Moral Judgments and the end of relationships

I was recently recounting the end of a past relationship, where I was dumped – and found out I was dumped by another person trying to sympathize with me via text message.  I mentioned that I’d pretty much cut all ties with that ex immediately.

The person I was telling said: “Wow, you must have been hurt“.

And the thing was, I wasn’t.

I was upset, sure. But it was a pretty casual relationship in many ways, so it didn’t experience the deep core-level hurt that I’ve experienced at other times.

Which got me thinking.

In all the instances where I’d either been the person doing the dumping – or cut ties with the person who dumped me – it wasn’t because I’d been hurt.

It was because I’d been morally offended.

To back up:  We all have some things where we make a moral judgment. Maybe it’s abortion, or the death penalty, or cheating, or lying about money.  The specific offense doesn’t matter so much here as the reaction.  They’re the thing(s) that are simply unforgivable and elicit an immediate, visceral reaction from you.  Those are moral judgments.

What occurred to me is the possibility that when I (at least) break up with someone or cut ties with them, it’s not because they’ve hurt me, but because they’ve crossed one of those absolute lines.  For example, explicitly trying to poison a kid’s relationship with a parent because your relationship with that parent sucks is definitely one of those lines for me.

Maybe this is just me.  But if it’s not just me, then this gives us a different way of looking at how relationships end and how (toxic) relationships persist.