It is simple maths. I am sure that ex-WRN Scotland members can improve on this example by supplying more accurate estimates but here goes . . .
If a group has around 120 members and the majority (about 80) are expelled then that leaves 40 members in the Group.
- If 5 exiles are readmitted then 45 members know that 5 have been readmitted. There is little uncertainty here.
- If 60 exiles are readmitted then 100 members know that 60 have been admitted. There is little uncertainty here.
- In both cases, there will be more or less information and rumours both inside the Group and outside WRN about members who applied to rejoin and were rejected or who did not apply to rejoin. There is much more uncertainty here.
That is a significant number of women who know how many women have been readmitted and, one way or another: Word. Gets. Out.
There were a lot of complaints aired in the first thread. IIRC, and happy to be corrected, only one woman said that she had applied to rejoin and she said she had been rejected. Her only complaint about that process, when her application to rejoin was "considered", was, IIRC, that she had no reply to her request to rejoin. So de facto rejected. Again, happy to be corrected if I am wrong.
There have also been women defending WRN in response to other women's complaints about all sorts of things. However, not once has anyone volunteered that after being expelled she was keen to rejoin, that her application was accepted and that she is happy to be back in her group.
All that is not proof of anything but I would suggest that it is a hint as big as a house that the vast majority of women expelled did not apply to rejoin.
Although almost everyone on these threads is anonymous, if there were only a very few re-joiners then someone who rejoined might be worried about self-doxing herself if she reported here that she had rejoined.
However, if many women had rejoined then this would not be a worry.
There is therefore a lot of circumstantial evidence that very few women rejoined.
That is not, by the way, the reason that I said:
"My understanding is that:
- only a very few applied and were accepted back
- most "removed members" did not apply to rejoin."
It is the reason that I believe that
"my understanding", which is definitely based on hearsay (ie. what I have been told), is very close to the truth.
I have considered if there is anything to confirm or support what I have been told, or instead to disprove or challenge it. What I have seen so far is a lot of circumstantial evidence to support "my understanding".
What I have also seen, in the letters from WRN North & South Bucks members, is evidence that women who have given their all to WRN for years were desperate not to be expelled and were then desperate to be readmitted and that they were rebuffed. This suggests that WRN is not prepared to consider readmitting even women who were very valuable assets and who were responsible for building WRN from the ground up.
"We also have no idea how many of the women initially removed from WRN as a group then applied to return individually and were accepted back."
You keep repeating that claim like it is some sort of magic spell that will erase all the evidence that is in front of your eyes,
Women in those groups know for certain. The rest of us can get a good idea just from what has been said plus what has not been said in this thread and in the previous thread. If you cannot see it, or do not want to see it, then fine, you "have no idea". Some of us do though, by considering carefully what women are saying, and not saying, rather than dismissing everything as "hearsay".
"If you want to decide whether the new groups would suit you, then I suggest you sample the posting style of some of the women involved in those groups."
Good advice. I guess you are not referring to the very reasonable and measured "posting style of some of the women involved in those groups"?
Also good advice to sample the posting style of most of the women defending WRN. They will have to be quick though because so many of their posts have been deleted for being abusive, personal attacks in breach of Mumsnet Talk Guidelines. They are not doing anything for the reputation of WRN.