If you can't trust your boyfriend, why are you with him?
This, times a 1000. He's your partner, your team-mate, not your siamese twin. A good relationship is based on trust, respect, and love. If any one of these is lacking, you probably need to re-visit why you are there.

Sounds to me as if respect and trust are issues. Ask yourself, if he had asked you for your password, instead of the other way around, how you would feel. Would you have given it to him willingly? Or would you have thought "Why? I've never given him any reason to distrust me? Why is he checking up on me? Does *he* have something to hide?"

Everyone has a right to their own private space, my husband, your boyfriend, me, you. Respecting that is part of a mature relationship. If you are feeling insecure, and think you need to snoop on your man, then you have deeper issues that should probably addressed with an unbiased third party, like a couples counselor, present so that your emotions don't get in the way.

I asked my boyfriend for his email password so I could look at a message he'd mentioned.

Uh, yeah. I smell some insecurity going on here.

--Suspicious

Why?

If you can't trust your boyfriend, why are you with him?
This, times a 1000. He's your partner, your team-mate, not your siamese twin. A good relationship is based on trust, respect, and love. If any one of these is lacking, you probably need to re-visit why you are there.

Yes indeedy!! Said this a bazillion times, to I can't even count how many people (of both sexes!) anymore. Jealousy is a manifestation of your own insecurities, not the supposed untrustworthiness of your partner. If ya ain't on the same page, perhaps it's time to put down the book? And if you suspect someone is deliberately trying to make you jealous, run. Run fast, run far, in the other direction. Which may not be the case here, but there is certainly a lack of trust. My BF sends me shit all the time, that he thinks is funny. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. But it'll be a cold day in hell before I go snooping through his email (even though I know his password, because I set up his account, at his request!). And he doesn't even want to know what's in my email, except to know that I got the silly shit he sent me.

I don't know why all these women want to read their boyfriends' email. I don't even want to read most of my own email.

I used to let my visiting girlfriend park in front of my computer so she could job search while I was gone to work.
She's probably happier NOT knowing what sort of details might pop up.

The feeling that one is being watched in everything one does is actually UNPLEASANT, in various ways. Duh. This "if you aren't hiding anything, why would you care" actually twists things around such that the burden of proof is now on *him* to 'prove' to you why he *shouldn't* live under a state of surveillance. If you think about it, that's pretty damn sick and twisted and disgusting, honestly, LW, do your boyfriend a favor and dump him.

I've been married for five years, and my husband and I were friends for 7 years before that. I have NEVER asked for ANY of his passwords and have no idea what they are. But since I trust him, it doesn't matter. But then, we also believe in having separate friends and doing things without the other.

My husband is the snoopy one in our relationship. That "if you don't have anything to hide" line is his favorite. It's so insulting, and it's a trap, because as soon as you demand privacy, that's "probable cause" for him to suspect something, which gives him the "right" to go snooping.
Mind your own damn business. If you want to be in the kind of relationship in which you each know where the other is all the time, then find someone who wants the same thing. There are couples like that, but most of us expect that we can have private thoughts, even private conversations, and not be accused of sneaking or cheating.

I'm with MonicaP...who has the time, energy or desire to "read your (partner's) email, Facebook messages, whatever?" A totally insecure person, that's who. And it sounds like the boyfriend realizes this is a slippery slope, as well. Clearly he doesn't trust that you won't abuse this information and go Gestapo on him every waking hour.

I'll add in a different thing no one touched on. How many other things does he use this same password for. We have passwords for everything now, e-mail, phone, each computer, facebook, logging in to newspaper web pages, work, online-bank accounts, etc. Far too many are lazy or not concerned enough and use the same password for all of it.
So there is very real possibility of him giving this password is giving her ALL passwords.

Waiting for those who support spousal snooping -- at least for the female halves of the relationship -- to weigh in. We know they're out there. I find myself wondering what these snoop-advocates would think if it were the male half of the relationship writing Amy demanding to know why his girlfriend won't give him her email password.

And for the record, I agree with everything above; you do not have the right to snoop in your partner's email, phone messages or whatever else is not owned jointly. (And owning things jointly is stupid anyway.)

I have never owned a joint bank account (except when I was a child and had to have my mother sign on my savings account), and never will.

Waiting for those who support spousal snooping -- at least for the female halves of the relationship -- to weigh in

I don't know if this counts as "spousal snooping", but...

My wife and I have each other's passwords, and access each others' emails regularly, if we need to find someone's address or phone#, flight info, etc. We're both much too boring to have affairs, we don't write or receive super-personal emails, etc. I would never suggest that every couple should operate like this. It works for us.

There's nothing wrong with this guy not wanting to give his password. If LW really needs the type of relationship where they both can access each others' email and everything else, it sounds like she's with the wrong guy.

KF, my folks are like that. Heck, I have all their passwords and their PINs and all sorts of stuff, but that's mostly because mom's in poor health and can't do much for herself and dad drives a truck, so he's never home.

I don't think there's necessarily anything WRONG with wanting to be that much into each other's busines, although I don't get it. I do think it needs to be mutual. As you say, she's probably with the wrong man.

I think this has less to do with trust/suspicion and more with different expectations for privacy. If you grew up in a household or lived with roommates or past SOs where everything was open and shared then it might be hard to understand why other people don't have that same level of openness, and vice versa. Similar to things like sharing towels/toothbrushes/deodorant with SOs--some people would be skeeved out, others couldn't care less.

For me, my parents always had a strong respect for my sister and my's privacy coupled with a healthy degree disinterest in our lives. They probably wouldn't have even read my diary if I left it highlighted and sitting open on the kitchen table, let alone snooped through my room to find it. As a result, it never occurred to me to be scrupulous about protecting my privacy, keeping things hidden, signing out of my email on the family computer, etc.

Then in college, it was hard for me to understand why my roommates would password-protect their laptops or lock their bedroom doors when they left the house. I wasn't in the habit of doing either, so at first seeing other people take those was almost offensive--like, do you think I'm going to steal your stuff?

Eventually I realized that it was just a habit (and probably a smart one) that had nothing to do with me personally, but I can relate to the feeling of insult in that type of situation.

On the other hand, I can also understand why someone who had their privacy violated in the past by a parent, roommate, ex, or even an identity theft would be compulsive about protecting their privacy even when it was inconvenient, impractical, or unnecessary.

So IMO, it's not always personal and it's not always about trust or lack there of on either end--it's just about compromising, setting clear boundaries, and figuring whether you can ultimately be compatible.

@kf: "I don't know if this counts as "spousal snooping", but..."

I don't think it does. From your comment, I get the idea that this was something mutually agreed on, for entirely practical reasons.

As for LW, she might consider asking herself, would she be okay with her boyfriend eavesdropping on her telephone conversations, or listening in the next booth while she meets her girlfriends for lunch. And if she is okay with that, I'd say she's got a whole 'nother set of problems.

Without even reading the other comments, I would like to say:

I have been with my husband for 22 years. We have been married for 17. I trust him implicitly; I have never known him to lie to me, nor to keep secret anything important that concerned me. We have long since grown so close that we are what we refer to as "effectively psychic" -- usually knowing what the other is thinking (and often we're thinking the same thing), virtually always knowing how they feel.

I do not have his email passwords. I do not listen in on his phone calls. I do not open his mail. I do not check his browser history. Why not? Because I love him, I don't own him. He is a separate human being, and he has a right to be a separate human being. I am not entitled to his every thought, nor do I have some inalienable right to be privy to his every conversation with someone else. He has activities -- clubs and such -- that he goes to on his own, and he has his own friends, though of course we have many friends in common. He has a right to a life of his own. He, of course, treats me the same way.

When I met him, he was in a bad engagement to a girl who, among other things, got hacked if he spent time with other people without taking her along. Maybe six weeks after we started dating, an old college friend of his came through town, and they decided they'd drive a couple of hours to visit a couple of other old college buddies. Having been trained by the ex-fiance, he assumed I'd insist on coming along. I said, "I'd be a fifth wheel. You'd just have to spend the evening explaining inside jokes to me. Go, have fun, I'll see you tomorrow when you get back."

Major, major turning point in the relationship. The fact that I respected him as an individual was HUGE. Still is.

He's your boyfriend, not your child or your dog. You don't own him. Respect him as an individual, fercryingoutloud.

They probably wouldn't have even read my diary if I left it highlighted and sitting open on the kitchen table

How inconsiderate of them! You mean if you wanted to tell them you were knocked up in your teens you would have had to do it face to face?

When my brother passed away unexpectedly several years back, his wife was unable to access any of his electronic accounts. What a additional pain she did not not need. We never found his passwords! After helping her recover as much from his computer as I could, I vowed I wouldn't put my wife through that. So, I have securely captured as many of my passwords as I can think of and told her where to get them. I keep them updated when forced to change them. We've been married 30 years and trust isn't an issue for us.

My husband and I have all each other's passwords. We just don't use them to snoop.

There are services that will keep your passwords for you in case the worst happens .... .

My ex was a control freak who wanted to have access to everything in my life. He even dug up my diary from my teen years and wanted to know about what I had written there!

Thank god my fiance now is not like that. He has never asked for my passwords (except for Netflix!) or gone through my purse. I don't go through his wallet, though I do go through his pockets before doing laundry (learned that the hard way).

There have been times I have needed him to log in to one of his accounts to forward me some info, and I just hand him the laptop and look away--not only do I not want to know, I want to afford him the same respect that I receive so he won't ever feel like he has to cover his hands or hunker over the keyboard to keep something private.

It doesn't hurt that I'm older now, and I know that there are things I don't want to know!

You're missing something here.

If your squeeze has your passwords and accesses something by mistake, the strain on your relationship caused by data loss or identity theft will be much worse than the angst over their not being able to see everything you do on-line.

I don't see anything wrong with wanting to know your partners password. In fact I think its something that comes natural as the bond between two people grow stronger.

It's as big or as small as you make it out to be. Think about it, we didn't have this issue 50 years ago when web mail didn't exist. Are you really gonna let technology possibly ruin a great relationship?

Relationships have always been hard to have, especially long, healthy ones. As time goes by they get tougher due to all the extra drama we bring into them. With cell phones, fast cars, social media, email, its harder to feel like you're the "special" person in your partners life anymore. So, why not demonstrate it by sharing/offering something as intimate yet as fabricated as a password?

I'm not saying I agree with snooping on your partner. Trust me, that will happen with or without your password if there's trust issues. Its about being an open book, laying your cards on the table for your partner to read as he/she desires. It's a great feeling.

I'm not talking about HUMAN RIGHTS here, I'm talking about being able to willingly share your password with someone you trust and love.

I'm speaking from my own personal experiences, knowing there's no right or wrong answer. For me this is step equivalent as meeting my partners parents. It's become a must have, for me.

It could have saved me tears, bad moments and years of my life in the past. The smartest thing I can do is learn from my own mistakes, right?

I dated a guy for almost four years. After one year I knew/thought he was the one, I was in love. We shared many things, clothes, toothbrush, cars, you name it, but never passwords. It was the myspace days, and we had the typical drama that came along with it. Why did you comment on this person's page? Who's this new friend you just added? Things got bad enough that we both agreed on making our pages private to avoid the unnecessary drama. Years went by, three to be exact and there was no signs of infidelity. We had a good relationship, I just considered him extra private with his cyber life. I, in the other hand had no issues leaving my computer turned on, unlocked or opened mail box.
One day, I showed up at his apartment for dinner. He was in the shower, I peaked my head to say hello, mentioned I was gonna jump on the computer to check my mail while I waited. No biggie, I got on his computer, typed in yahoo and...yahoo/match.com came up on the browser. I was NOT snooping. But I had to look, it was weird to see it on the browser, very suspicious don't you think? I mean if you're in a stable relationship why would you look through ads? Turned out, he had an ad going and mail from numerous girls and guys who he was obviously seeing on the side. All of sudden everything made sense. He was hiding so much, living a second life from the start. We broke up on bad terms. He said it was my fault for snooping around. In other words... what I don't know, wont hurt me. BS!

I am currently in the greatest, most balanced relationship I've had, with the most amazing guy ever. After one year of dating, we concluded to lay our cards on the table and be open books with each other to create a strong foundation and pursue a future together. We decided to eliminate all the artificial and unnecessary drama in our lives. We shared our email passwords, and exchanged apartment kseys. This has made our relationship grow much stronger. None of us want to deal with the childish nonsense that we dealt with in the past.

We still have our private lives, friends and alone time. That hasn't changed. We just trust each other completely with things that honestly shouldn't be such a big deal.

Since he gave me his password, I've only logged onto his account once, and this was because he asked me to. At the time he was in an area where logging into his email was not an option and he needed me to do it for him. It made me feel very good. I'm pretty sure he hasn't logged into mine ever.

Sharing our passwords felt good, we have nothing to hide from each other, we know that we want to be with each other forever and would get married if it was an option, but it's not.
We're both men.

I wouldn't have it any other way.

I'm a very private person, and am the most comfortable with a guy that's the same. I've been with control freaks to mistook my privacy for something suspicious and tried to turn the relationship into a police state. Then they were surprised when I would dump them.

I would also say that you can't trust anyone 100% and get lazy about seeing what's going on with their lives. Communication is very important and if your partner seems distant or has changed his behaviour even slightly, you have to find out what's going on, but not through interrogation or snooping. Relationships evolve, people change, boredom sets in, so you can never take things for granted.

"With cell phones, fast cars, social media, email, its harder to feel like you're the "special" person in your partners life anymore."

Oh horseshit. My husband and I are both techies, obsessed with the latest and greatest technology, software, apps, and games. There is still zero question that I am the most special person in his life and he's the most special person in mine. And no, we've never shared passwords. I don't open his mail or eavesdrop on his phone conversations either.

"We decided to eliminate all the artificial and unnecessary drama in our lives."
Yeah, and sharing passwords has nothing to do with that at all. It's entirely possible to have zero drama without having the ability to peer into everything your significant other is doing. It's also possible for an "open book" relationship to be more dramatic than Macbeth.

"We're both men."
And?