Only if they have betrayed your trust before or have given you a reason or a bad feeling to be concerned. We are the parents, right?

Absolutely not.  I do not snoop into my teenager's or pre-teen's lives; their room is their room.  If I suspected drugs (the only thing I could imagine that would warrant "looking through" their things), it would be addressed properly. 

My children deserve the same respect as anyone else; we do not hit them, we do not belittle them, we do not snoop on them.  They are people just as much as their father and I are.  They have a great deal of respect for our beliefs.

originally posted by SandraStehly

Absolutely not.  I do not snoop into my teenager's or pre-teen's lives; their room is their room.  If I suspected drugs (the only thing I could imagine that would warrant "looking through" their things), it would be addressed properly. 

My children deserve the same respect as anyone else; we do not hit them, we do not belittle them, we do not snoop on them.  They are people just as much as their father and I are.  They have a great deal of respect for our beliefs.

You said it!  I think it's great when parents treat their kids with respect. 

 Of course I snoop, I am not ashamed to admit it.  It has nothing to do with trusting her, it is trusting the others around her.  She is still a child and I am here to protect her.  Knowing that I have admitted to her my diary snooping adventure, we talked it through and was she mad yes, but glad to be able to talk some friend issues out with me.  I have not read in a while, but I do keep my keen eyes out there aware of her coming and going so that I may have a better reaction to the changes that are going on in her life.

When mine isn't old enough yes I will snoop and I really don't consider it a violation I view it as protecting my child and steering them in the right direction, if they aren't doing anything bad then they won't have anything to hide.

I think there is a difference between snooping and "being a proactive parent" I would never snoop through a journal or anything like that (unless it is warranted) but when my children are old enough they will not have free roam of text messaging and the internet (like facebook) Parents who are so nieve to "trust" their children online are the parents who have no idea what is online to begin with. Granted, my kids will know up front that it is not "private" and that we will check in on it at any point.

It isn't my own kids I'd be worried about, it's the rest of the world.

When DH's older daughter came to live with us after HS, she had her own room upstairs over our garage.  She was told that it was 'her domain' but that if DH ever felt it necessary, he reserved the right to go through everything in there...including her car which we were paying for.  Our philosophy is that a child, no matter what age, has to EARN your trust and respect.

i think parents have a right to know what they're child is doing. up until about the age of 16-18 i think it's ok to do it. i don't want my kid to be sneaking around and doing things behind my back, and i think that way you can at least keep an eye on what it is they're doing.

If your paying the bills, snoop away!

When our son is older I will definitely look around his room on a regular basis.  I prefer not to call it snooping since it's OUR house and in OUR house, we have the right to look around every room.