Stigmatised or illegal?

In Taiwan, adultery is a criminal offence punishable by imprisonment. According to Article 239 of the country’s Criminal Code, a married individual who commits adultery is subject to a prison term of up to one year, with the other party to the adultery subject to the same punishment.

Incidentally, adultery is not a crime in mainland China, but constitutes grounds for divorce.

Women’s groups are arguing that although the article punishes offenders of both sexes, it discriminates against women by failing to take the plight of the women involved into adequate consideration. The law, made and amended a few decades ago when there was no equality between the sexes, also is obsolete in light of changing social circumstances, they say.

Another reason they have cited for striking down the section is that according to government statistics, 50 per cent of women who sue their husbands for adultery will eventually drop the charges, but only 23 per cent of men will drop such charges against their wives, resulting in a higher conviction rate among women. Their view echoes a joint statement by the United Nations working group on discrimination against women in law and in practice, which says: “Adultery as a criminal offence violates women’s rights.”

It should be pointed out that while circumstances vary from country to country, especially in the developing world, women in Taiwan have made giant strides in their quest for gender equality. Even the presidency, the Holy Grail in Taiwan politics, is within their reach. So for argument’s sake, one might say now that if there is more or less equality between the sexes, the law, or the offending section of it, can remain, and if a woman drops charges against her adulterous husband, no one can blame the law which punishes wrongdoers of both sexes equally. One question that must be asked, however, is that while a spouse might forgive an offending husband or wife, how merciful are they toward the offending spouse’s co-offender in adultery?

It appears that a more acceptable argument for the decriminalisation of adultery is that while the law does precious little to save marriages and mend relations, criminal conviction is a stigma, at least in Taiwan, that apparently affects also the convicted criminal’s innocent children more than the fact that their parent is a known adulterer. Many political and business leaders in the country are confirmed polygamous persons who have somehow managed to avoid conviction, and yet their children do not seem to be overly affected.

While prisons in many countries are getting overcrowded, there is little ground for punishing the taxpayers by locking up adulterers at public expense, and courts of law may not want to be divorced from such a reality by throwing the first stone in adultery cases.

In countries that stress family values, a public exposure of extra-marital affairs can ruin promising careers, and that is punishment enough. One does not have to look far to find examples. Maybe it is time we started stressing family values again, especially when it is rumoured that many men who work in mainland China away from their homes and families in Taiwan are keeping mistresses.