AIBU To Point Out Opinions You Don’t See Outside Of Mumsnet …?

But the hotel debate reminds me that something I always notice on Mumsnet that is really different to my friends in real life is that on here, it's like the only type of holiday anyone thinks is a real holiday is a huge AI hotel. It's like no one stays in a small hotel or an Airbnb or anything other than an AI resort. IRL, I know hardly anyone who holidays like that - most of my friends go to small boutique hotels or do city breaks with apartments.

I think this really depends on the type of hotel.

I have done this in small family run hotels - these are really no different to large houses and no one would stop you from going to get your baby in a fire. It isn't really any riskier than at home, with a video monitor and is nothing like what the McCann parents did.

A large hotel with hundreds of guests and several floors no, not even with a video monitor

I don't think I have ever seen the former opinion on MN, except by people putting up straw men arguments.
In fact generalisations about groups of people like this tend to be deleted on MN anyway.
The debate on FWR is far far more nuanced. I won't attempt to rehash it here, but the summary is you can't change sex so you aren't legally allowed into opposite sex spaces and shouldn't try to group yourself with that opposite sex.

I will say with the ageism thing - I don’t think it’s the most prevalent but I do think it’s something that’s just seen as acceptable. You can make sweeping statements about the young/ old and it’s basically fine. I do think mumsnet misses that it does go both ways. I am 26 and hear all the time that young people are entitled and lazy and all that.

I also think classism is something that’s people really underestimate the prevalence of in this country, and that it’s probably seen as the most acceptable. I am definitely a bit biased, because I have faced a lot of classism despite now being financially pretty well off. I am not saying social class is totally immutable but I know I will always be seen differently to my middle class peers because of how I sound, the words I use, and even kind of the way I look, I can’t change my (objectively a bit chavy) taste because it’s who I am and what I enjoy. I have to accept that there’s always going to be (quiet a lot) of people in my peer group who look down on me and believe I don’t belong/ treat me with suspicion.

Leaving a baby in a hotel room several floors up or anywhere where you cannot see who accesses that room with their own keys, or somewhere that would be very difficult to get back to in a fire, because I really wanted to eat in the nice place downstairs without the baby is not a reason I could forgive myself for

So its less about the risk but the potential guilt if something did happen?

You can see, everyone has video baby monitors now.

A fire is very unlikely and a hotel will have excellent systems for that eventuality.

In a small hotel you can probably get back to your room in a matter of seconds.

If the room was too far away, the monitor didn’t work, I didn’t feel the environment was right… I’d not do it either. But in some scenarios, I think it’s fine.

Life is full of risk and you have to assess your comfort level - this seems statistically far safer to me than many more mundane daily things we do with our children.

As with many things, the responses here are very black and white rather than considering the nuance of it.

I did it several times when my kids were babies. Before baby monitors were common, hotels had "listening services", where they listened to your room (on the phone maybe?) and came to find you if your baby cried.

I think that saying “All trans people are perverted sex offenders who are just on a mission to access female spaces in order to alarm or rape women” is transphobic.

Saying “Yeah, in truth I don’t believe a person can change biological sex, but if someone wants to change their name, take hormones, have surgery and wear a dress it’s entirely their right to do so, and has no impact on me whatsoever” isn’t transphobia.

ETA: It’s usually the former option that we see on Mumsnet.

Well the fire could bar me couldn’t it?

People break into peoples homes all the time, you can’t control that 100%

My child is far more at risk from an injury when I take them in the car somewhere.

And my child is statistically more likely to be harmed by someone close to the family but I don’t isolate them from said family & friends.

Yes much better than i have explained, thank you

@MidnightPatrolcompletely agree about the pressure on parents. Compared to my 80s childhood it’s so different.

If there is a fire in your house no one will bar the way and stop you running upstairs to get your children.

In a hotel fire that won’t necessarily be the case.

In your own home you have total control of who enters your child’s room. In a hotel all sorts of people will have access to the door key.

And yes fires are rare and so are child abductions so then it depends how much risk you are willing to take and mileage will vary on this point.

Of course people go to the kitchen in their house while their baby sleeps in the nursery. It's be impossible to move through life otherwise.

We put babies in cars and drive to places - really dangerous but we need to get on with life.

Awful things can happen in the above situations but at least you can forgive yourself - you need to go about life.

Leaving a baby in a hotel room several floors up or anywhere where you cannot see who accesses that room with their own keys, or somewhere that would be very difficult to get back to in a fire, because I really wanted to eat in the nice place downstairs without the baby is not a reason I could forgive myself for.

A different room in your house vs a hotel room are not the same, obviously.

I'll end it here because obviously we just agree to disagree

house guests who strip the bed leaving the bedding folded on the bed are criminals. Despite this being basic social etiquette and the “done” thing

I don’t know anyone who does this & have never done it. Basic social etiquette?

But 'real life' depends on your circle and where you live. People where I live have very different views to the people I work with. And some different views to where i grew up. Am I going to share my own views with all sets of people? Not always, because conversation is often just being non committal unless you feel safe around those people.

Don't know anyone who'd leave their kids alone in a hotel room though. Even the slightly shit parents. At home, in the garden etc, yes, but something just seems off about doing it elsewhere.

Quite interesting looking at previous posts on Mumsnet about this, that even in the post madeleine McCann era
~15 years ago, people’s posts about this are far less extreme.

Modern parenting has become very anxious and the idea you are putting your child at risk of death or abduction in this scenario is a really good example of that. The risk is no greater than it ever was, the technology we have makes you able to be more attentive and aware than ever, yet people seem to be developing far more extreme views about doing it.

One of the myriad of ways in which modern parenting has become unnecessarily worse for the parents due to self-inflicted pressures…!

I don't know anyone I know who stayed in the same room as their baby for ALL sleeps and naps until their baby was six months old. Absolutely everyone I know, would put the baby upstairs at night and come downstairs with the baby monitor for a few hours.

And surely if you have more than one child this would be impossible anyway. There's no way I could have been in the same room with my baby while they napped while my 3 year old needed the toilet, or wanted to play, or was charging about plus all the other things that need done when you have two kids!

That everyone is investing and has maxed out a bunch of stocks and shares ISAs, has a fund for their kids to go through uni and still has enough spare to consider a new investment avenue.

I know a handful of people who are able to do this but the majority of us are just working out where on earth the next childcare payment and car repair is actually going to come from.

I don’t think it is. I think people just scream transphobia when women say that trans women are men and shouldn’t be in their safe spaces. That isn’t transphobia, as much as some people like to say it is.

All brand new clothes, towels, sheets must always be washed before being worn and immediately after 1 wear.

Yet also and conversely,
house guests who strip the bed leaving the bedding folded on the bed are criminals. Despite this being basic social etiquette and the “done” thing.

My elderly Mother and Mother in Law would like to be able to ensure that their personal care is carried out by a woman.

My teenage daughter would like to be sure her sports team won’t be at risk of any men in the opposing team or in the changing rooms.

I would like to make sure that vulnerable women in prison, in refuges or in rape crisis centres aren't forced to share space with men at any time.

We all have better things to do with our time but sadly need to focus on this particular topic until women’s rights are properly sorted out.

It’s so weird!

Maybe this is another fundamental difference between my social circle and yours - we openly discuss these things and I know for a fact my close friends a) all work and earn their own money (i.e. none are SAH), and b) keep finances separate - own checking accounts, own credit cards, own pension, own savings/investments. They will literally say things like “I sold my shares in ABC but {DH} still has his”, as an example, which obviously implies separate brokerage accounts.

Why is saying something is unthinkable to me and everyone I know considered judgemental? It’s just a fact. It would be unthinkable to any one of us to willingly make ourselves financially dependent on someone else. In the same way it would be unthinkable for us to, say, convert to a religion or move to DR Congo or never exercise again. Some things are so alien to a particular person or strata of society, that they really are unthinkable.

You forgot the biggest one. That anything you say you’ve seen on Mumsnet someone will ALWAYS reply saying that they've never seen that on here, so it can’t have happened.

The irony. 🤣