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>> When her children were teenagers, Rebecca decided to tell them that she was a spy. “They were super sensible, and I judged the information wasn’t going to be

>> When her children were teenagers, Rebecca decided to tell them that she was a spy. “They were super sensible, and I judged the information wasn’t going to be a burden for them, that they wouldn’t tell everybody.” Is Rebecca still working there?

giantg2 4y ago
Yeah... not a good idea. That's the type of info you might divulge on your deathbed to adult children. Absolutely insane to tell teens while still working there.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- s5300 4y ago
  Between a duty to family & country, which should truly come first in our short lives? Had her children ever accidentally found out at near any time in their lives, they may have never been able to trust their mother again - severing what arguably should be one of the strongest bonds one can have. Would you (rhetorically) find it reasonable that she, or anybody with children, is required to live with that thought in the back of their mind? In an occupation she’s otherwise taken an oath (highly presumably) to devote her allegiance to? I’m not sure. It definitely seems like a question with a hard answer.
  - thefounder 4y ago
    Lol. It's supposed that one of them (i.e the mother) should behave like and adult and own it. Of course nobody forced her to choose serving her country but I believe in this case she failed both her duty to family & country. It's just proof that not all the people are up for this job. I remeber when my brother spilled the beans on a "family secret" to some close family friends in front of my mother...good that was just a silly thing. Now imagine that could get her fired or worse, cause someone's death. I wonder if she(or the remaining parent) would find it sensible to share that as well with the children.
    - etrevino 4y ago
      > Lol. It's supposed that one of them (i.e the mother) should behave like and adult and own it. Of course nobody forced her to choose serving her country but I believe in this case she failed both her duty to family & country. > It's just proof that not all the people are up for this job. It's understood that family members will know to some extent. If nothing else, this is so that they know to be wary of security threats many people would otherwise ignore. She's almost certainly not sharing details of operations, she's instead sharing with her daughters why things are the way they are in their household. I've said in other comments, this is another world and the concerns here are different. It's not like it is in the movies. Again, that family members will know to some extent is understood, which is why she felt comfortable admitting it in the interview, otherwise she would have lost her job and the article would have been kiboshed by the security services.
    - ClumsyPilot 4y ago
      > I believe in this case she failed both her duty to family & country. So you likely never had to handle top secret information and couldn't spy his way out of a paper bag, has just declared that one of the most successful spies is a failure. So typical.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    "they may have never been able to trust their mother again" That's a real stretch. Anyone with the maturity to understand that information should also have the maturity to delineate between lies for inconsequential things in the sake of national security vs personal lies affecting their lives. "Between a duty to family & country," The logic goes that duties to country are inclusive of duties to family because without a stable country your family is less protected. That's what they say. Whether you agree or not is another matter. Not agreeing means that job likely wasn't for you anyways.
  - etrevino 4y ago
    I replied to the parent comment above, but it's worth replying to this. The kids might not know what mom did before this, but the way the mother operates was long ago normalized for them. The mother probably never lied-- they usually don't-- she probably just never shared. What the mother does is a job that isn't necessarily in conflict with her love for her children. People have to balance the effort they put into their job (as opposed to the effort they put into their children) all the time. She still gets to make that choice, at least in the US and the UK (as is the case here). That choice may cost her her job, but that's true of any job. This is all to say, it's highly doubtful that this had the impact to their relationship that you're imagining here.
- etrevino 4y ago
  I can speak as someone who was in the same situation as the teens. This is about the time that the kids begin to cotton on to the fact that things aren't quite right. Really, this is the point at which the parent has to start lying (as opposed to saying something like "oh I work for the government") or trust to their children's discretion. The kids' entire raising up to this point has normalized strong patriotism and a parents' inconsistent presence as a result of that patriotism. This likely came as no real shock to them. This is a different world and I didn't realize how different until I went away to college.
  - ClumsyPilot 4y ago
    Other commenters hwre seem to think that everyone else in the family is an idiot and will never catch on, despite living together for decades. This will lead to family suspecting their mother of cheating or crime.n
    - etrevino 4y ago
      Right. Lot of judgments made without considering how this might work long term in the real world.
    - poulsbohemian 4y ago
      When I was a kid, there was a guy at our church who had spent some years at a South American embassy and was vaguely in the defense industry. There were little bits of his story that all had us suspecting he likely did cloak and dagger stuff for the CIA in reality, but no point in really asking him for the truth.
    - giantg2 4y ago
      "This will lead to family suspecting their mother of cheating or crime." Generally not with the proper cover story. Stuff like working as a civilian purchasing agent for the military or other government agency provides an element of truth and can be strongly consistent with the realities of the true job. Travel for purchasing deals vs espionage, etc look the same for the family. Even better is if they actually are involved with the purchasing deals since it makes for a more solid cover.
- martopix 4y ago
  How do you know what the rules are? How do you know what the teenagers in questions were like? I find these comments astonishing. We literally know nothing about them, the family, "Rebecca" herself, her job, the rules behind it; how can anyone speak with such confidence and think they know better than her and her bosses?
- twic 4y ago
  I think there's a lot of misunderstanding here. A key thing to appreciate is that the women in this article, including Rebecca, are not spies. They are civil servants [1] working in a very sensitive area of government. None of them are undercover, or sneaking into Russian bases. It's a sensible precaution for them to keep quiet about what they do, but it's not like their ability to do their job depends on absolute secrecy. By way of comparison, the US equivalent of Rebecca, who is the deputy to the chief of the service, would be the deputy director of the CIA. The identity of that person is not only public, he has a wikipedia page [2]! [1] Well, diplomatic servants, but that's basically an alternative flavour of civil servant that exists for historical reasons [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_S._Cohen_(attorney) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_S._Cohen_(attorney)
  - munificent 4y ago
    The definition of "spy" that I know is that they are people who cultivate relationships with "agents" or "assets": people who have access to important secret information and are willing to share it. Most spies don't go into forbidden places and physically dig up secrets themselves. It's infinitely easier to get to know someone who already knows those secrets and persuade them to tell.
    - twic 4y ago
      That's not the correct definition. A spy is someone who does spying, and spying is obtaining information illicitly. Like the Cambridge Five: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Five https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Five Or Aldrich Ames: https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-cases/aldrich-ames https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-cases/aldrich-ames Someone who manages spies is an intelligence officer.
  - etrevino 4y ago
    I think that just depends on your definition of spy. If you're thinking, say, Americans being undercover or sneaking onto bases (instead of using local assets to do it) then it would probably fall under the Special Activities Center, which is a subset of the CIA. While you're right that these folks aren't undercover in the sense that their identities are known, that those identities are linked to an intelligence gathering agency is not known. A lot does happen out in the open and it always has. Being a member of the diplomatic service gives them protection when they're operating in a foreign country. You operate out of an embassy and if you're arrested they usually trade you back to your home country, because diplomatic immunity.
- thatcat 4y ago
  Yea like your kids are stupid and can't tell what's going on lol
- mhoad 4y ago
  I don’t want to be the bearer of bad news but it’s actually incredibly common and even the norm for most members to tell their children before adulthood.
WFHRenaissance 4y ago
Don't Tell Everyone You're A Spy Challenge: Difficulty IMPOSSIBLE
bell-cot 4y ago
> While I was writing this piece, Rebecca retired from MI6.
yencabulator 4y ago
Earlier in the article: > [...] working at MI6 is a distinctly strange experience. You cannot tell anyone beyond close family who your employer is, and even they are not allowed to know anything about your day-to-day activities.
sensitivefrost 4y ago
Literally two paragraphs down it says she has since retired from MI6.
bpye 4y ago
It's mentioned that past a point the cover of working at the Foreign Office is unsustainable. They give an example of having 6 mobile phones in your bag, and needing to leave a dinner with friends at a moments notice. I wager it's better to tell them (which is allowed as they are immediate family) and have the conversation about discretion, rather than have them put the pieces together themselves.

giantg2 4y ago

Yeah... not a good idea. That's the type of info you might divulge on your deathbed to adult children. Absolutely insane to tell teens while still working there.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
s5300 4y ago
Between a duty to family & country, which should truly come first in our short lives? Had her children ever accidentally found out at near any time in their lives, they may have never been able to trust their mother again - severing what arguably should be one of the strongest bonds one can have. Would you (rhetorically) find it reasonable that she, or anybody with children, is required to live with that thought in the back of their mind? In an occupation she’s otherwise taken an oath (highly presumably) to devote her allegiance to? I’m not sure. It definitely seems like a question with a hard answer.
- thefounder 4y ago
  Lol. It's supposed that one of them (i.e the mother) should behave like and adult and own it. Of course nobody forced her to choose serving her country but I believe in this case she failed both her duty to family & country. It's just proof that not all the people are up for this job. I remeber when my brother spilled the beans on a "family secret" to some close family friends in front of my mother...good that was just a silly thing. Now imagine that could get her fired or worse, cause someone's death. I wonder if she(or the remaining parent) would find it sensible to share that as well with the children.
  - etrevino 4y ago
    > Lol. It's supposed that one of them (i.e the mother) should behave like and adult and own it. Of course nobody forced her to choose serving her country but I believe in this case she failed both her duty to family & country. > It's just proof that not all the people are up for this job. It's understood that family members will know to some extent. If nothing else, this is so that they know to be wary of security threats many people would otherwise ignore. She's almost certainly not sharing details of operations, she's instead sharing with her daughters why things are the way they are in their household. I've said in other comments, this is another world and the concerns here are different. It's not like it is in the movies. Again, that family members will know to some extent is understood, which is why she felt comfortable admitting it in the interview, otherwise she would have lost her job and the article would have been kiboshed by the security services.
  - ClumsyPilot 4y ago
    > I believe in this case she failed both her duty to family & country. So you likely never had to handle top secret information and couldn't spy his way out of a paper bag, has just declared that one of the most successful spies is a failure. So typical.
- giantg2 4y ago
  "they may have never been able to trust their mother again" That's a real stretch. Anyone with the maturity to understand that information should also have the maturity to delineate between lies for inconsequential things in the sake of national security vs personal lies affecting their lives. "Between a duty to family & country," The logic goes that duties to country are inclusive of duties to family because without a stable country your family is less protected. That's what they say. Whether you agree or not is another matter. Not agreeing means that job likely wasn't for you anyways.
- etrevino 4y ago
  I replied to the parent comment above, but it's worth replying to this. The kids might not know what mom did before this, but the way the mother operates was long ago normalized for them. The mother probably never lied-- they usually don't-- she probably just never shared. What the mother does is a job that isn't necessarily in conflict with her love for her children. People have to balance the effort they put into their job (as opposed to the effort they put into their children) all the time. She still gets to make that choice, at least in the US and the UK (as is the case here). That choice may cost her her job, but that's true of any job. This is all to say, it's highly doubtful that this had the impact to their relationship that you're imagining here.
etrevino 4y ago
I can speak as someone who was in the same situation as the teens. This is about the time that the kids begin to cotton on to the fact that things aren't quite right. Really, this is the point at which the parent has to start lying (as opposed to saying something like "oh I work for the government") or trust to their children's discretion. The kids' entire raising up to this point has normalized strong patriotism and a parents' inconsistent presence as a result of that patriotism. This likely came as no real shock to them. This is a different world and I didn't realize how different until I went away to college.
- ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  Other commenters hwre seem to think that everyone else in the family is an idiot and will never catch on, despite living together for decades. This will lead to family suspecting their mother of cheating or crime.n
  - etrevino 4y ago
    Right. Lot of judgments made without considering how this might work long term in the real world.
  - poulsbohemian 4y ago
    When I was a kid, there was a guy at our church who had spent some years at a South American embassy and was vaguely in the defense industry. There were little bits of his story that all had us suspecting he likely did cloak and dagger stuff for the CIA in reality, but no point in really asking him for the truth.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    "This will lead to family suspecting their mother of cheating or crime." Generally not with the proper cover story. Stuff like working as a civilian purchasing agent for the military or other government agency provides an element of truth and can be strongly consistent with the realities of the true job. Travel for purchasing deals vs espionage, etc look the same for the family. Even better is if they actually are involved with the purchasing deals since it makes for a more solid cover.
martopix 4y ago
How do you know what the rules are? How do you know what the teenagers in questions were like? I find these comments astonishing. We literally know nothing about them, the family, "Rebecca" herself, her job, the rules behind it; how can anyone speak with such confidence and think they know better than her and her bosses?
twic 4y ago
I think there's a lot of misunderstanding here. A key thing to appreciate is that the women in this article, including Rebecca, are not spies. They are civil servants [1] working in a very sensitive area of government. None of them are undercover, or sneaking into Russian bases. It's a sensible precaution for them to keep quiet about what they do, but it's not like their ability to do their job depends on absolute secrecy. By way of comparison, the US equivalent of Rebecca, who is the deputy to the chief of the service, would be the deputy director of the CIA. The identity of that person is not only public, he has a wikipedia page [2]! [1] Well, diplomatic servants, but that's basically an alternative flavour of civil servant that exists for historical reasons [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_S._Cohen_(attorney) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_S._Cohen_(attorney)
- munificent 4y ago
  The definition of "spy" that I know is that they are people who cultivate relationships with "agents" or "assets": people who have access to important secret information and are willing to share it. Most spies don't go into forbidden places and physically dig up secrets themselves. It's infinitely easier to get to know someone who already knows those secrets and persuade them to tell.
  - twic 4y ago
    That's not the correct definition. A spy is someone who does spying, and spying is obtaining information illicitly. Like the Cambridge Five: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Five https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Five Or Aldrich Ames: https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-cases/aldrich-ames https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-cases/aldrich-ames Someone who manages spies is an intelligence officer.
- etrevino 4y ago
  I think that just depends on your definition of spy. If you're thinking, say, Americans being undercover or sneaking onto bases (instead of using local assets to do it) then it would probably fall under the Special Activities Center, which is a subset of the CIA. While you're right that these folks aren't undercover in the sense that their identities are known, that those identities are linked to an intelligence gathering agency is not known. A lot does happen out in the open and it always has. Being a member of the diplomatic service gives them protection when they're operating in a foreign country. You operate out of an embassy and if you're arrested they usually trade you back to your home country, because diplomatic immunity.
thatcat 4y ago
Yea like your kids are stupid and can't tell what's going on lol
mhoad 4y ago
I don’t want to be the bearer of bad news but it’s actually incredibly common and even the norm for most members to tell their children before adulthood.

WFHRenaissance 4y ago

Don't Tell Everyone You're A Spy Challenge: Difficulty IMPOSSIBLE

bell-cot 4y ago

> While I was writing this piece, Rebecca retired from MI6.

yencabulator 4y ago

Earlier in the article: > [...] working at MI6 is a distinctly strange experience. You cannot tell anyone beyond close family who your employer is, and even they are not allowed to know anything about your day-to-day activities.

sensitivefrost 4y ago

Literally two paragraphs down it says she has since retired from MI6.

bpye 4y ago

It's mentioned that past a point the cover of working at the Foreign Office is unsustainable. They give an example of having 6 mobile phones in your bag, and needing to leave a dinner with friends at a moments notice. I wager it's better to tell them (which is allowed as they are immediate family) and have the conversation about discretion, rather than have them put the pieces together themselves.