Have you ever been upset by something said to you on MN?

[grizy]

I’m a frequent name changer but I’ve been around for a few years. I deleted an earlier account after I somehow provoked a pile-on when I started a tongue-in-cheek thread about ketchup on roast dinners (of all things). Some of the comments were beyond brutal - I could laugh some of them off but others were really below the belt. Over ketchup!! 😂

In the end, I decided I was too thin skinned for the rigours of MN and I took a break until I decided to dip my toe back in MN waters again. I’m much more cautious now and tend to not start threads but I’m curious as to whether anyone else has felt upset at comments a stranger has posted at them online? Are you able to shrug it off or do you take it a bit more personally? This isn’t meant to be ‘oh, isn’t MN a horrible place’ discussion (I don’t think it is) but just me wondering if others get upset if you’re on the receiving end of spiky comments or if you’re able to just quickly dismiss it?

Never upset, no.

Annoyed, yes. Usually when someone latches onto a response I've made to another poster entirely, and they endlessly disagree with me like they are a dog with a bone that won't let go.

Under a different username, I was HOUNDED off a thread because I misunderstood the OP, I apologised about 4 times but the same poster kept kicking me when I was down saying it “wasn’t good enough” I hid the thread in the end, it’s about 3 years later and I still think “Oh, THIS bitch” when I see the username.

Yes. Often not on threads I started but when I see what some people think of people with depression.
Also remember being low and needing support. I wanted to ask for a hand hold, because even though it is all anonymous and virtual in some ways it feels emotionally tangible. Didn’t because I’d seen a thread about ridiculous that phrase, why not just ask for support.

No. I keep expecting to be flamed and am usually pleasantly surprised. Think I've a tough skin these days though so wouldn't take someone's opinion too personally anymore. Far cry from the old me. Received a comment on twitter more than 15 years ago where I was called a silly little girl for not knowing the difference between tyre and tire which for some ridiculous reason still pops into my brain uninvited every now and again 🙄

Someone accused me of lying once. It was in the context of whether an adopted child can be as loved as a biological child. The obnoxious person said that was impossible and if I said otherwise, I was lying. I should have just ignored such utter nonsense, but it upset me nonetheless.

More recently, I had a literal "How very dare you" reaction in response to one of my posts. That just made me laugh. 😂

I just shrug my shoulders and think it says far more about them than me. They are probably desperately unhappy people in real life. And a bit thick too, if they aren't capable of having a reasoned discussion but just bandy insults about!

I’m befuddled by the nastiness of people. I honestly don’t know why some are so nasty, judgemental and rude towards others when they don’t know any more than a random paragraph on a post. It really is astonishing. Its not a world I’ve experienced in real life.

I remember that one! People got enraged, especially if they didn't like the cardigan. it was insane

Years ago I posted when I was shaken because a child ran in front of my car. Well, you'd have thought I'd deliberately mown the kid down, the thread went on for 12 pages 🙄

Yes, me too. There’s a small handful of posters who seemingly rush to be the first to comment something hurtful. It’s almost as though there’s a prize to be the first. It’s very weird!

Me too! Because it was a decent brand?

Sorry to bump this thread.
I posted on a thread about A level results, and how I had to drop out so flunked etc.
Some nasty poster said all my posts on MN made sense as they were "all rubbish", and that I was clearly "not an intellectual" or capable of logical thinking.

It actually really upset me. I had to drop out of sixth form due to health issues.

Don’t apologise, a troll bumped multiple 2010 threads so good to bump more recent ones. That’s not nice, I think some people just get off on being vile to other people.

Yes. Some posters come in very fast and very hot. Doesn’t bother as much as it used to.

No, never actually upset. I don't care enough about what strangers online think to be genuinely emotionally affected by what they say.

But I do sometimes feel exasperated by bad faith, disingenuous, or deliberately obtuse posters. Those are definitely a bit irritating.

No. The bitch factor yes.
I am surprised by how conservative some english people are on here..
I presume many are straight laced christians...makes me bite.

Yes very upset and have very rarely started a thread since.

I asked Mumsnet to delete the thread but they said something along the lines of “mumsnetters not liking this”. They did however move it to the 30 day board so that it would automatically be deleted.

When my 94 year old father was dying from lung cancer and some evil bitch said she had no sympathy as it was his own fault due to smoking. I replied that the dangers weren’t known years ago and that when he was fighting in WW2 they had all been given cigarettes as they were thought to be good for them by reducing stress. She told me to stop playing the old soldier card.

I've had a couple of really nasty replies on Christmas Days, of all times. I'm now very wary of posting then.

I had a thread recently about a family issue where people were mostly helpful. I'd changed quite a few details to avoid it being outing, which I thought were irrelevant, but one of these details was picked up on and a few people zoned in on it with a pile-on, which was frustrating as I belatedly realised I had painted myself in a worse light than reality. I sucked it up and said I 'admitted I'd been wrong' as I couldn't unpick it without potentially making myself identifiable.

I was once on a thread where I was 'against the grain' along with another poster, but the other poster was being quite rude. There was someone else on the thread who kept attributing the rude poster's comments to me, either confusing us or thinking it was sock-puppeting. Someone else waded in and started saying really nasty things, like wishing members of my family dead! That person was deleted, thankfully.

Never but I've never posted anything personal. Id say the nastier you are on mumsnet, the more unhappy you are in own life. There's a lot of unhappy people on mumsnet it seems!

Not on MN but I was on Babyworld years ago and someone used to repeatedly disagree with me there and she said some really nasty things. Because she was a prolific poster and friends with the mods of course they agreed with her

A poster told me I had a "poorly managed menopause" on a thread about menopausal rages. Even though I said I was having BC treatment. Fucking idiot 🤬

I was called a twat when I posted that I’d told a man to clear up after his dog. I was a bit offended.

I posted that a male colleague had, in front of a group of children and another colleague (I'm a teacher), held my hand for an extended period of time, in front of everyone. He just walked up to me while he was talking to the children and held my hand like we were boyfriend and girlfriend while he spoke to the class.

I felt really uncomfortable about it and wanted the moment to stop but felt quite frozen. Looking back, I can see that it was very weird and inappropriate but many of the posters were acting like it was really fine and normal and that I was just so uptight.

I made this mistake of mentioning my husband. As this colleague took my hand, and held it for about a minute while I stood there bemused, my first instinct was 'hold on...I don't hold hands with you, I hold hands with my husband'. It was just something that was going through my mind when I was put in a situation that I felt was reserved for a romantic partner. Well, people couldn't let this go and kept going on about how 'weird' it was that I was thinking about my husband in that moment and I sounded Amish or something from a Jane Austin novel.

It was quite hurtful because people seemed to deliberately not looking at the situation or tracking with what had been going through my head. There was an implication that I had a weird reverence for my husband, when really my mind had just been doing a crude comparison of who I normally hold hands with. Something was scrambling around in my mind and there was like a 'people I hold hands with' and 'people I don't hold hands with' mental process going on and my husband went into the 'people I hold hands with' and 'men I'm not married to' went into the other one.

I kept trying to explain myself in the post and kind of work through it because, as I went on to explain, I had been at the receiving end of some very inappropriate behaviour from a male colleague in the past, as well as some other very unpleasant experiences with men in my youth.

Some of the responses made me feel very 'frigid', like a real prude who was too uptight to just hold my male colleague's hand like a good sport and that there was something wrong with me for daring to mention that me being married did come into my mind.

I avoid this colleague and go out of my way to not be near him. He has a very annoying habit of tapping my arm with the back of his hand every time he talks to me and has since asked me for hugs in our working day. I do think he is a creep. He held my hand for creepy reasons and it wasn't appropriate. I just wish he would stop trying to touch me but something about that post made me feel like it's actually me being a Jane Austen prude so I haven't done anything about it even though I know he IS being inappropriate!

He really does sound like a creep! Some people just like to be contrary arseholes and often the first reply sets the tone.