Unpleasant thread answers, but not ‘personal attacks’? Does it make Mumsnet into a place you don’t want to engage with as much, or at all?

I agree with this.

To often either the OP or other posters engage with posters like this. You have to ignore them. It's the only way to take their power.

I also agree with pp who says a mildly unpleasant post will prompt more and more unpleasant ones. Contributing your own kind, thought out post is the best counter balance to this.

I used to get upset by 'nasty' replies here and on other sites. Then I realied, at the end of the day it's just something some person said on the internet.

If they were harsh because they got totally the wrong end of the stick of what I was saying, it's not worth my time explaining to them otherwise - this is such a huge site it's unlikely they'd even remember my name if they saw it on another thread. If they've just decided to be a twat about it, then they're not someone whose good opinion should matter to me anyway. Also, sometimes people are harsh and they are also right and I'm prepared to accept when that's the case.

I am often shocked by how nasty the commenters can get. I read Mumsnet because when the comments are good, they are really good. I learn a lot from the advice, wisdom, and insight here.

But I’m not here for mean, nasty, stupid bullies, and I’m too sensitive for them! I can’t just ignore and move on, as advised. I get quite agitated to see how vulnerable people are treated (often ganged up on!). I don’t want to see it, don’t want to be told to ignore it, don’t want to be on a site with so much cruelty. I wish it would stop! I’m active on various social media platforms, and I’m an influencer, and on none of my social medias does anyone come close to the cruelty I see on here. Not even remotely! This is not social media; it’s something else. I don’t know what.

My guess is that if nothing is done, more bullies will be drawn to this site and make a blood sport out of cruelty, and there will be more and more of this. I predict it’ll become intolerable for me soon enough, but for now, the good outweighs the bad. Because the good is brilliant. I wish the bad would stop!

I also think a victim telling a person who has repeatedly goaded them (without what counts as a personal attack) to fuck off should be read in context and maybe edited rather than deleted.

Under a different name I was once told repeatedly by a certain poster that I clearly preferred my dog to my disabled child based on the flimsiest of excuses (that I wrote "my child" but then in a later post wrote "ddog".) I refuted this politely at first but this poster would not drop it as I got more and more distressed and offended. In the end I told her to fuck off and my post was deleted whilst hers were left to stand. Mumsnet said I hadn't reported hers so they couldn't be expected to delete them, but I think moderators should look at context in these situations a bit more carefully, where a person has a decent posting history and isn't known to be frequently deleted. The moderation "lacks curiosity" sometimes...like suspending a child who has hit someone without identifying, or even exploring, that the person they hit was stealing their dinner money and threatening them every day.

Mumsnet did eventually delete all the other person's posts and ban the poster, but only because i fought my corner behind the scenes.

There's a limit to how much they can delete, though. There are hundreds and hundreds of the types of comments you mention in your OP. It is pretty awful, but I think that in practice the ethos/vibe of the site is a grassroots-created thing. Moderation can only deal with the worst cases.

The best solution would be if we all did our bit to make the site kinder. Often what you see is that mildly unpleasant comments embolden others to make harsher comments, so a thread spirals down and down as people try to outdo one another in aggression.

So I'm trying to think twice before posting in a snippy self-righteous way (I don't always succeed!), and find a kinder way of responding.

I also think we should call people out if they are gratuitously aggressive. Or, if the OP is clearly posting in need of support, and the thread is at risk of being derailed by responses to a nasty poster, we could direct our response to the OP herself and make it clear to her that the nasty posters are not worth attending to and don't represent the majority view.

Facebook is the worst. Nothing seems to go against their community standards unless you want to sell something on marketplace with pet, in the title. At least on here, most things get removed if they're really nasty.

Nasty comments, if not deleted are best ignored. Don't engage and treat like trolls. You really need a thick skin on social media and the ability to switch off mentally when people turn nasty.

Read the room OP!

Don’t you realise how fortunate you are to have a job / child / house / meal on the table / car / DH etc.

‘read the room’ should trigger an automatic comment deletion