Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site wateng.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!wateng!jamcmullan
From: jamcmullan@wateng.UUCP (Judy McMullan)
Newsgroups: net.singles
Subject: Responding to the ORIGINAL jerk question
Message-ID: <1144@wateng.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 28-Jun-84 11:49:36 EDT
Article-I.D.: wateng.1144
Posted: Thu Jun 28 11:49:36 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 30-Jun-84 02:43:20 EDT
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 43

Sorry, Rich. You are right. My submission did not answer your original
question. I realized that. I was really answering some other submissions
I saw that deviated from your original question. (I was just explaining
to my office mate -- who does not read net.singles -- that we had really
gotten away from the original question on this topic). You reiterated:

	>What stands out, whether the person in question be male or
	>female, is that the person ADMITS SHE KNOWS HER MATE IS A JERK,
	>WILL PUBLICALLY STATE HE IS SUCH AND WILL CONTINUE TO SUFFER
	>THROUGH IT ALL.

I did think, from your original question, that the fact that the woman was
beautiful was a significant part of your question. But you've cleared that up.

In my own experience, I don't find women putting up with really awful guys
for long. Once, I dated a guy who didn't seem to be my type but I like
meeting different types and I took a chance. He turned out to be a liar,
unfaithful (not that I cared but he thought I did and was so chagrined when
it came to light), selfish, a boozer, etc. I dropped him like a hot potato.
I was terrified to go out after dark in case he was lying in wait to beat
me up.

A friend of mine got more deeply involved before she found out he got ugly
when he drank. She put up with it for a few months as the episodes were not
frequent and he was so apologetic and seemed so sincere when sober. They
had been through a lot of good times together before the bad times started.
However, she wised up eventually and dropped him. He DID follow her around
and phoned her at home and work, threatening suicide etc., and waited for
her outside her house and did a lot of other such stuff.

Both of us had to be BRAVE enough to break up with these awful creeps as
we knew we were in physical danger. Of course my friend was in physical
danger when she was WITH him, too. (I didn't wait long enough to find out).

Anyway, the summary is: I have never met a person who stayed with a "jerk".
The most that can be said is I have met someone who found it hard to make
the break with a "jerk" because she felt sorry for him or was afraid of him
(or some combination of the two). So I have no answer to the question.
I suspect the answer would be different for any given case of someone sticking
with someone awful. Such a relationship is obviously complicated.

   --from the sssstickkky keyboard of JAM
   ...!{ihnp4|clyde|decvax}!watmath!wateng!jamcmullan