Is Mumsnet getting worse?

[Soreen123]

I post here from time to time looking for advice when I’m not really sure who to talk to. Some of the responses I have had are just mean.

I recently put my house link up (which I realise- biggest mistake) only to be told by some I must be lying about the parking situation, my house looked ‘council like’, it’s scruffy, clinical, cold, screams millennial. When all I was asking for was a bit of advice.

A few months ago I asked for advice on my children not being included in something and the blame was put on my children that they must be so badly behaved and that parents of badly behaved children will never admit it. I never actually spoke about my children’s behaviour.

Has mumsnet just become a place to lay into others when they feel down or ask for some advice? It seems to have become a place for others to tear others down.

Or is it just the forums I’m on, it’s not just my posts I see it across loads.

From reading this group's posts and seeing them in the wild.

The threads I read generally have references to things before my time. But I am a Londoner so there aren't a majority of 25 yr old mums in the wild here.

The utter vitriol aimed at people on benefits is awful. No thought for any context or that some people are dealing with circumstances beyond their control. Yet those same people are probably asking why women stay in abusive situations.

The spitefulness, one upmanship and nastiness is something to behold. You have to wade through a truckload of shit to find the pearl these days. I have picked up some useful tips and info on various subjects, but most threads are full of goady. nasty people looking to have a pop unfortunately

Sorry,my reply was to the wring PP.

Peace and love.

I’ve been here on and off for about eight years.

There have always been vipers and trolls.

Quite often an op will shout about how mumsnet is nasty and not like it used to be simply because they haven’t got the responses they wanted

You do see that but i've seen plenty of threads where a poster says something like "I waited till after dinner to discuss this but DH felt, blah blah" & posters will ignore the dilemma & berate the OP for saying dinner instead of supper.

What age should the oldies shuffle off to Gransnet?

But if it's got worse then that is from the new comers not the OG's

I'm not sure, you start to recognise some user names and even posting styles and there are definitely some very cutting and argumentative posters who are older.

Well, I'm 70 and I'm never going there - it's not for me!

@Rosesgrowonyou you tell me?

I know there are mums in their 20s. I just don't think there's a lot of them on here. They'll be ok tiktok and insta rather than old style forum for a start, and like I said I don't get the impression the typical user has young DC any more.

Nor me. You can't swear on there. I'll stay right here.

I think a significant part (far from all of it, but a significant chunk) of it is the OGs becoming more conservative as they age tbh, as has happened since the dawn of time.

And god forbid she writes tea.

I never said there should be an age restriction on MNs just that originally I believed the age skewed younger than it actually does.

Absolutely! I wouldn’t disagree with anything you have said.

What age should the oldies shuffle off to Gransnet?

And this response is actually quite a good example to what I've been saying in my posts so thanks for that 😆😆

@Itsthatime thank you

I don't know. Until recently I would have agreed with you but for a few months there there was a very obvious anti-Irish agenda after the government made its position on Gaza clear. Constant accusations that Irish people are antisemitic, and other stuff too, there's always the odd dodgy post but it was dramatically increased. And then it stopped as soon as it started.

There was also clearly a lot of Tory promotion on here in the run up to the election. It's made me very sceptical.

This morning, for the first time, I reported a poster who I thought was being unnecessarily rude. I'm sure I was not the only one, and the post had disappeared in minutes. Impressive moderation, which I won't hesitate to use again.

Aye good luck with that. You could report the same post tomorrow and get a completely different response because it lands on a different person's desk.

Or to you could report the same term for literally a decade, see it deleted every time, and then all of a sudden be told you should just challenge it on the thread but that that's tooooootally not a change in policy.

@BarbaraHoward I have noticed anti irish sentiment but assumed they were real as opposed to bits.

bots!

There have always been posters who think telling it like it is means telling someone they are thick or ripping apart posts. I used to notice a lot of really angry nasty stuff around Christmas. I do think the tone has changed recently. There are still lots of lovely nice well meaning posters and sometimes I think they are frightened off by the regular names that jump straight into any post to pull it apart. There are a few that also automatically post against the grain just to cause friction. The tone does change regularly too so hang on in there.

It's usually real but for a while there it was bots. There was an acknowledged Israeli social media campaign against Ireland and MN was clearly part of it.

Now we're just back to the usual "people who say haitch are illiterate/Conor is a naughty boy name/Aoife is an unpronounceable jumble of vowels" stuff. Joy.