Arseholes Who've Ruined Groups And Hobbies

[EineReiseDurchDieZeit]

Moved house last year, then COVID happened.

I am CEV and so have done loads of shielding and joining a hobby group I was looking forward to post move hasn't happened but I am on their mailing list. For this specific thing they are my only option locally.

Get emails from the mailing list regularly and having had my interest piqued googled the social media presence of the named sender.

They are clearly an arsehole, a massive, tedious, arsehole with very "set views" which I imagine would need to be agreed with by any incomers, which is not going to happen. (They are a group organiser)

So potentially that's this group out the window...

Which made me think, MNers, were you / have you ever left a group style hobby you really enjoyed because of That One Arsehole and

What did they do? How bad was it?

@CosyAcorn

I'm part of a geeky FB group with quite a broad interest range: cosplay, gaming, Disney, crafting, tv, cute stuff. It's meant to be a place to share your interests and a lighthearted space of the internet.

One guy keeps putting up these really long posts chronicling his cross dressing journey. He does not identify as trans but has an alter ego called Jessica who loves 'coming out to play'. He details the clothes he's trying on and how his very supportive wife took Jessica on her first outing to a mall so that Jessica could have some outdoor photos.

Each post is accompanied by about 10 photos of Jessica in miniskirts and has 200 comments of praise and admiration.

It's not really got anything to do with geeky interests and there's something about the whole thing that makes me feel uncomfortable. Especially when he talks about his wife as this dear little mousy person who has to give him continual moral support and be his photographer. It just seems off to me.

You need to read the trans widows support threads on FWR. He's using your group for sexual kicks. Of course it's "off".

I left a line dancing group years ago because of a real arsehole.
It belonged to a woman who always arrived late, insisted on squeezing in front of me and did stinky farts for the whole session!

The poster who mentioned church flowers....

I was amused a while ago when I was looking at the notices in the porch of a country church. On the flower rota there was “Betty” by March 3rd. It had been, not crossed out, but scrawled out with what seemed like intense vitriol and “MARJORIE” - in capitals - written instead. Thereby hangs a tale.....

“ I was in a craft class with a woman who dominated the teacher's time: everyone hated her doing it but the tutor just went along with it.”

I realised with some horror that this was my bad habit during a one-day workshop to build A Thing. It was like an out of body experience (or being Monica from friends!) - adult me couldn’t stop Teachers Pet me

I’m aware now and since then have managed to lock her in a box before starting any class or workshop.

@CosyAcorn congratulations - you've met an autogynephile, who is basically getting his rocks off behind his computer. You should report him to the admins.

[quote SenecaTrewe]@CosyAcorn congratulations - you've met an autogynephile, who is basically getting his rocks off behind his computer. You should report him to the admins. [/quote]
High risk of being publicly called out as a bigot and booted from the group. Don’t ask me how I know...

@SenecaTrewe @Happinessisawarmcervix

I had those thoughts myself. The posts were hugely popular in the group so the admins must have seen them. I just try to ignore them but part of me is curious to see if things will get weirder.

We've recently had a series of talks (on Skype) at work by a trained counsellor/ psychotherapist about a variety of subjects. Really interesting stuff that makes you think. Every single session the same 3 or 4 people feel the need to make "interesting" comments as he talks . After the 3rd one I privately asked the organiser (not the speaker) if he could put everyone on mute because it was so frustrating having the flow of the talk interrupted. He was finding it annoying too, muted everyone and asked us to set our status to do not disturb to stop the pinging of messages. Why do the same people think that 200 people who have signed up for a talk are remotely interested in their comments?

Similarly, and also at work, I am part of a network of people with the same medical condition. A new member completely dominated an hour long meeting going on about her diagnosis and how she felt about it. OK, that's natural when you've only just realised. She then went on to do the same in the next 3 meetings. It's great to share experiences but not when it's the same person who won't let anyone else speak, especially with 50 or more people on the call.

I've remembered another one. At a parenting course. One guy just kept chipping in with anecdotes about his children. Whatever the topic he'd want to make a point. Whether it was fussy eating, conflict, sleep... I could tell you more about his boys personalities than my own

I think I've met "Jessica". Is he in Scotland?

I left an amateur orchestra after incurring the rage of a really highly-strung oboist who had a Special Chair that she always sat on, which I took by mistake. Everyone else took her side, probably because they were scared of her and she was the only regular oboist they had. I just wanted to play music in a group, no interest in handling crazy people who were obsessed with chairs.

DD is a dance teacher and regularly has trouble with one of the dance mums who insists on managing the costumes for shows. When DD had her first class as main teacher, she wanted to do simple tunics for the dancers (average age 4) to slip on over their leotards. This did not go down well. I had to give DD a lift home one afternoon as her car was in the garage and overheard "YOU CAN'T EVEN SEW A STRAIGHT SEAM!" from crazy lady.

I've sworn off any fandom groups, online or real life. Used to enjoy them, sometimes things would kick off but it was mostly interesting discussion and respect for different opinions. Now you have one set of opinions and you have to fall in line with them. Boring. No thanks.

Not to mention they tend to be woke as fuck too.

My DM was in a well known national association for rural women, and used to sell surplus garden produce at a weekly market they held.

A new member’s husband, recently retired tax inspector, joined and within a month he had taken over the running of the market and harangued the ladies about their tax affairs each week. He asked one old dear who occasionally sold crocheted blankets (for about £25) if she declared the profits on her tax return and she laughed at him, but soon found herself investigated by the Inland Revenue! She suspected the former tax inspector had denounced her and there was a stampede of ladies to another village’s market.

@TalktotheFoot

Trouble is, I've always had a strong suspicion that the Roys of this world do not have the capability to form the second half of those thoughts, but don't realise it. They are so full of their own supremacy in all things that they are unable to process any information to the contrary.

This is genuinely how narcissism works with a few more bits thrown in. Fragile egos and insecurities. Thankfully I haven't experienced anything that bad but I definitely understand where people are coming from. I hate bitchiness with a passion.

I got kicked out of a poetry group for asking if a book launch they were going to have could be on a different date to the regular open mic.

The woman who ran the group was actually really nasty to me for a long time afterwards.

I started my own group in the end.

One village group on FB was ruined by the admin who set it up as she chose the setting to pre-moderate all posts. But of course she isn't on her phone all the time so sometimes nothing gets approved for ages, and any post where time is of the essence then makes no sense at all.

Someone set up another group in the village more recently which is reactively moderated, so much better, well-used, livelier and more useful!

@Bearnecessity

I understand all too well the folks with allotment issues, I got mine in October and it has caused me nothing but misery. They gave me a plot surrounded by five others two or three have been bitching about me to the administrators, I haven't planted anything yet and I feel like walking away to be honest...it just wasn't what I thought I was getting into. What is the matter with people..

This all sounds very familiar. When my DS was a toddler, I got an allotment. Most plot holders were retired men and I was always referred to as the 'young lady plot holder'. I soon ran into problems as we weren't allowed to have a shed to store our tools as they 'spoiled the look' of the place. This was fine for the blokes with their 4x4s but I soon got fed up with trailing through the village with a pushchair, trying to carry my spade, fork etc. (we only had one car at the time, which my husband used for work). Then the complaints about my plot started. I lasted 2 years before giving up. I haven't joined any more village organisations - it's still the same group of people on all of them...

@averywittyusername

Don't be put off, Joining a creative writing course or whatever interests groups you feel curious/drawn to, interested in.

I have been part of a creative writing course for brief times,and have had good experiences.

Also make sure you show what's inspired you writing wise, as its interesting to have as many people to give their input in that way,

Plus its obviously useful to have constructive feedback from Tutor and other members too of the group.

these kinds of groups/committees,
Its like most things in life you come across all sorts in life of people,
obviously some /few you will get on better with than offers,
its only natural.

I agree - don’t be put off. I’ve attended really lively and fun book groups, art groups etc for years. We don’t always agree, people are very different but that’s what makes it interesting (unless of course I am the arsehole!)

[quote Tehmina23]**@ProfessorPootle* & @DorisLessingsCat* I will go to the gym post lockdown & see if it happens again... if it does then I will speak to the management, as one of the men is a PT.[/quote]
@Tehmina, is this in south-east London?

@ScarletZebra sounds like you handled that really well.

I’ve experienced the same at performances and public lectures (back when those still happened) and am old enough and ugly enough to say to them “I paid to hear the speaker, not to hear you.”

There was a thread a while ago about singing along in musicals, wasn’t there......similar behaviour!

Ah, memories of Lisa, who joined our established ladies cycling group. We did it for fun, a bit of exercise and to make friends (expat community). We weren't fast enough for Lisa though. Cos Lisa was fabulous. She complained and complained behind our backs to the most experienced rider in the group. She tried to turn our lovely group into something totally different. Wanted to change times, dates etc. Made it thoroughly horrible and many of us avoided going if we knew she'd be there. Then Debbie who was super fast and experienced purposefully then spent a few rides competing with and beating Lisa. Lisa left.
I saw her recently, she had joined a group doing triathlon training. She's better than them all, she told me, even though she's only just started running and swimming and they've been at it for a few years. And was pissed off that she was having to wait for the slower members at the end of training. No etiquette.

I had a fantastic mother's group. Random women who.met through a clinic group. We leaned on each other a lot.

Then one joined a nameless MLM selling plastic containers & kept trying to turn our meet ups into party opportunities. It destroyed the group. Still annoyed many years later.

God, this has just reminded me I got banned from a Chalet School fan site for being mildly critical of a beloved character AND for pointing out (when an obsessive poster kept talking with complete seriousness about all the wondrous things that character ‘did offstage’) that as the character only exists in the words on the page, there is no ‘offstage’, and she only does what the reader ‘sees’).

You were in the wrong Chalet School group! All the ones I've ever been part of have been the reverse, with the flouncers tending to be those who dislike criticisms of series favourites. I would suggest getting back on a different horse - nothing as life affirming as giant online brawls about children's books written almost a century ago.

Yes, yes, to the MLM horror. My nice laidback postnatal group was totally trashed by a Thermomix hawker.

I was in a women's choir for years. I was one of the youngest and probably least emotionally invested, and went along just to sing - I stayed well clear of 'the committee' and its works. I coped with the group discussions on some subjects on which I was labelled 'too politically correct' but finally the arrival of two women who made a thing of not knowing the pieces, talking through every rehearsal, sneering at anyone they considered 'keen', and not speaking to any member they had selected as undesirable caused a mass exodus of those of us who just wanted a good sing. The choir leader and chair knew what was happening but only tried addressing it through generic fairly rude emails to all of us telling us we needed to behave better rather than raising it directly with them.

Urgh this thread reminds me of why I mostly stick to solitary pursuits! I do quite like some (maybe even most) people, individually and in short bursts, but there really are a lot of cunts out there.
What's that phrase? The more I see of people, the more I love my dog!

The name Roy has popped up a few times

I left a yoga group as a Roy, aged 60 or so, kept wanting to sit next to me, really close, mat-to-mat, his hands constantly accidentally touching me. Wanting to do all the 2-person stretches with me.

I kept moving position in the hall, but then so did he. I’d come early, and he’d set up camp next to me. So so came last, and would take the last available spot...that worked some days.

The teacher once asked him to demo a 2 person stretch and he did a little jazz-hands samba across the room to me to pull me into the middle. I said “ Sorry, I don’t want to do this”

The shock and horror.

His wife, who is also always there, was giving me dagger looks, but she gives me dagger looks anyways

In the end I left the group

Bloody Roy