Devil's Advocate: Should We Care When Celebrities Cheat On Their Spouses?

YES: Milly Smith

Celebrities possess a lot of soft power. If the term ‘influencer’ is anything to go by, those in the public eye certainly have the ability to affect the behaviour of their loyal fan bases. Celebrities continue to encroach on the political sphere — the US President himself is a celebrity, and even actors, singers, and Instagram stars are now expected to speak out on each and every political cause, with silence being taken as a venomous denial of human rights. 

In a world where we continue to uphold and enforce this cult of celebrity, we view celebrities almost as if they are elected leaders or gods who are expected to act as moral examples for ordinary people. So, when every aspect of a celebrity’s life is under public scrutiny, their romantic life will obviously come under the microscope too. 

We are forced to care about celebrity infidelity because it is public. Those involved are not just victims in a private sense, able to confide in their friends over a teary glass of wine. Instead, their personal traumas become tabloid headlines and are subject to endless international speculation. 

When the married Dominic West was spotted with Lily James, twenty years his junior, on a couple’s holiday in Rome in 2020, it prompted a press frenzy. In response to the scandal, West went on to term the furore “absurd” and “deeply stressful” for his family. He admitted no blame, instead laying it at the feet of the press for their intrusion into his private life. 

However, for a Hollywood actor, private life is never private. Whether he actually committed adultery or not, in choosing to go out publicly with a fellow Hollywood star in a promiscuous fashion, he cannot have expected to garner zero attention. And, in making this controversial public appearance, he caused stress for his family, most pertinently his wife, who will forever be publicly understood as a poor, betrayed spouse. 

Celebrity infidelity has prompted the creation of some incredibly catchy, rage-fuelled ballads, from Dolly Parton’s ‘Jolene,’ to Beyonce’s ‘Sorry,’ and, my personal favourite, Stevie Nicks’ ‘Silver Springs.’ Most recently, we got the less covert ‘Madeline’ by Lily Allen, which gave us the iconic, female-rage-epitomising line: “Who the f*** is Madeline?” These songs were written by victims of infidelity in an attempt to shape the narratives surrounding their relationship’s breakdown. As artists, these women attempted to exert some influence over the narratives of the tabloid articles about their husbands’ infidelity.

Regardless of whether I think that we should care about celebrity infidelity, we invariably do. After the release of the recent Lily Allen album, which already put a lot more personal information into the public domain than is perhaps usual or necessary, there was still an endless amount of speculation. TikToks upon TikToks searched for “the real Madeline,” as if the laid-bare song didn’t feed them enough personal information about a public star. People will always want to know more about the interior lives of celebrities. And, as they say, with great power comes great responsibility. Those who elect to be in the public eye need to act in such a way that will not put their loved ones under the cruel lens of public scrutiny. 

NO: Desdemona Smyth

It struck me recently that celebrity cheating scandals have somehow become a favourite guilty pleasure. Every time a famous couple breaks under the weight of infidelity, the internet zooms in on blurry paparazzi photos like archaeologists examining runes. We dissect cryptic Instagram captions the way medieval scholars analyse sacred texts. Suddenly, everyone becomes an expert on a relationship they’ve never even been in the same room with.

I have some questions: Why do we care at all? Why do we assume celebrities have infallible moral compasses? Why does it matter that they don’t?

Cheating is painful. It’s messy, human, and heartbreaking. Yet when it happens between two people who happen to be famous, the world reacts as though we’ve been personally wronged. We clutch our pearls, refresh our feeds, and debate loyalty and betrayal as though the relationship in question includes us. Meanwhile, the people involved — the only people who actually matter — are left to deal with the emotional fallout while millions of strangers turn their personal crisis into content. Somewhere along the way, we started confusing public figures with public property.

There’s a seductive idea that celebrities owe us something beyond their art, performances, or talent. As if fame comes bundled with a moral contract requiring perfect relationships, perfect choices, perfect fidelity. But perfection is a fantasy, and the expectation that celebrities must embody our highest romantic ideals says less about them and more about us. It reveals our desire to believe that somewhere out there, someone is doing love perfectly, even if we aren’t.

Of course, we don’t want to admit that. It’s much easier to gasp over someone else’s scandal than to look at the imperfections in our own relationships — or worse, our own choices. Outrage is entertainment disguised as judgment, morality masquerading as gossip. And clicking through a cheating scandal feels productive in a way that dealing with our own messy humanity never does.

But let’s be honest with ourselves: the ferocity with which we latch onto celebrity infidelity has almost nothing to do with principles. It’s spectacle; the emotional equivalent of junk food. Instant gratification with zero nutritional value. Like all junk food, it leaves us feeling empty.

Meanwhile, this fascination causes real harm. When a celebrity cheats, the internet doesn’t just react — it swarms. Suddenly, the betrayed spouse becomes a symbol, the cheater becomes a villain, and any children caught in the headlines become unwilling characters in a drama they didn’t audition for. And the audience? They hurl opinions, memes, and think pieces with the intensity of a Greek chorus that’s had one too many cocktails.

Relationships are not scripted; they’re not written for our entertainment or consumption. They are complicated, private, and — dare I say — none of our damn business! 

Every time we treat a celebrity cheating scandal like a must-watch miniseries, we reinforce the idea that romance is a performance, that relationships exist for public interpretation, that love is only real if it’s validated by strangers. Is that the world we want to live in? Where intimacy is currency and heartbreak is content?

Because the truth is, when we invest emotionally in celebrity cheating scandals, we’re really outsourcing our own emotional curiosity. We’re asking other people’s lives to do the moral introspection for us. Of all the dangerous habits we develop, outsourcing our emotional work might be the most seductive one. I can honestly say I would judge someone more for basing their morals on whatever their favourite social media star says than I would judge them for cheating. 

The healthier approach — the more grounded, cosmopolitan, and grown-up approach — is simply to step away from the spectacle. To let celebrities be what they actually are: humans with complicated, imperfect personal lives. Humans who make mistakes in expensive clothing. Maybe, instead of analysing someone else’s relationship like it’s a prophecy etched in stone, we can redirect that energy into our own stories. Our own choices. Our own definitions of love, fidelity, and happiness.

After all, celebrity cheating doesn’t affect our rent, our relationships, our friendships, or our Wednesday night plans (Aikman’s, always). It offers zero value to our real lives except for a momentary and vapid escape. There are healthier escapes than watching strangers torch their marriages in real time.

I’m not here to advocate for cheating. I’m here to advocate that we should not crucify celebrities for cheating, and should pay less attention to other people’s relationships and more to our own. We should say,  “N.O.B.: Not Our Business,” and move on with our days. Isn’t that a far more fabulous way to live?

Illustration by Kyla Biesty