, a secretary at a technical firm. Shamin concurs, adding, “The Internet certainly is a great avenue for meeting new people. The only hitch is you don’t know if you should have met these people at all, once you already have. Shocks and surprises are guaranteed!”
But the Internet does offer some happy news as well. “I’m in a threeyear- old relationship with someone I met online on Myspace,” smiles Seema. Shamin adds, “My first interaction with my husband was on Facebook.” So, technology certainly does offer a plethora of positive uses. It is the sad truth though that as flawed human beings, we tend to create and indulge in the negative uses as well. It’s a pity how cheating online has become such a thriving business. One is reminded of the seemingly defunct adage, ‘cheaters never prosper’. In the age of technology, it would seem they sure do. They don’t just prosper, they thrive. They multiply twelve-fold. But, as is the way of the world, they also get caught. So go forth, cheat and multiply. But know that your electronic trail will lead us to you! Cheat at your own risk!

The mistress takes pictures of them on her cell phone and messages one of the pictures to him the next day, with a sexually-explicit message. The wife happens to see it. Explosive dialogue ensues and is then followed by a messy divorce

Volume 1 Issue 3