Infidelity: Protecting Your Marriage, Social MediaSample

ACCOUNTS, PASSWORDS, AND BEST PRACTICES

Again, it’s common practice for couples to maintain separate social media accounts (that’s how Facebook is set up to work), it’s a good idea for husbands and wives to share their passwords with one another, both as a gesture of mutual respect and as a way of ensuring accountability. Their respective Facebook profiles should make it clear that they are married to one another. Icons, photos, and other visual images should be designed to remind visitors that they are married. As far as possible, posted pictures should frequently show husband and wife together. Everything should be expressed to reflect the couple’s identity as a unit.

If desired, couples can prevent unwanted searches by making full use of their privacy settings. They can also set up the same access groups on both pages, ensuring that each spouse is sharing only with the same group of people. In cases where a greater degree of accountability is required or recommended, spouses may decide to set up a new shared “family” account instead. This type of joint account does have its limitations for the practical use of social media, but in situations where it is necessary to preserve the integrity of the marriage relationship, we would not advise against these safeguards.

It’s important to emphasize that this isn’t about lack of trust. Husbands and wives don’t need to“baby-sit” each other to make sure that no one gets out of line. At the most basic level, this is simply a question of remaining above reproach. It’s a way of staying accountable to one another and to the rest of the world. The apostle Paul urges Christians to steer clear not only of evil itself but even of the mere appearance of evil (1 Thessalonians 5:22). This is something believers need to take seriously, both in their marriages and in their interactions with others.

And that’s not all. The “open door policy” can actually foster a healthy sense of freedom in a marriage when it’s utilized in the right way. If it doesn’t — that is, if it turns into a kind of “monitoring,” a la “Big Brother” — that probably indicates that a couple already had trust issues before they got involved with social media. Where this is the case, they could probably benefit by engaging the help of a trained counselor. Remember, if your communication as a couple is suffering, Facebook isn’t likely to help. As a matter of fact, it will probably only make matters worse.

It’s important to add that sharing passwords or, if appropriate, maintaining a shared account can also be a way of building a hedge around your marriage. It’s a strategy for protecting your relationship against outside threats. Whether you’ve been married for thirty days or thirty years, you’re never really immune to the threat of an extra-marital affair.