Anti-cheating ring brands I'M MARRIED into the flesh of your finger

TheCheeky sells a $550 titanium wedding-band with I'M MARRIED etched on the inside in block serif caps. After wearing it for a sufficient time, your finger will bear the indelible mark of those words, advertising your marital status even if you slip the ring off.

With Arnold, Tiger and two timing IMF guy in mind, we have created this wedding ring for people intent on cheating. The negative engraving on the inside means that when you are in the ‘Club’ and an attractive woman…or man comes along to chat, slipping your wedding ring off is not an option. The mark left on your skin says…’I’m Married’

ANTI-CHEATING RING (via Neatorama)

• [MB44]

  And after your inevitable divorce, you will have to wait a few months for your resilient but non-committing skin to bounce back before you begin your next doomed venture. Maybe I am projecting.

  • [JohnQPublic]

    or just hit on illiterates or people from  (insert your favorite state’s name here).

    • [cdh1971]

      I dunno…an engagement, wedding, or any other ring placed on that particular finger can be a great way of attracting other girls and boys, according to various married acquaintances and single acquaintances I’ve met .
      Anyway, I can see this not hurting or hampering some people’s style at all.

      • [Jim Saul]

        Right… it would help prevent the long term fling with a gullible dupe, but not the one-night stands that send home a petri dish of mementos.

        Do they make one that says “single?” That would be better for me. I’ve turned too many casual flings into mismatched serious relationships out of a combination of romanticism and childhood catholic guilt imprinting.

        • [Mantissa128]

          Nothing says “I love you” like drug-resistant Gonorrhea.

• [zarray]

  It wouldn’t work on me, I fidget with my rings (when I can stand wearing them).

  • [awjt]

    I do too, so my finger would say, “IMI’IMMARMRMAMRMAMRMAMARARRAARARARARIIIDEDMEAEEDEDD.”

  • [Chris]

    I think that would just tear the skin up on your finger.

• [Mike Norman]

  “With Arnold, Tiger and two timing IMF guy in mind,…”

  Does it work for women, too? Or is the ring just as sexist as the prose?

  • [Antinous / Moderator]

    Would you turn down an invitation to sex with an attractive woman if you saw that on her finger?

    • [Mike Norman]

      I’m tempted to reply, “Yes, because I have an ounce of class.” But, while it’s true that I have an ounce of class, the real reason I’d decline probably has more to do with my assessment of the kind of person who would, first, subject themselves to the debasement of being branded like and then, second, present themselves in the naive and childish hope that I wouldn’t notice the mark.

      That person has issues, up with which I’ll not be mixed.

      Maybe that’s a part of what it means to have an ounce of class, though.

      • [Ryan Lenethen]

         It would likely be more a result of how many ounces of alcohol you currently have in your system…

    • [rattypilgrim]

       Antinous, I just hope you’re as attractive as the fictional woman of whom you allude to. That said, if a man or woman has to brand their spouse for the world to see, the relationship is in deep doo-doo, not to mention from a  less than free, 21st century society. But we do seem to be regressing on many levels.

      • [Antinous / Moderator]

        Antinous, I just hope you’re as attractive as the fictional woman of whom you allude to.

        Setting aside the fact that I’m queer, why the aggressive response to a simple question?

        • [Cooper DiBiase]

           Sour grapes over your “Are you a woman?” theme on those comments re: sexism?  (apologies if I don’t recall the correct question, but I’m not going to look it up).

          Of course, if a person wanted to be argumentative they’d do better to interrogate you on whether you’re assuming that all heterosexual marriages are monogamous by agreement, but whatever.

        • [Jim Saul]

          I read that as kind of awkward heavy-handed flirting, actually. Which does still leave it aggressive, I realize.

        • [rattypilgrim]

           Sorry if you read it as an aggressive response. I read yours as somewhat sexist.

        • [Antinous / Moderator]

          Projection.

        • [rattypilgrim]

           We live in a time where there is so much polarization between us we can hardly have a civil discussion without one or both parties getting confrontational or defensive.
          That was certainly not my intention. Maybe we both erred on the side of projection. For what it’s worth, it seems some people got what I was trying to say.

    • [SomeGuyNamedMark]

       I don’t know, depends on how much she was charging.

    • [snagglepuss]

      I HAVE turned down offers from attractive married women.

      Because there were always far too many fish in the sea, to risk getting dragged into the unhappy ones’ personal drama.

    • [Rindan]

      I’m single, so no.  If someone wants a fling and seem willing and compatible, why not?  If it is a poor idea, it is their own mess to work out.  If I was in a monogamous relationship, I would graciously turn down the offer.
      More importantly, if a woman ever came to me looking for marriage and demanded I wear that ring, I would very happily turn down that offer too.  Why the bloody fuck would you make a monogamous commitment to someone who you trust so little that you want to stamp MARRIED on them.  Seriously, that is completely insane.  You need some epic neurotic mental damage or some seriously bad judgement to think that that ring is a good idea.  You also need a solid serving of stupid and desperation to agree to wear said ring.

      Any two people fucked up enough to agree to use that ring deserve each other.  Hell, it is a service that these people self tattoo themselves.  It will help warn people off that they are dealing with some seriously damaged goods and that they need to stay away.

      • [SomeGuyNamedMark]

        I prefer the old branding of the forehead method.

  • [Quiche de Resistance]

    Could we get rings that say “MARRIED, BUT SHE/HE LETS ME FUCK WHOEVER I WANT”?

    OR “MARRIED AND DOWN FOR MFF THREESOMES”?

    • [SomeGuyNamedMark]

       That would be a Craigslist ad

• [Antinous / Moderator]

  Or you could just shackle the happy couple together as the climax of the wedding.

  • [Stephan Zielinski]

    Pff.  Typical namby-pamby wishy-washy shilly-shallying.  Let’s not fool around, here.

  • [foobar]

    What, like cats?

    • [Antinous / Moderator]

      Once you go barbed, you never go back. Because you can’t.

  • [SomeGuyNamedMark]

     Right after the ritual crippling of each other.

• [pjcamp]

  I dunno. Kind of looks like he’s claiming to be Mordred.

  • [Antinous / Moderator]

    No, It says MAORI.

    • [Marc Mielke]

      MAORIED? Is that a thing in (New Guinea? I always confuse them with New Zealand, New Jersey, New York, and New Mexico)

    • [Daemonworks]

      Sort of a step down from the facial tattoos, I would imagine.

• [RedShirt77]

  I bet five minutes and an ice cube could solve the problem of the brand. Now the solution for the spouse that would ask you to wear it…. That takes at least 30 minutes.

  • [Mari Lwyd]

    I know a hooker who would suck that finger till the mark went away for $75.

    • [Just_Ok]

      I know one that would do it for $10, but she leaves gum marks.

      • [llazy8]

        Oh, lolz, but just on the off chance that you don’t actually know any sex workers personally, or especially discount ones with *no teeth and no dentures*, then in that case you’re a misogynist asshat.  I mean, *would be* a misogynist asshat, were your comments not just sincere musings on things in your daily life.

        • [maybeimjustanasshole]

          Why are they misogynists? I mean, amanicdroid did not even refer to woman specifically, and sex workers can be any gender (or none).

• [DeanCutlet]

  How trite.  No wonder another name for a wedding ring is a leash.

  This ring will surely instill the utmost confidence in the sackless husband that agrees to wear it.

• [Sirkowski]

  So dumb.

• [theophrastvs]

  Does this mean the sucker doesn’t rotate but is glued in one position?  …finger must turn purple/black drop off…   wouldn’t it just be easier to get a tattoo?

• [jere7my]

  You could just claim it says I’M MARRED. Self-descriptive and cheating-compatible!

• [oldtaku]

  Does the other ring in the set say ‘I’M NEUROTIC’?

  • [EH]

    It says “I AM TOO MARRIED” like Jennifer Jason Leigh in “Miami Blues.”

• [surreality]

  This is a joke, right? …right?

  • [dnebdal]

    I was thinking “artistic statement about marriage”, though there’s no reason it can’t be both.

• [AwesomeRobot]

  It only says “I’m married” because “I should seriously question my relationship choices” didn’t fit.

• [Mace Moneta]

  If you need a ring – or a brand – to tell that you’re married, you’re not.

  • [BillStewart2012]

     On the other hand, I do know people who could use a ring that says “Left” or “Right” on it…

    • [Chris]

      It would be cool if you could get whatever engraved inside.  Passwords, SS numbers, Blood type.  Things that might actually be useful…

• [Mari Lwyd]

  if only it weren’t so easily defeated by advanced technologies like coffee mugs and beer steins.

  • [Marc Mielke]

    Or gloves, bandages, etc. 

    • [millie fink]

      Or dark nightclubs.

      • [mccrum]

         Or prospective partners for the evening who just don’t care.

• [Red Pill Junkie]

  I hear gloves are making a come back this season.

• [GrrrlRomeo]

  I’ve been with my partner for 15 years without a ring or being legally wed. I’ve tried wearing a ring, but I just find it uncomfortable. Maybe I just haven’t found the right one, but I know this one sure isn’t it. I have considered a tattoo though. I mean, I want people to know I’m taken…just without having a piece of metal wrapped around my finger.

  • [Lithi]

     Wear a blinking neon sign that says “I’M TAKEN.”

  • [Cooper DiBiase]

     Tell people “I’m taken,” if the question arises.

  • [retepslluerb]

    Neither my wife nor I wear rings. 

    We’ve decided on pockets watches. Engravable,  memorable and more practical. 

  • [jimh]

     A forehead tattoo is the only solution.

• [bolamig]

  Should say “I’M MORMOM”.  If your marriage is threatened by a slip of the ring or gays getting hitched, you are not really married.

• [raikou]

  So totally off topic: most hospitals don’t carry the proper tools to cut titanium. So if you get into an accident and your finger swells up, you’ll have “I’m married” etched into your amputated digit.

  • [copperwatt]

    pretty sure this is an urban legend… Titanium is only about as tough as steel, just much lighter. Also most medical plates/hardware is titanium, so they must have tools to cut the stuff.

    • [Theranthrope]

      Actually, the previous poster is half-right; in that there is an exotic metal which can be made into rings, but can’t be cut, which actually is: carbide (used for drill bits, cutting tips for circular-saw blades, and strangely-enough, neutron-absorbing control rods in fast-breeder nuclear reactors), not titanium. 

      Carbide rings can’t be cut off by any of the gear available to an emergency room doctor because of carbide’s extreme hardness.
      Fortunately, there is a way to get the ring off without actually cutting the ring …or the finger: while carbide is extremely hard, it’s also extremely brittle, so all an emergency room doctor needs to do is apply enough force via a mechanical vice and the ring will shatter; destroying the ring, but saving the finger.

      • [Marc Mielke]

        Having my finger in a mechanical vice doesn’t exactly sound like ‘saving the finger’. More like ‘crushing the finger’. 

        • [Theranthrope]

          Do you not understand the property of “brittle” as in “brittle like glass” or crystal?

          While it does take a lot of force to shatter carbide, it doesn’t bend or deform like iron (or iron-alloys, I.E.: steels) or aluminum, it just goes: *crack* and shatters into pieces. That’s WHY it’s so hard.

        • [Michael Smith]

          Only if you keep turning the vice. They are very precise tools.

        • [bcsizemo]

          Or just a quick tap with a hammer would probably do the job.

          If my finger was swelling or something and I needed a carbide ring off in a hurry, I’d risk smashing my finger some to bust it off.

      • [Theranthrope]

        Incidentally… the genesis of the story which lead me to learn this little factoid was, in itself, highly unusual…

        Let me put it this way:  it was for a ring that was not worn on one’s finger, as the metal carbide was chosen in order to impart the property of “hardness” to the wearer…

        At times, we can all unknowingly become victims of our own… vices…

        • [pKp]

          Ouch, man.

        • [wandermarket]

          Did this ring also imprint “I’M MARRIED” on the wearer?

      • [inedible]

         Carbide simply means “With carbon added”. Carbide steel is nothing more than regular steel, with carbon. Lots of metals can be “x-carbide”.

        You’re thinking of tungsten carbide specifically. Tungsten is almost as hard as diamond, melts at the temperature of the sun’s surface, is heavier than lead, has a million really cool properties. It’s pretty awesome stuff to play with, just holding a rod of it sinks into your skin as if it was made of neutron star material. It’s fantastically heavy for it size. Pretty cool stuff. Incidentally it’s what the filaments in incandescent light bulbs are made from.

    • [raikou]

       I should have been more specific and said most emergency rooms, instead of hospitals. Oh well, I’m glad I spurned on a cool conversation about properties of nifty metals.

  • [Michael Smith]

    My wedding ring is titanium, but I will take my chances.

  • [tyrsalvia]

     Due to weight gain, I had to get my titanium wedding ring cut off when my marriage broke up. I went to my local health care provider, and the equipment was easily found. I don’t think this is true for titanium.

• [Scott Reed]

  You know what marks your ring finger more than a silly ring that has a negative embossing on the inside — actually wearing your wedding band.  I’ve been wearing a wedding ring for ~9 years and there is a semi-permanent dent in my ring finger where my ring constantly rests.  I recently had to take my ring off for a couple of days due to an insect bite near the ring, and the dent did not go away.

  • [BillStewart2012]

     Aside from the dent, there’s usually a difference in skin color due to tanning, at least if you have a skin color that tans.  A few years back I had my ring cut off and resized (because I hadn’t been able to remove it for a decade), and there was a distinct difference in shape.

    • [George Herbert]

      That eventually goes away.  I still carry my ring – am still married – but it doesn’t fit on any fingers anymore (resized once and can’t again, and either won’t fit or falls off all the options…  So it’s on a chain around my neck).  Has been for about 8 years now.  The ring finger was indistinguishable less than a year after I stopped wearing it.

  • [VibroCount]

    For my first marriage, we had matching wedding bands which were sized to fit our fingers; they had a plain outside part which faced the palm side and a leaf pattern on the outside toward the back of the hand. On the inside, the plain part was still plain, but the leaf pattern side was slightly hollowed in the center. If I ever removed my ring, the inside of my finger showed a small wide indentation and the outside of my finger showed two sharp grooves. After five years of marriage, I broke that finger, and with pain and a lot of soap, we removed the ring. After my finger healed, it was too large to put the ring back on. For our tenth anniversary, I had the ring enlarged to wear it again. The grooves on my finger were still there four to five years after I stopped wearing the ring.

    When we were married 12 1/2 years, we divorced. We tried for four-five months to put things together but failed. Just before we went to court, I took off the ring. Two weeks later no one could see the grooves my finger had shown for nearly 13 years. My finger knew when I was married (ring or not) and knew when I was not.

  • [Visceral Vixen]

    It’s true – all the married guys I’ve dated can’t get rid of that groove in their ring-finger. *shrug* Why bother even taking it off, the main appeal of married men is that you know they’re not going to stick around and bother you!

  • [timquinn]

    I took off my wedding ring forever about ten years ago. There is still a depressed ring of skin on my finger. The scars inside are much deeper, though.

    • [ocker3]

       I think there are unfortunately a lot of people here who know something of what you’re going through :/

• [tyger11]

  If you can’t be trusted without a ring, you can’t be trusted with one.

• [simonbarsinister]

  This works because the “other woman” never knows the guy is married, right?

• [Subhan Michael Tindall]

  Of course, this assumes that all the people one could cheat with would not sleep with someone they knew was married.  

• [Stephan]

  Chastity belt works better for me …

• [gwailo_joe]

  Better to set aside the five hundred bucks for those lawyer fees…gonna need it.

  The whole premise is sad and lame; but etch it in Fëanorian script and I’m marrying whoever, just because…

• [Amit Adhikary]

   This is the assumes

• [Smash Martian]

  Weird. I know folks who’d really go for jewellery that temporarily etches text into your flesh like  this.
  It’s just that “I’m Married” is a bit too vanilla for them…

• [Frank Diekman]

  It would be more accurate if it said “I’M MARRED”.

• [inedible]

  Well, it’s probably too late for anyone to read this way down here, but what’s the advantage to the lettering? If your ring is tight enough that it leaves a mark, does it matter that the mark spells it out? Presumably you’d have the same ring shaped indentation, just without the words. I think an indentation on the ring finger would be self explanatory. The words wouldn’t last any longer than a standard ring indentation, so it’s pretty well moot.

• [Adam Coe]

  so this only works if you wear the ring in the exact same position every time and never rotate it? also, I imagine you have to show your Douchebag membership card to buy one. this is the stupidest thing ever, and unfortunately (and I know this sounds unfair, but it’s also the truth) there will be a few men suckered into wearing these by their future wives. This is a marketing gimmick aimed at nervous women at best.

• [cservant]

  So the other woman would wear one that says “mistress” right? I guess for the other man, “boy-toy”?

  And what’s the point of these rings again?  Something about symbol of something?

  • [Visceral Vixen]

    I’d like one that says ‘mistress’, but I think ‘homewrecker’ has more class. :p

    • [blueelm]

      How about “swinger” too?

      • [Antinous / Moderator]

        “Open for business”?

• [sjofels]

  Nothing says “love and trust” better than this ring.

  • [benher]

    Well, it was either this joke or lift something out of Tolkein; this is my favorite!

• [RJ]

  It says a lot about who they’re trying to sell these rings to when they have to use language like “negative engraving” to make the point. If you’re too dense to know the difference between engraving and embossing, you’re probably too dense for marital fidelity.

• [Mordicai]

  What about not marrying someone you think is going to cheat on you?  Or if you must marry this person, having an open marriage?

• [Frederik]

  If you browse the website and see some of their other products this starts to make allot more sense. It’s a joke/art object not an actual seriouse anti cheating ring.

  • [dnebdal]

    Reading the article? What a quaint idea.

• [nogravity]

  It should come with a ring that has DIVORCED engraved in it.

• [Thorzdad]

  Seems to me that, if the ring is on your finger tight enough to mold the letters into your flesh, I doubt it would be that easy to take the thing off in the first place. Mine’s on relatively loosely and it’s still an effort to get it off over the knuckle. Any tighter and I’d be drawing blood to get it off.

• [blueelm]

  Won’t change who you’re marrying. If that person wants to cheat, especially if they’re the type to think ahead while on a business trip to keep the ring off so that they can convince an entirely clueless person in another country that they are single only to slowly let the truth be revealed over a period of years, denying it all the while… what do I sound bitter?

• [blueelm]

  Actually now that  I think about it, etching “Bitter” on my finger might send just the right message. Wrong finger though.

• [Daniel Friesen]

  If you think you need to buy this ring, you should reconsider getting married to the person you want to give it to.

• [Snig]

  If these get common, some enterprising soul will sell finger stamps with “un” on them in the same font.

• [Selkiechick]

  I almost want one of these… only I want to have the word FINGER  or RING instead

• [Teller]

  A good engraver could make the ring say MARRIED but the impression say HARRIED.

• [llazy8]

  wouldn’t a lojack be more secure?