I’m the girl who slept with your husband, and I’m not sorry.

I wasn’t cheating on you, I was cheating on a system which is fake and outdated. I was cheating on a society which glorifies sexual monogamy as the main acceptable life model, even though the reasons for this (monogamy was the only way to determinate paternity and inheritance) have been outdated for decades.

When two people get married, or when they start a relationship, our society implies that they are granted exclusive rights to each others’ sexuality. People’s bodies and desires get degraded to property, just like a car or a house or a laptop. And all of this in the name of love—what does love have to do with property and ownership?

When you say that sex outside a marriage or a relationship equals cheating, you are in fact cheating yourself. You’re oversimplifying the bond between two people, based on mutual acceptance, trust, loyalty—all of these can be betrayed, and this has nothing to do with your genitalia.

But sex is much more tangible than these complex factors, it can be observed and proven and even recorded—making it all about sex makes your life so much easier.

You may say that your husband or boyfriend has committed to sexual monogamy when entering a relationship with you. But think again. If I’ve slept with your significant other, this means he has clearly expressed his desire to have sex with me. And by doing that, he has already made it clear that he has no intention of playing by the rules of the system.

Of course I could have said no. Most people would say it’s the only sensible thing to do. But the thing is, I don’t believe it’s the sex I’ve had with your husband or boyfriend that’s causing the harm. It’s the system itself that’s flawed, because it enforces rules we ourselves are unable to yield to.

You may say that sexual monogamy works fine for you, and you will never ever be the one who cheats. But please, don’t say that unless you’re on your dying bed. You’re only speaking with the voice of a society which is trying to predict your sexuality for the rest of your life. Nobody’s able to make such prediction, not even you.

You may yet come to experience loving one person and having sex with another. You may yet come to believe that the sex your husband has with another woman doesn’t affect his love for you. That your intimacy as a couple can remain intact regardless of who you are sleeping with.

As for me, I can only hope that one day we’ll reconsider the significance of sex outside a relationship. While cheating is considered the major sin, our society tends to neglect and forgive lots of actions that are just as much, or even more damaging in a relationship.

I hope that one day the vexing problem called cheating will be replaced with concern for emotional neglect, or abuse, or manipulation, or marital rape—you name it.

This article originally appeared on xoJane.