Issa Double Standard: When Women Cheat…

I see it all over my Twitter news feed and I can sense it when talking to friends about the show. A lot of women feel sorry for Issa and think Lawrence should take her back. For those who don’t watch the popular HBO series, Insecure, Issa and Lawrence were in a committed relationship, everyday life issues hit them, Issa cheated and Lawrence left.
As a woman who’s been cheated on and could easily jump on the Issa bandwagon in the name of sisterhood, I don’t know if I want Lawrence to take her back. I look at cheating through the eyes of morals and fairness. As women, we can empathize with other sistas who’ve been stepped out on so low key it’s kind of empowering to see a woman do what men have been doing to us for centuries, right ? WRONG. Infidelity can be just as damaging (if not more) to a man as it is to a woman.

Throughout the years, the picture has been painted that all men are cheaters and women are the innocent, unsuspecting victims. That is not always true, women (sometimes) are just smarter at covering their tracks than men.
It sucks when anyone gets cheated on but it especially sucks when a man has gone against society’s assumptions about men in general by being the “rare, faithful good guy.” Women hurt too but we’re emotionally stronger than men. We’ll go through our dark spell by listening to some Mary J and eating a couple tubes of ice cream but next thing you know, the glo up becomes too real. Before we know it we’re back to focusing soley on ourselves and getting shit done. Our bounce back game is official. Lets face it, some women fall in love faster than men but some men fall in love harder than women and they can’t handle it.

From experience and in my thousands of girl talk sessions, we’ve spilled the tea on how this ex or that ex went crazy after a break-up because he swore he was in love. He could’ve been the hardest, most unemotional man during the relationship but once its over he realizes that the love she gave was the love he wanted. The possibility of a new beginning makes said ex go bat shit crazy.
We can take it step further and add in some infidelity on the woman’s part and that’s all she wrote. Social Media stalking, numerous calls and texts, slashed tires, broken windshields and threats to “the new person in your life” don’t just come from scorned women. Men go off on the deep end when they find out another man has had a turn with their woman. Y’all remember what happened to Marshall Williams (Charlie Murphy) when he told Ghost what he’d do to his wife? And that was just verbal. The thought sent him over the deep end.

The craziness that happens after infidelity and a break up has a lot to do with the male ego and wanting to feel powerful. A cheating woman not only breaks their heart, it diminishes their power as a man, in their minds. Most men I know want to be PERFECT. They want their women to only rely on them and the mere thought of their wives or girlfriends depending on another man for any reason sends their egos straight to hell. Men can be crazy AF.
In regards to cheating in general, whether male or female, I’m all for forgiveness and reconciliation if that’s what a person wants to do. I’m in no way shaming people who want to work through infidelity for the sake of love. With Lemonade and 4:44 dropping this year and last, people made getting back with their cheating partner the thing to do because our favorite power couple did it. Its cool, I get it. Reconnect if you can. Just try your best to be careful of your partner’s feelings in the future. I know relationships can get hard at times but put forth the effort if that’s who you really want to be with.

In the meantime, let’s look forward to seeing what Ghost is going to do when he finds out that Tasha slept with Silver. *insert eyeball emoji*
-Shauna
