What do you think of the investigative behavior in the following examples?
You have a coworker who you suspect is exaggerating most of his stories. You want to google him to see if his stories check out.
You do a google search on all your coworkers to see what juice info you can find.
The google search finds something interesting, and you use other sources not open to the public to explore things further. Would it make a difference if this was something the coworker was dishonest about, but the dishonesty didn’t relate to his ability to do his job?
You suspect your SO is lying to you, so you hide a tape recorder in your house and listen to his conversations. Would it make a difference if the SO has a history of lying about changing his behavior. E.g. This is the third time he’s promising you that he won’t make fun of you to his friends after being caught twice - now you want to see if he’s lying again.
Your SO leaves his phone or computer unattended. You check his browser history, his call history, and maybe some photographs. Would it make a difference if you’ve been lied to by another SO in the past, and want to make sure that your current SO isn’t dishonest?
Depends on your values system. If spying on someone makes you feel bad about yourself, don’t do it. If you can do it and feel justified then I suppose it doesn’t matter.
Maybe it’s best to talk to the person first about your feelings of mistrust and explain why you have them?
In the case of a co-worker I’d just write them off as an exagerator until proved otherwise unless you have something to lose by listening to them. In which case, don’t.
I personally don’t check up on my husband because it makes me feel creepy. And we’ve been married so long that I think I’d figure it out if he was doing something I didn’t like. Then we’d talk.
Some people are just suspicious of everyone. Other times a very trusing soul will be taken badly advantage of. My feelings are if I had good reason to believe that something I considered serious was going on I might very well do it. Looking back over my life their were instances I gave someone the benefit of the doubt when I shouldn’t have. Most of the time the writing on the wall is pretty clear, if you need verification then get it.
Why do you care so much? How do his stories affect you at all, exaggerated or not?
Again, why do you care so much? You’ve got nothing better to do?
See above, and no it wouldn’t make a difference. You still care way too much about something of little consequence to yourself. Stop being nosy, it’s none of your business.
You don’t trust your SO so… why are you still with him again? Without trust the relationship is already dead, so bury it already. Just dump him and go.
If I deserve privacy, so do the people in my immediate vicinity. Past histories of unrelated parties are completely irrelevant. If you don’t trust your SO, leave.
I think said investigator has some serious boundary issues that need to be dealt with by a therapist. This person is also lacking in character and ethics.
I agree with everything Kaio said. I can’t say that I have never snooped on anyone but I can tell you that the few times I have ever done it, I felt worse whether I found something significant or not. The examples given in the OP are all absolutely reprehensible actions to me and a true sin. I was raised to actively avoid snooping on people even if I could do so easily and knew I would never get caught. I raise my kids the same way and actually punish them if they are caught in that type of behavior against anyone no matter what the other person was doing.
I thought the examples were going to be better like snooping on your child to prevent grave danger to them or watching a neighbor that might be involved in something that hurts others. Instead you just described Gladys Kravitz (the nosy neighbor from Bewitched) type behavior. Everyone has known someone like that and no one likes them. I take it a step further by actively punishing people that I have authority over like in a work situation for displaying any signs of that type of thing. It is absolutely despicable to engage in that as a casual pastime or a life strategy. I want nothing to do with people that think that way because the cause is group of traits that I actively avoid in people.
Curiosity? Same reason for reading Cecil’s column on where does the phrase “the dickens” come from. If it’s public information, then why not go through it? Is looking at a Facebook profile wrong?
Another reason is to encourage honesty from your coworker. If he lies to you and you show him evidence of the lie, then he might stop lying.
What if it’s a 20 year long marriage with several kids, and a divorce would hurt financially. Or any other relationship where leaving isn’t so easy. Would you advise the same thing?
I’d mind my own business in all the examples. And I honestly don’t know what it’s like to mistrust my partner. Having a partner who would lie to me seems like an oxymoron. I know this is a situation that some people have, but it’s totally foreign to me.
Why are you so curious about people you have so little relationship with? Do you look up Facebook profiles of people you meet on the bus too? Do you try to hack medical databases so you can check out your neighbor’s medical history? Reference:
So clearly we’re not just talking about idle Facebook surfing, either.
Boundaries are absolutely necessary for living in a society with other people. Don’t like it, feel free to live alone as a hermit on a mountaintop.
It’s creepy, that’s why. It shows an unhealthy obsession with things that don’t impact you and are none of your business. It’s not even in the same solar system as looking up linguistic trivia. It’s more akin to caring whether or not the gay couple three states over can legally get married or not.
Do you really think that will work? Or that he’ll just get more clever with his lies? An old phrase “teaching a pig to sing” comes to mind.
Also, unless you are that co-workers direct supervisor, that’s not your job. Even then it’s only your job if it has a negative impact on his work.
Yes. Emphatically. Especially if there are kids involved. Don’t drag THEM down with your drama.
Just to be clear, the OP is a hypothetical. I don’t know why you’re referring to me in all your examples. I never said I do any of the things you are referring to.
I agree that boundaries are necessary, but I haven’t figured out where those boundaries should be.
I accept that caring about other people’s personal lives is unhealthy, but how unhealthy is it? Is it as bad as eating chocolate, or is it like drinking moonshine?
I don’t know how creepy it is either. Tabloids run on gossip about other people’s personal lives, and millions of people buy those. Any news at all about celebrities is always about their personal lives, and millions of people read news about celebrities. So how creepy is it when someone wants to know about someone else’s personal life?
If it doesn’t work then at least you know if he’s dishonest or not, and whether you can trust him in the future.
So you’re against using investigative work to figure out if you can trust a SO? You’re saying that you should trust everyone automatically, and that if you don’t, you should break up with them?
You spying on your coworkers (unless they are already doing something to damage you) is likely going to result in them becoming enemies–and this is something you want to avoid.
Personally, I think the trust part should come before the person becomes a SO.
As far as being interested in other people’s lives, it’s one of the reasons I read this forum. I would say that, for me, it would become unhealthy if it took up more of my life than my interacting with the people in my life. And here people are volunteering information.
I don’t know you so I don’t know why others are being so rough on you. If you’re just figuring out boundaries I think it’s a good thing to learn.
Because you’re arguing in favor of something horrible, which leads me to believe that you find it favorable rather than horrible.
Uhh… you realize that there are lots of people out there who behave badly, don’t you? That doesn’t mean you hold them up as a shining example of how to conduct yourself.
I mean, people beat up, rape, and shoot each other too. LOTS of people do. Still doesn’t make it okay.
Also, protip: no one actually respects tabloids for their high journalistic standards.
You have very strange methods of establishing trust with people. By being untrustworthy yourself, apparently. How’s that working out for you?
Uh, YES. Once you’re at a point where you trust them so little that you’d stoop to snooping, that horse is already out of the barn. It’s no longer even a question of IF you trust them. You clearly DON’T. By that point, it doesn’t matter why. And if you can’t re-establish trust without violating their trust yourself and thus creating a vicious cycle of, by this point, perfectly justified mistrust, then the relationship is DEAD and you should deal with that reality as it is, not how you wish it to be.
It’s exceedingly hypocritical to bitch about your SO being untrustworthy, and then go around being untrustworthy yourself.
You establish trust with an SO the same way you normally do with anyone you choose to spend time with; incrementally, over time. You don’t start out with handing your house keys over to that guy you just met on the bus; but you allow yourself to get to know them and learn how trustworthy they are with the small things, before you get to a point where you trust them with, say, keeping their promise not to cheat on you.
I did a bit of a search on an old co-worker about whom I had a hard time believing that he really was who he said he was. And I was not the only person who felt this way, or did this.
Good for you. You didn’t mention how it turned and I don’t really care and neither does anyone else. I have had true stalkers on this board and elsewhere that didn’t believe something I said. They also did a good job of researching it and found out everything I said was true just like it always is. What now? Friends? No, absolutely not, get away from me forever you creepy stalker (I direct that to them in general, not you in particular).
Sometimes I have a position that I’m not sure of and like to talk it out with others so that I can understand it better. Instinctively, I’m against all my examples in the OP, but I’m not sure why. That’s why I’m questioning your logic, so that I can come to a more thoughtful conclusion regarding this issue.
Yes, but no one seems to question the people who read tabloids. No one is calling them creepy. But according to you, doing a google search is creepy.
Can you please stay away from personal attacks? It’s too difficult emotionally to argue with someone who attacks me and not my position. I’m not going continue our discussion if you continue to do this.
There are different types of untrustworthy behavior. Isn’t being dishonest in the hopes of uncovering the truth somewhat better than being dishonest in order to continue doing something that you know is hurting your SO?
One more example. Lets say you’re dating someone who tells you he’s an attorney. Should you check the state’s attorney registry to see if he really is an attorney?
OP, I teased you before and I should not have. It wasn’t a personal attack; I’m not Jerry Seinfeld and I will state publicly that I have never imagined your belly-button talking.
That said, spying is just wrong. Spying feels creepy, especially to the person being spied upon. It’s one of the few areas where women can easily be just as creepy as men. It’s not healthy emotionally for the person who spies or for the person being spied upon.
The victim’s POV would be as follows: The spy doesn’t trust me. The spy would stand over the victim’s shoulder and crush their creativity and take their freedom… for what exactly? The Spy wants/loves/needs the victim, so they are creating an invisible tether for the victim? The victim, once aware, is to change their behavior to the Spy’s standards…but the emotional damage would be significant. I can’t imagine the victim being able to maintain a positive emotional bond with the Spy even if the victim started the relationship head-over-heels in love with the Spy. The constant presence and threat of the guard towers of surveillance would drain the happiness and joy from each and every moment that they ever spent together. That and the victim under surveillance (even if it’s only subconsciously) will start to have the desire to escape to freedom.
The Spy’s POV would be that they want the victim, but that they won’t risk enough of themselves to trust them. In effect, by throwing money and technology at the problem, the Spy becomes emotionally more fragile, as their ability to trust anything on their own erodes. Eventually, without independent confirmation, the Spy will become more and more distrustful of anyone or anything. I’m not qualified to say what exactly constitutes paranoia, but I know that the Spy is travelling down a bad road and in that general direction. Its times like these that I wish I was a doctor and able to say with authority that the excessive need to spy and the inability to trust is a well-documented medical condition complete with a name and a historical course of treatment towards a cure.
Yes, some people do background checks. Yes, some people who don’t get burned. Part of the strength of the emotion behind the feeling of love a person can have, however, is that human gamble…that personal risk to receive personal reward. It’s part of the bond that keeps two people together. Sure, the Spy can search the bar records in their state to see if their victim is an attorney; but how much better would it be just to call them at the office & bring them lunch? Depending on how far gone the Spy is, though, they may never even think of this.
After all, it didn’t come in a binder from ACME Gum-shoe.
I think spying is wrong. I did it ONE time in my life when a friend whom I trusted told me that my boyfriend had propositioned him online for sex, and that he was sure he wasn’t mistaken. At that point I went through my boyfriend’s laptop for evidence of him cheating on me… instead of just asking him about it directly.
Even though I turned out I was right and things ended because of it all, I wouldn’t do it that way again. I would just talk to him directly about it. If he denied it I would ask to have unrestricted access to his laptop and online accounts so I could put to rest what I had heard.
Anyone who does any of these things is an asshole who needs to learn to let things go and/or communicate better. I can perhaps think of hypothetical situations in which it’s okay to snoop, but none of these are it. And I would never betray someone’s privacy because someone else lied to me. What a terrible way to be.
