Hello. Im an old fan of Xeney.com but this is the first time Ive really browsed the forum or considered posting to it. I dont actively shun it, I just dont have a lot of time, and Im a consummate lurker; in fact, Im a really private person in general, so it has taken one whopper of a problem to bring me out into the open this way.

Sorry sorry. Screw this. Enough with the dramatic build-up, heres my question:

How the hell do I explain to my well-meaning, nosy boyfriend that keeping my journal (paper, online, whichever) private and anonymous is important and justifiable? He knows I write everyday, he knows I keep a diary, but he just doesnt understand my need to withhold it from people I know would belittle it, or share its location and my identity with all and sundry heinous relatives-in-law.

(My guy has relatives who gossip like a cloud of gnats. They would think I was nuts for doing it and hound me to my grave with comments and creepy Ive-got-your-number-missy remarks. It would suck, dont doubt it. If I did tell him I dont think he could resist telling them for long.)

Its true that its not entirely private or anonymous, but those people who do know about it are friends who are half way around the world, in prison, or out of touch except via email. In two cases I havent seen these people for over a year. They also seem to understand my need to experiment with relative privacy and I can trust them not to make too many thoughtless comments about how useless or utterly narcissistic it is. Blargh.

My boyfriend - lets be really trite and call him J - is a wonderful guy. In almost every respect hes really, really great. But he cant seem to wrap his brain around this privacy thing and I dont understand why. Its not like I take quality time away from the relationship to wallow in my diary, no way. Whenever Im writing Js either asleep, out, or playing a game on his PC (and yelling at it like a crazy-boy-nutjob). The contents of my journal are really unremarkable; I dont wander around looking like Im listless and charming and full of secret thoughts; I dont end conversations with Im going to have to reproduce that word-for-word in my secret online journal; I dont even write much about him and Ive told him as much when hes asked. In fact, Ive verbally outlined a few entries when hes asked - what the hell more does he want? Help me out and tell me, relationshippers.

The point is I want to keep it private; I want it to remain mine. If thats so ungodly selfish, Im sorry, but there is a very real and important part of me that needs to be selfish, and separate from the rest of my life here, at home, with him.

How did he find out about it in the first place? Well, he asked if I had a journal and I said yes. He then asked if he could read it and I said I would rather he didnt. And I explained the reasons why, but in terms a bit less blunt with regard to his relatives. I told him that he could ask me anything about it and I would always reply truthfully. But I want the writing - the entries themselves, the original thought process - to remain private.

Thats all, thats it; now tell me, is it too much to ask? When he moves into nosy-mode, how do I get him to drop it?

-- Anonymous, March 08, 2000

Answers

Maybe you could put up another site on Geocities or something with another version of your journal filled with non-incriminating stuff. This might satisfy his hunger but that would be lying (and a lot of extra work) and that ain't cool.

Better yet, how about letting him read the above paragraphs. It pretty much explains how you feel in a loving and truthful way.

Just a thought.

Driving along The Road Trip.

-- Anonymous, March 08, 2000

If it's on the web, it's not private, and people you don't want to know about it *will* fin dout about it, period.

So if you really want to keep a *private* journal, don't put it up on the web, either with or wihout your real name on it. You are * publishing* the material, and you really cant control who will read it and who won't unless you want to have a password-protected thing going, and even then, there's no guarantee that you won't be read by someone you don't want to be read by.

So yes, it's too much to ask that something that's being published on the web be treated as "private" when it's up in a public place and not even password protected.

-- Anonymous, March 08, 2000

If J is the kind of boyfriend who feels entitled to cross a line you've drawn for yourself in all fairness, and you are the kind of person who understands the importance of trust in a relationship, then the real question is does the value of the relationship with J outweigh your rights as an individual. Since you didn't immediately hand over your journal to J, I'm assuming that you haven't already decided in favor of the former.

If J doesn't respect the line you've drawn for your privacy, you may want to keep in mind to what degree you will tolerate his inability to respect your individuality. If he persists beyond what you are able to tolerate, any conflicts between you two may cause harm to yourselves long after the relationship should have ended. In being fair to yourself, you may find yourself more fair in dealing with J. Or so it seems to me.

Although, if the journal is online, it isn't fair to J to leave it in a public area, and expect him not to look at it. There is such a thing as setting him up.

-- Anonymous, March 08, 2000

>>> If it's on the web, it's not private, and people you don't want to know about it *will* fin dout about it, period.<<<

I have to disagree. Thats a very easy line to take, but its not strictly speaking true.

If you want to argue semantics, sure, everything on the web is published material and therefore not private. Okay. But the web is one darn big place, and it is growing larger all the time. All. The. Time. Thousands and millions of pages of ads and news and porn and such are uploaded and tinkered with and pulled down constantly. Theres a lot of information out there to sift through and some things are much more public and published than others. If someone was actively looking for my journal they would have a very hard time considering that I havent joined any rings, burbs, or directories, havent registered it with any search engines, and have even inserted some meta telling the Happy Engine Bots to back off. It is also anonymous, so unless someone was willing to spend a huge amount of time trying to track it down, chances are good theyd have no luck. Unless they had the exact URL, they wouldnt find it; even if they employed a room full of monkeys with typewriters for a bunch of years, theyd be more apt to die of old age or boredom before they stumbled upon the correct sequence of characters.

All this is assuming theyd be looking for it, which, to my knowledge, is not really an issue. The original issue was not about privacy in the public domain, but about how to make my boyfriend understand that I want to keep some things  benign things  separate from our everyday talk and life together. Im sure many of you have friends that you discuss things with that you wouldnt necessarily feel comfortable talking with your SO about, things that belong to the time you spent together or to a friendship or shared circumstances.

I know my boyfriend has such relationships and talks with friends; all I really want from him is an acknowledgement and acceptance of the fact that I have this too, whatever form it may take. Total honesty is important to me; so is respect for personal, emotional space. Thats all I really want him to understand. And Im sure he will, in time; we have a really great history of working things out together. We have a history of tolerance, though sometimes we hit some snags. But they usually come undone and go straight again with time.

Its the nutty relative issue that really hangs me up. If I could be sure J wouldnt pass on the info I would give him the URL, no problem. See, I would freak if Js grandmother, for instance, made some snide comment about the entry where I talk to my Dad. It would be painful. Even though Im 23 I still react in some situations like a child  if I was faced with a confrontation like that Id break down, and those people, some of whom can and will be hurtful, would have the skinny on me. I would feel trapped. It would be hell. And having a journal online certainly isnt worth that. Im still trying to figure this out, but your comments have been helpful. I have some more to think about, thanks. If I do resolve this in my favor, I may even make things public or, rather, more public. In which case Ill probably be back to talk to you all.

Thanks again. Sorry if this post was too damn long.

-- Anonymous, March 09, 2000

It wasn't clear to me if this journal is on the web or not. If it is, you're always taking the chance that somehow someobody you don't want to see it will see it. If you want it to be absolutely private, or open to a few selected people, you could set up a password system.

I agree that the basic issue is that if this is important to you and J doesn't understand why, you may have to make a choice. Lie to him and tell him you don't keep the journal any more. Break up with him over it. Whatever - there are lots of ways you could handle it. You're the one who needs to figure out how important the issues are.

I'm one of those people who wants to know what the man in my life is thinking, and wants him to feel the same way about me. I'd be flattered if he wanted to read my journal, and I'd snoop in his. So that colors my perception of the issues. I mean, I don't think you're wrong for wanting to keep secrets, but I don't think he's wrong for trying to find them out.

-- Anonymous, March 09, 2000

The difference between an online journal and a private journal is key here. If you kept a private journal, I don't think J would be so hot to read it, because no one is permitted to read it; it's private. But instead you're putting on a public performance*, and you've specifically asked him not to attend. Furthermore, your reasoning is that you don't trust him not to tell his family about it. Of course your lack of faith hurts him.

[*Aside: If you don't have it linked from anywhere and you use all available technology to prevent anyone from coming across it, what exactly is the point of having it on the web? It sounds like you've gone through a lot of effort to give yourself a readership of zero. Which is too bad, because you seem to be a cogent writer and I'm kind of curious about the URL now.]

While I understand not wanting friends and acquaintences to read it necessarily, a partnership with a lover or husband is a different ball of ear wax. You're telling him outright that you don't plan to share all of yourself with him, and that kind of attitude has poisoned many relationships. Furthermore, you're more willing to be emotionally intimate with dorx on the web than him. I have to say I understand his perspective entirely.

The only way to really keep something secret is to conceal not only the secret itself but the very existence of the secret. You already blew it by telling him you've got a web diary. If he weren't curious about it, that would be a worse indicator, to me, than that he is. ("Your thoughts and feelings? Who cares? Time to play Tomb Raider.")

Time to start afresh with a new boyfriend.

Or, more sneakily, expunge everything you don't want him to see from the old journal, give him the URL and say you've quit keeping it, then start up a new journal in an undisclosed location and post entries when he's not around, heh heh heh. As far as I'm concerned this is ethically indistinguishable from what you're doing now, which is also essentially behind his back.

...........................................

-- Anonymous, March 09, 2000

For most people, it's very difficult to wrap their minds around a concept that's essentially formulated as:

1) I'm keeping a journal and it's online. 2) I don't care if complete strangers see it and comment on it. 3) I don't want YOU, whom I love and to whom I give most of myself, to see it.

For many people, this isn't going to sound like a privacy issue--how can it possibly be private if you're broadcasting it to the world? For many--MOST people, they'll see this purely as a trust issue.

And you have, in fact, SAID to him that you don't trust him not to tell his relatives, so it IS a trust issue.

I would imagine that he also suddenly feels rather insecure, like he doesn't know you at all the way he thought he did.

And, let's face it, he doesn't.

Depending on how nosy he actually is--unless your computer is password protected, it wouldn't really be that hard for him to figure out where your journal is, I suspect--he'll probably drop the issue himself, eventually. But just because he isn't talking about it doesn't mean that it will go away. It's just going to sit there, and he'll be reminded of it every time he sees you working on the computer.

-- Anonymous, March 10, 2000