Relationships are supposedly about honesty and communication, but something is amiss
By Suzanne Harrington
We’re 30 years past the projected date, but George Orwell would still nod knowingly at the Big Brother-style revelations of Edward Snowden. The fact that we’re being snooped on has caused widespread indignation, but the truth is that many of us do it to ourselves, and to our very own partners.
Be honest now: Would you ever snoop on your partner? Have you ever snooped, or been snooped on yourself? On a scale of one to ten, do you find the idea of snooping ethically indefensible, or is it necessary pragmatism?
Several recent studies reveal the embarrassing truth: We snoop. But in the digital era we’ve moved from grainy photographs of people leaving hotels and checking collars for lipstick, to online monitoring. In 44 percent (nearly half!) of 920 couples in a 2010 study, at least one partner was secretly monitoring the other’s digital private life. Within that group, 20 percent were men, 43 percent were women, and 37 percent of couples secretly monitored each other. Ten percent of couples secretly read each other’s emails or texts. And in 16 percent of couples, one partner even kept tabs on the other’s browsing history.
Some study participants went so far as to install monitoring software, read instant message logs, and even pretend to be another person online in order to lure a partner to cross a boundary and ‘prove’ infidelity.
And it is primarily about fidelity, at least according to most admitted snoopers. Although 25 percent of men in another study were happy for their wives to look at sexual material online, most women don’t want their partners viewing cyber porn, engaging in cybersex, falling in love with someone else or even flirting online, and a good many—70 percent—would disapprove of their partner discussing relationship difficulties to a third party.
Likely Occasions
So let’s say you have a home, a family and a life together, but although you sense something is amiss—maybe your partner showers a little too often, regularly deletes digital history or has a second phone—you’re getting repeated reassurance that you’re imagining things. Maybe you are! Although transaction monitor Verity receives about one hundred calls a week from individuals concerned about their partner’s activities, between 70–80 percent of those monitored by the company are not having an affair. They really are working late. They really are out with their pals.
“That can be a bitter pill to swallow too, accepting that your partner might be happier [spending time with] someone else than with you,” says Kate Figes, author of Our Cheating Hearts: Love & Loyalty, Lust & Lies. “That’s the most difficult thing for people, when there isn’t something going on.”
And if you do find out that your beloved is cheating on you, how do you take the moral high ground once you’ve gone to intrusive lengths to find out the truth? Relationship expert Fran Creffield cautions, “Imagine your next partner asking how you discovered your last partner’s infidelity, when you explain how you hacked into their email and read their messages. You take that history into the next relationship.”
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Snooping might also reveal that your partner has been dissing you to friends. In other words, if your partner isn’t sleeping with your best friend but has been complaining about your annoying intimate habits, what can you do with this information? It would be difficult to confront someone without betraying your own sneaky behavior.
“People tell me they want concrete proof for their sanity because each time they question their partner they feel they are being lied to or are told they are paranoid and imagining things,” says Verity. “They don’t realize that once you get to the stage that you are even thinking about having to check up on your partner, the trust has gone. Infidelity is not just about sex; it’s not telling your partner something, whether that’s an affair or another secret part of your life.”
Infidelity, as noted writer Anthony Burgess once said, is the most creative of sins, and in response, we have come up with some other creative responses: The Checkmate Infidelity Test Kit promises to cause semen traces to show up bright green. Theft Detection Powder leaves a black stain, and there’s a UV version that shows up with a UV flashlight (though that leaves you with the tricky challenge of planting the powder in your best friend’s underwear).
We’re primarily a monogamous culture—at least in theory—yet sexual boredom is also “now considered unacceptable, the sign of a failing relationship,” writes Kate Figes. Perhaps it’s not our sex lives that are deteriorating but our expectations of what our private lives should look like—somewhere between the Kama Sutra and a Bollywood romance. In other words, we do not make space for lulls, droughts or temporary disinterest, because we are constantly reminded by online porn, mainstream films and advertising that we should be having multiple orgasms all the time. While remaining faithful!
Snooping happens when things have gone very wrong, so the snooping is only a symptom. Nevertheless, indulging it can make things worse. “The moment you start snooping, you put a block on the intimacy,” says Creffield. Although by the time you start snooping, the intimacy may already have left the building; if you need to secretly spy on your other half, it’s probably time to get help, have a serious talk or pack your bags.
—Suzanne Harrington is the author of a memoir, The Liberty Tree.
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