Oh please educate yourself.

[Getagripffs]

Why has this become a thing! Saying this? It's bloody horrible.

Someone just said it to someone who started a thread about whether she owed a taxi driver a quid or not.

Is no-one allowed to converse on a topic they have not extensively researched before hand, anymore?

It's ridiculous!

@Shmithecat2 I think there is a difference though between genuinely looking for some information to read up on and not believing what the poster has said so asking them for a link you know they won’t be able to provide to make them look stupid. There’s a lot of the latter on here of late.

Is it maybe used when someone professes ignorance about something really commonly known? Someone spoke about blackface the other day and claimed not to know about cornrows being cultural appropriation. I think she was asked if she lived under a rock.

I've had my fair share non-conventional opinions/ experiences and so people do tend to ask about them. If I ever felt I couldn't be arsed talking about that again, I guess I would have said, 'sorry, i don't really feel like going into that now'. Not 'Educate yourself'. That's like you are offended that someone does not know something you know. Which is daft. It's also daft as people are less inclined to find out if you are rude to them about it. So totally counter-productive.

It's not just on MN and it's rude and patronising. And meant to be rude and patronising!
I hate it too.

professes ignorance about something really commonly known

Commonly known is not the same as universally known, is it? Why are you offended that people don't know stuff you and yours know? They have just lived different lives. Not everyone watches the news/ is on social media. There are lots of commonly known things relating to the digital world I don't know. I didn't know what angry birds was when that was a thing. I don't think that is a reason to tell me to 'educate myself.'
And its not 'commonly known' is it? It is stuff that is commonly known by a sub-section of educated, elite society who are into that stuff. There is plenty of stuff known within white working class cultures that his elite would know eff all about.

Very patronising

We don't all have the same life experiences. I'm learning new things every day.

I strongly dislike it, and also hate “You do know that.../You do realise that...” - sounds so patronising and arsey.

I think it's unhelpful, rude and dismissive just for the sake of it. If you can "educate" someone by answering the question at hand or pointing them to somewhere they can get the answer, why don't you?

What's the point of going on about how uneducated they are on the topic, yet won't do anything to help? I'm sure we're all uneducated on one topic or the other. No one knows EVERYthing.

This culture of shaming or belittling people who "don't know" leads us nowhere.

Maybe I have answered my own question - it started as a way for a sub-section of society to define who was in and out of that 'tribe' by the knowledge they had (and making their tribe 'elite' by denigrating those who were not in it).

Now it has morphed into a general insult as shown by the uber-ridiculous use of it on the taxi thread.

I’ve seen it used and yes, it’s ill-mannered and patronising. Tbh I think it says more about the person who uses it.

It is so rude and so patronising. And often means, learn and repeat my view point.

Yes the use of it on the taxi thread was weird too, as the OP was literally asking whether she had been unfair as she didn't know if taxi drivers had received financial support during the pandemic.

@Destroyedpeople

'Educate yourself' and 'check your privilege'.. Usually said by spoilt 'uni' students with breathtaking unawareness of irony...

And don't forget 'do better'.

Oh this annoys me so much! It's so rude, and so stupid/nonsensical too when someone is asking about something, because they are already trying to educate themselves by doing so.

As a working class person with a hard won tertiary education it REALLY pisses me off.

YANBU.

I would like it if MN remained relatively free of the wokestazi who infest other sites.

How about if every time someone says this we all reply with 'did you mean to be so rude'?

There is a new wave of posters on mumsnet that I believe are genuinely just here to create an argument or upset genuine posters. They've probably been banned from twitter or too scared to behave like that in real life so they come here!

Also, if you can’t even manage to treat another human being with some semblance of understanding, your ‘woke‘ credentials begin to look a little insincere.

I think it has its place. There’s a thread running at the moment about tenancy law where people who clearly have no idea what the law actually says are spouting pure bollocks in an authoritative way, and insisting they are correct. Also see most threads about disability and SN, where posters see fit to confidently opine, despite their obvious ignorance. I have no problem with people being told to educate themselves in those circumstances.

I have no problem with people being told to educate themselves in those circumstances

How do you think that deliberate put down is constructive though? Do you think anyone thinks' sure, I 'll go do what the person who was rude to me told me to'?

Why not just disagree, state your facts, link to websites with the facts? This is how reasonable people manage these situations.

'Educate yourself' is a rude and lazy cop out. People have come to disparage 'wokeness' because the people promoting it are often perceived not to want to do the hard work that implementing their vision of society would require, instead they take the lazy option of calling others names or tweeting to get someone sacked.

It's patronising and often said by people who are terminally smug and/or thick as mince.

I feel the same when people ask for small pieces of info for their uni projects and get told 'do your research. Well straw polling strangers is research. Not for major thesis arguments or crucial facts but for a quick opinion check, it's legitimate.

"Educate yourself" and the one that goes with it "it's not my job to educate you"
roughly translate to, I have no idea what any of this is about but I am not going to let that stop me.

it's not my job to educate you"
roughly translate to, I have no idea what any of this is about but I am not going to let that stop me

About 25 years ago I was reading an article in the paper about the USA civils rights movement which referred to the Edmund Pettus Bridge. I asked my (much older) boyfriend of the time what happened at the bridge. He looked appalled and said, ' you need to read that article'. I replied, 'I am reading it, but it doesn't say what happened at the bridge, what happened?' He couldn't answer but just blustered and it became massively apparent to me that he had no idea but had just seized an opportunity to act superior. He didn't say ' go educate yourself' as that was not a phrase then, but that same wanky-superior-with-no-justification attitude has been around time immemorial! (unlike my boyfriend whose sorry ass I finally woke up -in the true sense of the word- and dumped).

It did however give us a glorious twitter exchange. A woman had a long thread on sexual violence stats. A wokey bloke with a beard came on to tell her off and tell her to "educate herself." She retorted that she had a masters in criminology and 20 years experiences as a prison governor.

The thing that is most annoying about it is that it is used as a put-down often to people who are actually immensely knowledgeable about the subject under discussion, but just happen to hold a different view from the person telling them to "educate themselves" (aka "woke scolds.")