Reply #56: Ew. Inappropriate much?

[BlueIris]

Your daughter has just as much right to privacy as you do. How would YOU feel if someone read one of your journals? I mean, nice try attempting to rationalize the violation of an essential boundary with the whole "it's publicly published" excuse but she clearly wants to keep it private from her family or she would have mentioned she was keeping it.

I don't know when the last time you took a parenting class was, but experts nowadays will tell you that if your kids, particularly your young adult female ones, aren't allowed to develop a sense of privacy, individuality and an ability to trust their parents, they can develop severe mental health problems in their older years, including lovely things like fears of intimacy, self-esteem problems, self-image issues and more.

Apart from whether or not what you want to do represents good or healthy parenting, however, which in my opinion, it doesn't, it's disrespectful and wrong for you to want to ignore a boundary of this nature. In good relationships, people are aware of and attentive to boundaries. A lack of desire to do so is the kind of thing people go to therapy for.

Other parents of the world, respect your kids. Especially as they mature. Reading their journals, searching their rooms, and pretending it's appropriate for you to do this "just 'cause"--isn't. And it makes you look like assholes.