How far would you go before classing it as cheating on a partner?

I would not do (and never did do) any of those things. Showing interest in somebody else that I didn’t intend to follow up on would be out of bounds for me. Showing interest that I did intend to follow up on would too, naturally.

Exactly what @Jeruba said. If you go about pursuing another person while you are in a relationship, you are cheating.

It’s not my definition of cheating that matters. It’s my partner’s.

I actually think getting emotionally involved with another person constitutes an inappropriate relationship and could/should be considered cheating. There is a level of emotional intimacy that should be saved for your partner.

Pretty much what everbody else said. Now tell the ol’Troll the truth. Are you a cheater?

If feel guilty for doing it, it’s probably cheating. You should know what your partner is tolerant of. If the action you’re performing can be fulfilled by your partner, but you choose to do it with someone else, that’s cheating. This includes confiding in someone else instead of your partner, and any physical contact you wouldn’t want your partner knowing about.

Wow lots of cheating questions here.

It’s pretty simple. If you don’t want your partner to find out about it and you take measures to cover your tracks, it probably considered cheating.

Your intention has a lot to do with it.

If you wake up in the morning and say “today I’m going to cheat” and you get dressed call up the other person and say “meet me at the club”. After a few drinks you say “let’s go to the Holiday Inn” The person says “sure” so you get to the Holiday Inn and your ready. All of the sudden the person gets an emergency call on their cell phone stating they have to get home right away. In my opinion the whole evening was cheating because you had every intention of completing the act only because of a small intervention you didn’t.

Next time the cell phone may not ring.

One kiss, when there is no love and nothing else further occurs, isn’t cheating, it just makes the person kissing someone besides their partner an asshole who is showing the potential of what they might be capable of later. I think anything further than that is cheating.

I also believe in emotional cheating, wherein there may not be contact yet but where love or emotions or intent is involved… that’s TOTALLY cheating! I think the emotional betrayal is deeper than the physical.

To think the thought is to commit the act. I might see another woman as pretty. Or a nice person, but I love my lady. It see women as nothing more that another person. It is just not in me. Because of that, I would never put myself in a compromising position. Because I would be with my baby. Why would I want to be anywhere else, or why would I want to think anything else.

Doing anything the AVERAGE person would not want thier partner to do is cheating!

Well seeing as I have to have an emotional connection to do anything with someone then I would say anything emotionally or anything physically if I did it would be cheating, but only if I do it behind his back, I send nude pics of myself over my cellphone for my friend but my fiance takes them and helps me choose which ones to send, that isn’t cheating, it isn;t cheating as long as your partner knows and is ok with it, anything hidden or deceitful is cheating and wrong!. My fiance and I hide nothing from each other

Going beyond admiration or a daydream to thinking seriously about wanting to touch that other non-partner person and ways to do go about doing it whether or not I go through with it or not. Slippery slope.

Flirting is the limit that I will do and that I would condone from a S/O.

Flirting is harmless fun, past that though…. and I get upset.

@justwannaknow: Nonsense. If you do something your partner does not consider cheating, you haven’t cheated. Your partner is the only one who has any sort of standing to object to your behavior.

@cwilbur Yes maybe but if you haven’t talked with your partner about what they consider cheating and what they don’t and you find yourself in a situation where you might do something with someone the best thing to think is about what most people consider cheating and not do anything you think might possibly hurt your partner

@justus2: if you have no idea about what your partner considers cheating, is that person really a partner?

@cwilbur Yes they can be really a partner, I usually don’t have conversations about what is and isn’t cheating, I know what I would and wouldn’t do, basically I hide nothing from him and he hides nothing from me.

@justus2: Then if nothing is hidden, you know what he or she considers cheating, whether you’ve had an explicit conversation about it or not.

@cwilbur I just re-read everything that was said and you are right, I got confused. If your partner doesn’t consider it cheating then it isn’t as long as they know what you are doing before and approve of it, like I wouldn’t send my friend a naked pic of myself without telling my fiance before I did it and make sure he approved of it, even if he has approved them before I tell him everytime just to make sure it wouldn’t upset him for any reason, because once might not upset someone but more than once might, you just have to be open and upfront about everything. :)

“If your partner doesn’t consider it cheating then it isn’t”. I disagree.. My partner loves me so much that I CAN do what ever I want with whom ever I want. (Her words, but let’s not get into the dynamics of that). Anyway… But that does not mean I will, and, I wont. I know if I did, it would hurt her on some level or at least give her something to use on me when things did not go her way. In my case, it is a test of trust and character. So, for me it is a non issue. I made a commitment, without that what do you really have? Might as well be single.

its cheating when you wouldnt do it in front of your spouse