Neal Pollard
Ashley Madison, which markets itself as an extramarital dating service with the slogan “Life is short. Have an affair,” has used email campaigns and other advertising including a controversial Super Bowl Ad a few years ago. While it is appalling that such a service could exist, it is more appalling that there are 20 million users worldwide! Infidelity is ancient and adultery has always been all too common, but to try and legitimize and organize it seems a record low even in a world that has proven it can sink pretty low.
But there is a nation deserving of high praise and recognition. Singapore is trying its best to keep Ashley Madison from coming to their state.
The London Telegraph reports Singapore’s earnest efforts to block the company. This resistance includes those in some of the highest offices in the land, including their minister for social and family development. Businesses are also standing up against what they see as a moral invasion. In fact, a businessman known only as Mr. Tan, has led a popular Facebook protest against the company. The page is called “Block Ashley Madison-Singapore” and, as of 1:00 PM Mountain Time on Monday, 10/28/13, the page 25,200 likes and the telegraph reports that their petition has over 13,000 signers. The Facebook posts include so many encouraging statements for marital fidelity and decrying adultery (Hannah Strange, 10/25/13, http://www.telegraph.co.uk).
While such organized efforts for biblical morality are too few, it is thrilling to see Singapore, known for its conservatism and strict social controls, banding together to uphold an institution created by God for one woman and one man for life. While they are being reported as having a prudish reputation and sited as having a low, collective libido, Singaporeans serve as a global leader in honoring sexuality as God ordains it. May their tribe increase!
Christians ought to earn the attention and spotlight of the world by honoring, in practice as well as word, fidelity in marriage. God has made His view crystal clear and not just in the Ten Commandments. The writer of Hebrews says, “Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge” (13:4). We should ever echo His truth on every matter, including His pattern for marriage and sexuality!
I don’t understand why people can’t see the destructiveness that extra-martial “Affairs” brings to families. They can try to soften the terminology by calling it an affair but it’s still the sin of adultery. Just because you try to call it something else doesn’t make it any better. Having experienced the pain of an unfaithful spouse and seeing the trauma that it brings the children and devastation it does to the ones left behind. Are these people that blind or are they just that uncaring of others.