marital boundaries

Rhonda is 28, married without kids, and has only been out of work for two months. Already her husband, John, is resenting the fact that he’s responsible for all expenses - but Rhonda didn't expect his resentment to go as far as it did.

Rhonda was willing to excuse his stingy behavior on account of the fact that they do have heavy commitments - mortgage, car repayments and a heavy credit card debt that she, rather than John, ran up - but when he took it upon himself to post her resume online - without her permission - Rhonda was enraged.

"John maintains that he was only trying to help speed up my job searching," says Rhonda, "but what right does he have to do something like this behind my back?"

"I kept my own name when we married because I don't want to lose my identity," explains Rhonda, "but even this simple marital boundary did not prevent him from thinking that I am his property."

"John is computer semi-illiterate and I don't even know how he managed to do it," sighs Rhonda, "but I'm angry with him not just because he did it but because he doesn't understand the online job market as well as I do."

Rhonda explains that the speed and convenience of online job-hunting can trap unwary jobseekers into making some dreadful mistakes - one of which is the potential of sending your resume and personal details to bogus sites.

"John says that he only posted my resume to a few sites," says Rhonda, "but from what I can see he plastered it all over the Internet. He may as well have written my telephone number in a public lavatory!"

Rhonda is very concerned about whether or not the sites he posted her resume to are bona fide.

"I would never post my personal details online without first checking with the agency behind it, or knowing someone who has used the site and received job offers through it," explains Rhonda.

"Also," says Rhonda, "with so many people unemployed these days, what employer bothers looking at online resumes? As far as I'm concerned, all John has done is expose my personal details to prying eyes."

She checked out the sites John had posted her resume to, and only one of them had an office address and a telephone number readily available on the site. She then checked to see if the address was valid and called the number listed to inquire personally about their job matching record.

"The line was dead," cries Rhonda. "John had indeed posted my resume to a bogus site, and the other sites were even more suspicious because they had no real life contact details. How are these sites allowed to get away with that? It's cowboy land out there in cyberspace!"

Until newspapers brought in very strict rules about job advertisers, Rhonda is well aware that there were a lot of bogus operators advertising non-existent jobs just to obtain a pool of job applicants to promote their business.

Worse still, some of those job advertisements were placed by crooks.

"Predatory men placed job advertisements specific to females, and thieves placed bogus job advertisements to gain addresses and telephone numbers for convenient house-breaking."

"I'm now paranoid that our house is going to get robbed and I can't believe that John would be so dumb as to post my name, address, telephone number and personal history on the Internet," sighs Rhonda. "This is taking marital liberties way out of normal boundaries."

"Obviously," says Rhonda, "the Internet job market is slow catching up with strict rules governing privacy and job advertising. Nobody really knows whether any advertised job exists, or whether the people behind the job agency or portal are merely collecting personal data for marketing purposes."

Rhonda is not even very happy applying online for positions placed directly by well-known companies, or well-known recruiting agencies. She is well aware that any personal information sent through cyberspace could end up anywhere.

"In an employee’s job market - when labor is scarce - online resume posting could be viable," says Rhonda, "but only if resumes are strictly limited to viewing by bone fide employers."

"In an employer's job market like today's," says Rhonda, "job seekers are a dime a dozen and all John has done is devalue me more than I feel already."

"He's posted my resume to sites that are available for viewing by nosy web-surfers, and no matter how much he argues that he was only helping me find a job, I cannot forgive him."

"John tried to get around my horror at seeing my name and personal details plastered on the Internets by saying I can always use his name from now on," laughs Rhonda, "and now I'm thinking that he's not only resentful of having to support me while I'm unemployed but also that I kept my own name!"

"I love the dope but if we are to remain together then he's got to learn about marital boundaries," says Rhonda. "There are some things you just can't ride roughshod over and my private identity, separate from him, is non-negotiable."