Why does it seem that most of MN assume everyone lives in England?

[chickawhoo]

Just that really. Lighthearted thread but also a genuine question.
I have lost count of the number of things I've commented on or read on here where the reply isn't really relevant to anyone who doesn't live in England. The assumption seems to be that everyone in the UK is in England being English. I usually notice it on threads about schooling.

For example the complete shock every year when people find out Scottish schools have different summer holidays and that they can actually defer starting school which we can't do the same way down here. Or that Scottish high school exams are different and they don't do gcse/a-level and they even get their results earlier but it's never publicised down here whereas our gcse etc results days are splashed all over the news up there whether they want it or not.
Or the fact Scottish schools don't have all the governor nonsense we have or comps or grammar schools even. It's so much simpler and clearer.

I'm not Scottish myself (I'm in Gloucester) but I have a good friend who is and I've educated myself on the differences over the years. I will add she would be mortified to think I was posting this online hence a name change!
It's so weird to me how often people on a post just make the presumption that we're all English 😄 Imagine how daft I felt when I asked when they changed their summer holidays to June/August and they pointed out it's always been that way 😄

It's also notable that all my Scottish friends have always been well aware of the way schooling works down here and I honestly felt pretty feeble that we never give theirs a second thought.
So how about you? Have you found yourself making the sweeping assumption that all posters are in England? Or have you had someone on here presume you must be English and you're not? Or is this just me and my imagination? 😂

Wishing you all a joyous weekend when it comes and hope none of what I've said has seemed hurtful, I would not want to be disrespectful. I'm just a nosey lady in her 60s.

It’s probably because the English population is ten times that of the Scottish population, to be fair. I think people just forget and speak about what they know. (Scottish woman in her sixties here 🙂) Incidentally, we have had comprehensive schools since when I went to school a long time ago!

Other countries have INTERNET?

Wow.

Because most people are (and I say that as a Scottish person)

Yep, because most users are in England.

Because the website had an English founder? People also can’t seem to get over English posters who live overseas posting at ‘odd’ times, it really seems to piss some posters off big time!

You can't blame people for not knowing how things work in other countries but it's the blanket statements that in the UK we...... insert random thing that definitely doesn't happen across the UK that annoys me.

That’s true. They should be clearer and say in England.

As the majority are in England, surely its for those who are not in England to make it clear?

Or maybe mn could do a little flag by your username to indicate where you are (or where you want to show you are)

Because 9/10 the poster is in England. Maybe suggest to MNHQ about having flags next to usernames.

Crosspost!

Because going out in England makes one feel as though everyone does live in England?

The vast majority of users are English, followed by Scottish, Irish and Welsh - users throughout the world, both British expats and other nationalities but it's predominantly a British site and England makes up most of Britain

Because they probably are. 56ish million in England 5.6million in Scotland, 3million in wales, 5 millionth in Ireland.

Basic probability.

The vast majority of the UK population do live in England though. If it isn't stated then the base assumption goes with the majority. I think some people in Scotland deliberately don't say, just so they can have an England popping opportunity when people don't rush to ask them where they are.

To be fair, with a population 10% of England it does make sense that Scotland isn't the naturally assumed location.
There's been many threads posted by Scottish MNers where they've asked for advice, and after posters giving pages of help they then think to drop in that they're in Scotland, and none of the above applies.
Examples where things are vastly different are law and school holidays - but there's of course mountains of other differences between the two countries.

If asking for advice that specifically relates to Scotland, posters need to make it clear that's where they are flow.

Because the vast majority of users are in England, if you're not, the onus is on you to tell people where you are.

im in England now, I was born here, but haven't always lived here. If asking/giving advice that's location dependent I made it known where I was posting from.

asking on here for tenancy advice & not saying you're in France/Aus/Dubai is a waste if everyone's time & you'll get irrelevant advice.

a little common sense goes a long way!!

It would be interesting to see the percentages

It's so basic, it makes me wonder why the OP didn't think of it.

Yeah there are more people in England, but when a poster casually mentions that e.g. their child was at school yesterday and posters chime in with "but there was no school yesterday its the holidays" like its some kind of gotcha it gets annoying. Some posters really seem to forget that other places do exist.

Also seconding the PPs frustration of people saying things like "in the UK things work like this". No, not everywhere.

And white middle class.

Same reason people assume you’re American if you post on Reddit, the vast majority of users are American, the majority of Mumsent users are English.

It’s just mumsnet, I think it’s fairly common across the UK. The BBC are one of the worst for it!
a few years ago at work we had to point out that the last 2 weeks in June are not a great time to send out the staff engagement survey because half of the Scotland offices are on annual leave. That’s since changed but we’re still battling over the offices being closed on the English bank holidays when our schools all have different public holiday days.

“Not just mumsnet” for fecksake!!

Because the vast majority of mumsnet posters do live in England. I’m Scottish but I find it hard to get annoyed about it.