Well, I've dated both, and I have to say the baggage from being recently divorced was WAY worse. the education thing can be fixed.

oops! I voted "that" when I should have voted "this"...

I would take the lying over the education before I would take the lying over a marriage. Seperated does not equal divorced.

I don't care if he's only married on a technicality...married is still MARRIED and he could easily reverse course and try to make things work. Waaayyy too messy a situation to get involved in.

I totally get all the married comments, but I feel like I'd be more pissed off if he lied about having a Master's if he really didn't, especially if he didn't intend to get one.

i have to say married - but the caveat is that this happened to me. my fiance has been 'divorced' for the past 6 years since that's when he split with his wife..but the paperwork still hasn't been finalized since she's being spiteful about things.

(I was the one separated-divorcing... NO baggage )
You guys...he lied about his name. I was calling him 'James' for months!!! his occupation too. He knew I love pilots... even wore a flight suit, ok, I knew that wasn't true ... but the suit was sexy on him I let it slide, for awhile. Turned out that he just worked at a piano store. After all that, we broke up because I wouldn't move to his state and he couldn't move to mine.
I'd sure move now though...

The lying in both of these situations, for me, is a deal breaker. But married is married, regardless of whether or not he's separated.

I guess Im in the minority when I say that lying about education is worse. Not so much for what is it literally. But that because he was lying to impress you. If he was lying about being married he probably wasnt doing to make himself look better. In fact from these situation, it sounds like maybe he never really lied about in the first place, he just left it out. Where in the second scenerio he flat out made up stories to make himself sound good. I cant stand people like that and its a very big turn off when guys lie or exaggerate their accomplishments. I think the lying about being married thing could be forgivable because he probably just didnt want to scare you away. But I could be biased because I met my boyfriend when he was in the process of getting divorced (though he told me about it from the very begining)

Cheating on his wife and then looking me in the eyes and lying to my face about his marital status makes him a much bigger sc*mbag than his lack of a Masters degree .IMO there is no comparison....

I refuse to be involved in the devils work of adultery. As mentioned above, both would be a deal-breaker. But if you couldn't be honest about being separated, then how can I trust you to be honest about not cheating?

Its one thing to lie about age, education, and other things to impress a girl, but to avoid your situation because you don't want to deal with whatever it is, then yea, that's not cool.

imo lying about marriage is worse. it's cheating, even if their not living together or whatever. my best friend was dating a married man,he lied to her for months about it and then she found the seperation papers.

but i dated a guy who lied about his education to everyone including his friends, i only found out through his mom during conversation.. i had to question things from then on.

If someone lied to me about their education, I'd figure they felt a need to bolster their image. But someone lying about being married - separated or not - makes their character very questionable to me.

Being married is a much worse lie, even though in real life, both would be a deal breaker.

Both are bad, but being married is worse. Please don't even bump into me.

I am a big advocate for education and believe in the college degree but out of these two..I would forgive a lie about a degree over being married far more.

I think I'd be a little more angry if he lied about getting his Master's.

wade I was SO sure sober that I would pick the degree lie but now that I am drink and don't have time to think I am going with the married lie. Ok...seriously...I am leaving.

drink = drunk.

wow..

To me, they're both equally bad. This man has a hard time with the truth. He's pretending to be someone he's not. He's a fraud. In my book, that's a serious character flaw. I would leave him over either of those scenarios. I know that's harsh, but being with a trustworthy, forthright person is very important to me.

If he was honest in the beginning about either of those issues, I would have been fine with it. My problem is the deception and fraud, not the actual circumstances he lied about. I think the circumstances themselves are somewhat innocent and acceptable. I just don't like how he chose to handle them with me. It was immoral.

I'd be more pissed about lying about the marriage.

FAR worse if he were married!!!

I'm with GlowingMoon - any kind of deception is a deal breaker for me. I once met a guy online who said in his profile that he was 34. After we started dating, I found out that he was 36. His excuse was that women my age (26 at the time) exclude men who are over 35 from their searches. When I pointed out that what he did was *lying*, he had the nerve to be offended. Needless to say, the relationship didn't last long.

My view may seem simplistic, but I think that good people don't lie for their own advantage, period. If someone is capable of lying like that, they're capable of much worse.

Online, I'm gonna lie about anything that might give you sufficient evidence to stalk me or steal my identity...that should be a given. I'd think someone where nuts to give exact info

Mesayme - am i missing something or are your comments completely out of context?

skigurl, Mesayme was probably replying to my comment. I still stand by my opinion though.

married. DEFINITELY.

Lying about being married is a lot worse

I don't take lying at all!! I know we all have this tendes at times but when it comes to a relationship it needs to be honesty! I wouldn't dare stay with a man that told me that he was still married but just waiting on the paper's. Now college is another story b/c education is what's needed now a day's but I can handle that more than the marriage!

Umm...marriage! What a scumbag.

Of course I voted that married is worse. But honestly, if either of these lies occured, I would dump him in a heartbeat. Lying about something so big (in either case) for so long would not sit well with me. I can't be with someone I don't trust.

Omg it would be far far far worse if he didn't mention his "separation"

The whole thing with him having a better degree or not only shows that he was trying to impress you and honestly what guy doesn't do that in the beginning.

marital status

Because he's separated it's not really cheating, but he should have been upfront about it anyway. It's like seeing a guy while he's on a "break" with his girlfriend, you gotta be upfront because they could always get back together.

Lying about his education doesn't bother me as much, but yeah, always tell the truth.

Either way he is a liar. Which never makes for a good partner.

I'm a guy who has spent the last 6 years living a lie. Every night I wake-up in the middle of the night hearing my own voice going over how to get out of this lie. My eyes have lost their life, I feel so dulled all of the time, I feel empty and in constant anguish. When my girlfriend visits while family is around my heart races, I sweat and I become very impersonal in an effort to get out of there asap. I've completely stopped talking to most of my family and claim that I was never close to them anyhow, to my girlfriend. I originally stayed in this relationship because I felt sorry for this girl, I met her after she came out of a bad relationship and I took care of her and her family liked me and my family liked her. We shared tons of interest but the lie was that I had never gone to college, we met in our early twenties and I felt that she wouldn't respect me or would lose interest if I told her I never went to school. Then I had to put off going to school for years and now I take classes secretly and its killing me inside trying to hide this all I feel like I'm losing my mind. God, I wish I had never lied but now I fear how I would hurt her if I told the truth and I really don't want to hurt anyone, I'm not sure what to do...