Please send your questions for publication to prudence@slate.com.

Dear Prudie,

My husband and I have been together for more than four years and married for two and a half. He has a child with an ex-girlfriend. My mother-in-law has told me that the ex confessed to planning the "accidental" pregnancy because my husband was talking of leaving her, and she hoped it would keep him around. I was quite disturbed by this, and now more so since a woman friend of his ex told me she has done the same thing to another unsuspecting man.

I feel that someone needs to put this woman in her place but don't know if it's any of my business. I think if I don't ... no one will. (She's a bad person to have mad at you, by the way.) It just doesn't sit well with me to see another child used in this way, and another good man being manipulated like this. For some reason I just can't forget about this.Thanks.

--J.T.

Dear J.,

Prudie understands why this issue presses your buttons. It is not, however, your job in life to put people in their places. Another reason for butting out is that you say this latest trapper is a bad person to have mad at you. People can get knocked down, as well as up, you know. What I mean is that by confronting this woman with something that is really none of your business, you run the risk of incurring her enmity and making yourself a target for social unpleasantness.

There are times when a dearly held principle makes interjecting oneself acceptable: when you can affect the outcome. In this situation, however, the man is already trapped (and presumably committed to child support) and the woman is not about to undergo an integrity makeover. Prudie suggests you go to the gym to work off some of this (understandable) hostility.

--Prudie, athletically

Dear Prudence,