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Dear Julia: I’ve moved in with my fiancé, and, in the past few months, I’ve noticed him receiving unusual texts on his cell, locking his computer, and so on. The whole Weinergate situation, coupled with the news that Arnold Schwarzenegger fathered a love child, added to the Tiger Woods nonsense of last year, has made me even more neurotic. I’m no Sherlock Holmes, but I know there are ways to find things out online. Any tips for me? I’d like to nose around ethically, if possible. — E-Snoop Dogg
Dear Snoopie: Ah, yes, ethical snooping. Some believe that’s an oxymoron, and it’s pretty clear that e-spying on your significant other raises some serious moral dilemmas. That said, I’ve never encountered a situation in which a simple: “Hey, are you by any chance grossly undermining my trust and love?” elicited a “Yes! Since you asked, now I will reveal all.” This is why lying was invented.
Your fiancé is definitely acting sketchy, and if he’s up to no good, there should be plenty of electronic evidence to support your intuitions.
It’s one thing to hide a keylogger on your significant other’s computer, or a GPS tracker on his car. Unless you need to catch him cheating for a divorce settlement, however, that’s probably not the best way to ensure your relationship lives to fight another day. Still, it is possible to set up a situation in which you can “snoop ethically”.
First of all, have an open discussion about your concerns. You love him, but you have trust issues. Tell him that those issues can be alleviated, but it will require some changes.
I’m a huge advocate of what I like to call “open electronic environments”. You know his passwords, he knows yours. You may lock your phone to avoid a stranger being able to access your data, but he has the code. He leaves his phone around, and if you were to pick it up and glance at the photos, he wouldn’t go into a state of epileptic shock.
It’s not “snooping” if you have permission to access his digital world.
“I do check his email and text messages,” says Tamsen Fadal, a dating coach and owner of The Love Consultants, along with her husband matchmaker Matt Titus. “At first I think he was surprised by it, but if you don’t have anything to hide, what’s the problem? A real relationship has to be built on trust. He trusts me to look and not make more of something that isn’t and I trust him enough that I wont find anything I don't want to see.”
But isn’t checking on him violating his “privacy”?
“I don’t consider it ‘privacy’,” Fadal answers. “I dress in front of my husband, he sees me at my worst and best, he sees my ‘private’ moments and hears my ‘private’ thoughts — so how in the world is his cellphone or email more private than any of that?”
Interestingly, the people who have the least problem with this are also — not coincidentally in my mind — those least obsessed with electronic privacy. My happily married parents don’t lock their phones, and they use a joint computer with access to both email accounts. When I asked my mom whether it bothered her that nothing was private, she looked at me quizzically. “What would I need to keep secret from your father?”
A fellow on Twitter, @mrmuhammad, phrased it best when explaining why he doesn’t set electronic boundaries: “If I can trust her with my life and kids, why not with my voicemail and email?”
Exactly.
Dear Julia: My boyfriend wants to keep his relationship status a secret on Facebook. He insists that it’s because he’s “a private person”. Is this a sign he’s cheating? — Freaked Out
Dear Freaked: Um… it’s not a good sign, that’s for sure. The Wall Street Journal cited a study pointing to the increase in unfaithful behaviour among the younger generation, explaining that “infidelity in most instances is simply a matter of opportunity.”
What increases opportunity more than social media? You’re interacting with a wide variety of potential partners, partners who may or may not know about your relationship status (even if he doesn’t select “it’s complicated”).
I used to buy into guys who waxed poetic about “remaining private”, by hiding their relationship status and not allowing you to tag them in photos. That is, until I dated a guy who insisted on it, and four months down the line, got contacted by — yep — his other girlfriend. How had she found me? By checking my Twitter stream! Zing.
