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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Trolls and emotional leeches

128 replies

LoopyLoopsBettyBoops · 21/06/2011 23:45

Why do they do it? I just don't get it. Recent trolly threads about tokophobia (particularly the stillbirth one) have been really distressing for a lot of people. Why would you want that? I just don't get it. Confused

OP posts:
zukiecat · 22/06/2011 10:48

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

TheRhubarb · 22/06/2011 10:53

What I particularly don't like is something that every mumsnetter ought to be warned about.
When a poster, even a regular trusted one, posts something about children and sexuality or asks advice about their genitalia - that post is public and anyone who googles can see it. There have been a few instances where I have seen intimate posts about children appearing on other websites where members have ripped the posts apart, made fun and god knows what else.

It disturbs me that all this should be out in the public arena and I think some posters really don't realise that, if they did perhaps their posts would be more restrained.

For intimate posts of this nature I do think they should have a private setting on them so that they are not available to be read outside the mumsnet site.

Portofino · 22/06/2011 11:02

I wonder if some of these Troll posters are researching stuff for a novel and are hoping for some nice juicy stories they can steal - with all the technical details correct. I have seen legal ones like that too. We all pitch up with the correct terminology etc.

BornSicky · 22/06/2011 11:12

portofino

I'm convinced that's true for many of them, especially that Zeebrugge one.

they're trying out their faked up misery memoirs.

it's so patronising.

the other ones i hate are the: "so and so did XXX to me/my kids etc" and you know damn well it's the not the full story and it's just someone trying to garner sympathy on the tinterweb.

Portofino · 22/06/2011 18:10

It's the way they phrase questions and then build on the info they are given. Almost as bad are the serial moaners - the ones who pop up time and time again with very over exaggerated tales of misery and never listen to any advice. There's one of them going at the moment with loser boyfriend. Never sure if they are making it all up, whether they are just thick, or just like the attention.

LadyBeagleEyes · 22/06/2011 18:26

Can someone pm me too please, I haven't come across any of these type of trolls lately, though I've certainly seen them before.
In my opinion, the ones that lie about tragedies that have happened to them are not so much trolls as fantasists. They thrive on the attention they get online, sort of like Munchhausen syndrome but in a different way.
I worked with someone once who's whole life was just a fantasy, everybody knew she was lying and joked about it.
But when I look back, surely there were mental health issues going on, it was attention seeking for a (probably) very troubled individual. Maybe some of those trolls are like her which makes me pity them to a certain extent.

HowToLookGoodGlaikit · 22/06/2011 18:30

Where is this stillbirth thread?

Miffster · 22/06/2011 18:46

That thread. I thought: it's someone with quite heavy mental health problems, who is currently obsessing about her horror of birth, yet who is also fascinated by it all, hence obsessively reading and now posting on MN.

Having done the ' I am tokophobic' thread and the 'I have issues about having a baby' thread (under different names but with the same style and concerns), she's moved on to posting about the same subject yet again, but this time, upping the emotional ante even higher by appropriating someone else's tragedy (that she's read somewhere), mashed up with a bit if US talkboard NHS-bashing (possibly the 'NHS forces women in UK to VB stillborn children' came from a rightwing US talkboard/blog, which gave her the idea).

What she's doing is using MN to vent some of her fear/rage/horror/obsessive interest in the idea of birth. That posters have responded generously and humanely, sharing their own stories is heartbreaking - because she's not really interested and isn't able/willing to empathise anyway.

As to why she wants to have a baby. NPD/BPD stuff about having the attention/someone to love her/a small 'her' to cherish, I expect. Or possibly some kind of boyfriend pressure.

Awful for the child if she does have a baby, as things stand now. She'd be doing herself and any future children a great service if she stopped using the internet to work through her issues and went and did some 1 on 1 with an experienced psychotherapist instead.

BitOfFun · 22/06/2011 18:58

That sounds like a fair assessment to me, Miffster.

neverontime · 22/06/2011 19:00

who are the trolls? i'm confused. And obviously very naiive Blush

BulletWithAName · 22/06/2011 19:01

Was just about to post the same neverontime. I've never noticed...I must be dense! Some kind soul PM me please Grin

scurryfunge · 22/06/2011 19:04

I usually report trolls but will sometimes get the response of "give the poster the benefit of the doubt".
There is a ridiculous one on the go at the moment which people continue to engage with unbelievably.

Catslikehats · 22/06/2011 19:06

loopy sorry you were so upset by it Sadhink

I think mifsters assessment is pretty accurate. I'm pretty certain the story was made up but I don't doubt the OP had genuine fears surrounding giving birth and was pedalling a very specifie agenda.

She was clearly very angry and spolining for a fight from the off.

As an aside, although the thread made grim reading in some respects, I think it also showed a fabulous side of MN. I am a recent namechanger: no one "knows me" in this current guise and the support I received was fabulous: self moderation at it's absolute best Smile

lostintransition · 22/06/2011 19:07

Is it me or has the latest suspect thread disappeared?

Catslikehats · 22/06/2011 19:08

Dreadful typos sorry Blush

LadyFlumpalot · 22/06/2011 19:12

There is a [http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/feb/26/faking-illness-online-munchausen mental health condition] that could explain some of these threads.

meditrina · 22/06/2011 19:12

Lostintranslation - could you (or anyone else) PM me details of the thread that may have disappeared?

Misfit's analysis made me think of one I remember seeing (? late last night) with a very long OP.

MmeLindor. · 22/06/2011 19:13

I reported that thread, but it is still there, so I guess that MNHQ have not found evidence that it was a troll.

Or believe it to be genuine, as they are normally quick off the ball to delete a thread.

There was another thread that someone (Pelvic?) linked which showed the same poster under a different name but very similar posting styles. I am convinced they are the same person, but the stories were slightly different.

It is a shame that people like her/him are trolling the board, worrying and upsetting mothers who have lost children to stillbirth and are being told that they are wrong or weird to have gone through a VB.

It is clear that the OP of those threads has issues with the whole giving birth scenario. I would not have even known the the correct word for this phobia.

HowToLookGoodGlaikit · 22/06/2011 19:23

but where is the thread?

Portofino · 22/06/2011 19:34

It must be nearly impossible to prove in some cases. There are ways and means of getting round things.

xStarGirl · 22/06/2011 19:34

Unfortunately, most of the time it's attention-seeking.

I'm gonna stick my neck out a little bit here and confess that when I was a teenager I was a horrendous troll. I was a member of a very specific, very elitist community that actually made a name for ourselves on a kiddie/teen website for trolling on their messageboards. We did it to show off, to brag amongst ourselves about how much better we were, and to push boundaries.

We all grew out of it. Some people don't, and go on to just get worse and worse, until threads like the ones mentioned start popping up. A lot of them have problems - I knew a girl who was so lonely in real life that she would pretend to be anyone just to get people to talk to her. She'd pretend to be a boy, pretend to be terminally ill, anything, because she thought she was so boring she needed to be someone else for people to like her. Sad
(She's better now, btw)

With some, it's more sinister than that. Being vague so I don't out myself, I was once sucked in by someone's sob story (not on MN) and forked out about a hundred quid's worth of help before they admitted they'd just been stringing me along, and promptly buggered off.

Guess what I'm trying to say is, it's hard to gauge the motivation behind anyone who does this, but I do think it stems from MH issues.

lostintransition · 22/06/2011 19:35

It seems the least offensive thread has been removed but the horrible one remains....?

lostintransition · 22/06/2011 19:36

that was meant to be italics, not bold (not used to this yet)

BitOfFun · 22/06/2011 19:43

I'm fascinated, xstar. Can't you tell us what the "elite" force was?

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