AIBU only gives a snapshot of a person’s life...

[strawberrisc]

I’m a both a reader and a poster on MN and AIBU in particular is the place to come from for no holds barred advice.

However, both reading and posting I’m struck by how difficult it is to always give a full picture of a whole life situation.

It always saddens me when OPs are accused of “drip-feeding” 🤢 when they jump on MN for advice. Often they are distressed about one specific incident and they post mid-crisis without thinking to disclose every finer detail of their life.

Recently I went to post something myself but realised how the situation would sound in isolation but also how impossible it would be to get across every nuance of my entire life.

Does anyone else think this?

[StoppinBy]

Yep. I don't consider it drip feeding, just part of a normal conversation where different questions prompt different memories and relevant answers.

But that being said there are a lot of nasty people just out for blood on here.

[Nautiloid]

Yes I agree. Sometimes other posters will pick up on something genuine in the post where the person lacks self-awareness, but a lot of posters also rip people to shreds over irrelevancies.

[AgentJohnson]

Drip feeding is when someone purposely omits information in order to skew the response and when they don’t get the response they were hoping for the drip starts. It isn’t, disclosing the finer details of their lives in their opening post.

I think some posters really have difficulties in connecting the dots and recognising patterns. It was a shock to me when I realised that the little fires I had been putting out in my relationship turned out to be a pattern of behaviour that I was failing to tackle properly because I couldn’t face the fact that they weren’t isolated but indemic.

[strawberrisc]

@AgentJohnson

Drip feeding is when someone purposely omits information in order to skew the response and when they don’t get the response they were hoping for the drip starts. It isn’t, disclosing the finer details of their lives in their opening post.

I totally agree. That’s why my heart sinks when somebody has turned to MN in a crisis, has not deliberately “drip-fed” and can be torn to shreds.

[mrsmuddlepies]

In some ways it is the nature of the beast. Most posters are anxious to present their own case in a favourable light. I think most readers automatically challenge some 'convenient' details in their own minds and challenge 'facts'. All readers have probably fallen for fabricated posts from trolls at some point and that can make readers question how things are being presented or the speed at which a post develops.

[Dotty1970]

I agree with you also. I think it's like a pack of wolves waiting to pounce.
I'm sure if you were having a conversation with a friend they wouldn't freak out if you started to 'drip feed', it's a natural part of a conversation and easy to not divulge everything in the first post.

[ScreamingValenta]

I think there's a huge difference between more facts coming out in response to questioning, which the OP might not have seen as relevant, but which the experience of other posters tells them might have a bearing on the situation; and withholding a key piece of information that completely changes the OP.

E.g. if it's am AIBU to think my husband is cheating, not mentioning in the OP that he's cheated before; or if it's AIBU about someone's behaviour, not mentioning that they have serious MH issues, etc.

The latter kind of drip-feed is designed to wrong-foot posters who've said YABU on the basis of the original information, and create a bun-fighty sort of thread.

[ushuaiamonamour]

Good points. I think omitting pertinent information is understandable when the poster's distressed not only because of unrecognised patterns but because under extreme stress thinking can become disorderlypoints A, B, C don't follow in order or even come to mindand recollection weakened.

There is a really manipulative form of drip-feeding here that seems to achieve its purpose, an appeal to sympathy for an irrelevant experience. OP: WIBU to have punished my daughter by eating the chips she got from the takeaway? AIBU: You were being unreasonable. You were being unreasonable. Etc. OP: Yeah, but when I was 8 I had to spend 9 months in hospital. AIBU: I'm so sorry. You poor thing. No wonder you feel left out chips-wise.