/ Ah that's better than I thought the problem you were getting at was. I was wondering if your wife might be hostile to the idea of your son's possible non-hetero orientation.

A friend of mine's dad was in the military, a real uptight, hot-tempered square-head. One day he stormed into his kid's room as he was reading comic books and practically shouted, "Are you a hommasexshul?"

Kid didn't know what brought that on, but told me he was completely humiliated. I wondered if you feared your kid might be subject to some variation of that, or some religiously intolerant version of it.

Is it ok for people to snoop on you?

Personally I think the loss of trust can be pretty significant, so you shouldn't indulge in it. It's more for emergencies only. I think people's backgrounds may lead to different ideas on this, but my parents were pretty crazed when it came to snooping, and it made me lose a huge amount of respect for them. Probably not a good thing to loose in general, but especially if you want to be a good influence and role model for a teenager, when enough things are likely to be going wrong already that aren't even a parent's fault.

I have some thoughts on this. But I think AJ is right and it's probably a discussion for another thread. Unless of course, OP wants to discuss it.

Blarg,

Great reply. We're on the same page.

When it comes to kids, their privacy is going to be secondary to their safety, especially when it comes to the online activities of a 13 year old.

Its a delicate situation, but there's always going to be a degree of snooping with any responsible parental oversight.

you are an adult, OP's child is not. If OP has a reason for snooping, it's his right in order to help protect his children.

Feel free to discuss the propriety of snooping, or whatever else comes to mind.

I have no problem with someone disapproving of it, though I do not think it's an easy issue, particularly when you have a quiet kid, who struggles to communicate. But I'm not necessarily saying I was right by any means.

One thing I will say is that, even if a person intends on very limited snooping (whatever that means), it is easy to get carried away. And if it makes a difference to anyone in a similar situation, then I can unequivocally state that I'm not having fun here, and truly wish I had never gone down this path.

I have a right is always a flatulent argument. (For god's sake don't freak out.) With rights come responsibilities.

I do admire some of your honesty and the way you're handling things in this thread, shrug it off though you might.

I agree that something like snooping can get "carried away." I'd go so far as to say addictive and start a spiral of personal and social destruction.

People like to feel like they're "doing something." Something that proves them competent, active, caring, creative, whatever. (You see this in business with managers all the time, who do absolutely nothing positive but always have to give the appearance of "doing something.") But despite all the shouting and flapping of wings, nothing can really fulfill that need to feel positive and valuable, especially when you're not really doing jack, so you can easily get addicted to being that much more snoopy, that much more controlling and interfering, in the vain attempt to do something, ANYTHING, to eventually zero end whatsoever except being a total *up and burden to everyone else. You can jump down a hole into hell that way and drag everyone else along with you.

Blarg, do you think that snooping in itself is bad or just that it CAN become a problem?

Question for junt and others as well, if it's pertinent. I think that I know junt's answer here though.

I find it a strange question. How can demonstrating distrust and spying on your kid and violating his privacy and sense of an inviolate self NOT be bad? The only reason it could not be bad is because your kid's welfare is truly in question. In which case it's totally fine and not just an option but a duty.

not wanting your daughter to marry XXXXXX is different. it's her life not yours. i still maintain that there is absolutely nothing wrong with not wanting your child to be homosexual. if it happens it happens, and you deal with it, and of course you don't think any less of your kid.

I mostly agree with you all on this but with one observation. We are looking at this through a mans eyes and a woman will usually see thing differently. When we want to play the white knight and stay silent "For the good of the family" it may be seen very very differently from the woman's point of view. I have been married a long time and one thing I have found (and it took a long time and many many mistakes) is that at least in my case keeping information hidden is tantamount to lying about it. God help you if it is something a mother would think is important information about their child. Granted this is only from my perspective and what I have see with my wife. Your situation may be very different and I agree with all the ultimately you have to decide the answer to that question.

Pretty darn good response for just skimming.

lol

there's nothing wrong per se, but I think it depends on your reason(s).

I definitely wouldn't want my kid to be a homosexual. In fact, I don't want him to follow in my footsteps at all!

Couple of more comments:

Believe it or not, this thread is proving to be some comfort to me, because I don't yet have many other outlets for discussion. (I have already contacted some support groups, exchanged emails, gotten on a list serve, but the give and take is not as satisfying, yet.) And this discussion enables me to look at things more dispassionately, which makes everything a little easier to manage.

About snooping: in real life, this is not a yes/no black/white situation, for there actually are various degrees of snooping parents frequently may consider. Look at my situation a little more closely, and you can see how I could have stopped at different stages (and can still stop).

I began by checking the bookmarked pages on my son's browser. Then, I looked at his history of pages viewed recently. Then, I looked for terms searched under google recently. Through this process, I found a forum where he had posted (ultimately revealing the thread where kids volunteered their sexual orientation). Then I looked for programs on his computer that might reveal, well, I don't know what. Then I returned to the forum to search for other posts he made. I could have stopped at any of these points.

And now, I have the ability to monitor his posts at that forum. In fact, if I were really subversive, I could directly communicate with him at that forum, pretending to be another kid.

So when did the snooping become unjustified, if ever?

Here is my own general, equivocal answer. The snooping is more justifiable to the extent it is motivated out of a concern for my child's safety and well-being. It is less justified to the extent it is motivated out of nothing but curiosity. But even this paradigm is problematic, for it does not take into account the impact on the snooper himself. Simply put, it is not healthy for a parent to know too much about a kid's innermost thoughts; for too much info could make one lose almost lose oneself in the child's personal travails. (Indeed, if I do end up telling my wife, I think I will affirmatively refuse to give her the location of the other forum, just for her own peace of mind and to stop her from going down this road.)

So, on a practical level, then, there is a lot to consider before engaging in snooping. One has to ask what the motivation is. If the motivation is to protect, one has to ask whether there are better ways to accomplish the same goal. And anyone who snoops should think through what would happen if troubling information is found. (Had I considered the possibility that I could not share or act on my information, maybe I would have resisted snooping in the first place.)

Here's a practical application of those concerns. I am now sensitized to the fact that gays often endure terrible bullying in high school, and they may not mention that to their parents. (I am guessing that my son may be less susceptible to this, thankfully, because he does not seem notably effeminate.) Theoretically, this concern could rationalize more snooping.

But before taking that kind of action, I will consider whether I can just as effectively prevent/deal with bullying by making sure my son is aware of support groups at school and elsewhere (yet do so, somehow, without disclosing what I know). And I will be extra-alert to any sign of bullying.

Thanks for listening to this stream of consciousness. It does help.

I wouldnt want my kids to be homosexual only because I couldnt have grandchildren. I want to be able to spoil my grandkids when I get old.

Alright, this is mildly amusing:

Moments ago, I walk into my son's room, see some dishes on his desk, and while I'm picking them up I notice on the computer screen a post from him on that forum, mentioned he is a bisexual. If I wanted to, it seems I could quite credibly now tell him (or my wife) that I learned about this just from walking by his computer.

This seems akin to the scene where a parent discovers a gay magazine in a kid's room.

Does this change the equation at all?

Regarding accomplishing some particular good or just avoid blame? Sounds like 1) no 2) yes.

This would only let you dodge blame for being a snoop (which I don't see how that's much of a big deal at all, you are his father after all). Lying won't help the situation anyhow.

I agree, usually. And I promise not to fart again.

But as long as he's not doing it every other day, I see nothing wrong with a parent checking out his child's internet history, especially if he has suspicion that something is wrong in the child's life. I'm old-fashioned that way.

Now, if the child has given you no reason to be suspicious or fearful for his well-being, doing something like reading the child's diary could very well be an invasion of privacy.

But I'll always lean towards supporting the parents doing what they feel is best in order to ensure their child's safety.

Of course, when I was 14 I thought differently! I think I told the story of when I had the temerity to lock my bedroom door once and my Dad took the whole door off for two weeks as punishment!

Granted, he was a bit on the strict side.

For safety issues, sure. For curiosity, I think the cost to a parent's ability to be trusted and serve as a role model is too high.

My parents went on really destructive random "raids" on my bedroom, leaving the place looking like a tornado hit it, prying my little model painting kit open when they could have just asked me for the key, etc. Just berserk. I was just a quiet straight-A student who stayed out of trouble and had no vices besides watching too much t.v. sometimes. There was no call for any of that at all, much less doing it repeatedly. I lost so much respect for them when they did that.

well, I agree both our parents went too far.

get off his facebook!!

I think this would allow you to open the door of discussion. Open the discussion with letting your son know that you are ALWAYS willing to talk about anything that is on his mind. He may not want to go into specifics during that first talk, he may even be mad; but you have opened the communication. If he is mad, wait a while and talk with him again. I'm not saying you have to discuss his sexuality every time, but talking about him his day at school, friends, worries, safety on the internet, safe sex, and other things let's your children know you are an active participate in their life and not just a parent who throws out orders.
I have always tried to keep the lines of communication open with our children, which can sometimes be a challenge. I talked about strangers, drugs, sex, etc., with them at a very young age. And more importantly I listened to them when the talked. This is important, because if you listen they will feel more comfortable in coming and talking to you with problems, concerns, etc. Just a week or two ago, I picked our youngest son up from football practice and in talking about his day at school and football practice, I brought up drugs and the dangers in them. Having a casual discussion about this seems to work for us because then when something serious come about, our children seem more receptive to talking and not just getting defensive.
As far as your wife is concerned, I think you need to let her know what is going on. You need someone to talk to and who better than you partner. And what would happen if she would have been the one to pick up those dishes and see what was on the computer screen?
I don't think your "snooping" was wrong by any means. As parents we all need to be aware of where our children are on the internet. There are way to many sick people out there who are searching for any child to victimize. I for one, visit my daughter's MySpace page just about everyday. I trust her, yes, but I definitely don't trust the world around us; which happens to be keystrokes away in our world today. I agree that there is a fine line to snooping, but I think it is, in most situations, done out of love and concern for our children.