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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

AIBU to stop buyng The Independant because of this ad?

821 replies

NowThenWreck · 16/03/2012 12:00

The one from Fathers4Justice, where they accuse MN of:

"carrying abusive and distressing anti-male content which promotes gender hatred against men and boys"
and, apparently, labels "men and boys as rapist, peados and wife beaters."

The ad has a lovely picture of a sad little boy with words like "rioter" and "homeless" and "sperm bank" written on his skin.

I am confused, as I have never come across a thread on here where people routinely call men paedophiles and rapists. In fact, usually, if someone implies that a man being left alone with a child is dodgy, posters will pile in and say "God, don't you know not all men are paedos.?"

As I understand it, this is a forum for discussion, not a political movement with a manifesto. There are many and varied opinions on MN, and the minute one opinion is aired, another will be along to refute it.

Or should I just laugh at F4J? The ad is quite gruesomely funny.

OP posts:
flippinada · 17/03/2012 11:39

"It isn't the solicitor, it is the courts and the judges. To be honest, I think a lot of it has to do with because I am Australian. Even though, multiple times we have shown her to be lying, the courts just dismiss it."

I doubt your nationality has anything to do with it, really.

If it's not court ordered, why are you paying all that, seriously? Do you mean you choose to pay it?

By the way I didn't realise you can report your ex to the police for not paying enough maintenance, I might try that myself Grin.

Nyac · 17/03/2012 11:41

I give up. Tell that to the Home Office, the World Health Organisation, the FBI, the United Nations, the UK Government, Rape Crisis, Women's Aid that their statisitcs aren't facts.

Statistics record real events in the real world. Girls really are being married off at ten in Afghanistan, there really is mass rape going on in Congo and Darfur, women really do suffer the levels of rape and domestic violence that I said, there really are 100 million girls and women missing from the populations of China and India. Each number represents a real female human life.

And until you can come up with any facts about men being appallingly treated by "misandrists" I'm going to call your argument BS Sigmund. Sorry.

flippinada · 17/03/2012 11:43

Note to any literalists, I am not serious as I suspect the (entirely appropriate) response from the police would be "fuck off go away and stop wasting our time".

SardineQueen · 17/03/2012 12:00

I am dismayed (to say the least) at the casual dismissal of the plight of women around the world.

I don't understand how anyone can turn their gaze to Darfur or Afghanistan and look at what is happening to women (as individuals and as a group) and shrug and say it's just opinion that women are being violently oppressed.

SardineQueen · 17/03/2012 12:04

I can look at men being harmed for instance mining in terrible dangerous conditions in China and say that is terrible and wrong.

I find it sad that people can look at the situation for women in somewhere like Saudi, and not see anything wrong, not see oppression.

Remember the story about the burning girls school where the police prevented the girls from being rescued as their faces were not covered? Look at that and tell me that it is nothing to do with women being oppressed.

story

NowThenWreck · 17/03/2012 12:05

I don't really know why auschopper is getting interragated here. I don't personally wish to know the ins and out of his divorce settlement.

Maybe his Ex is a nutjob, who knows.

Some women are, you know. Just as some men are abusive.

Many of us have experienced horrendous relationship breakdown etc (personally I walked away from my abusive Ex husband with a couple of suitcases, and that was it, (but we didn't have any kids).

I still wouldn't say that the general consensus on MN is "man hating" and branding men and boys as "rapists and paedos".
Nyac has one, quite extreme view, Worra has another. They will never agree, but, I suspect, enjoy having a heated debate about it ad infinitum.

That's what it's like here F4J lurkers.

Its about discussion, and usually, disagreement, personal experiences which vary wildly, and very different reactions to those experiences.

The more I think about it, the more I hope MumsnetHQ take those libellous fuckers on and break them.

OP posts:
SardineQueen · 17/03/2012 12:06

nowthenwreck's post

SigmundFraude · 17/03/2012 12:07

'I find it sad that people can look at the situation for women in somewhere like Saudi, and not see anything wrong, not see oppression.'

Nobody has said that.

SmellsLikeTeenStrop · 17/03/2012 12:08

auschopper, you don't see your child any more. What do you have to lose by not paying for her other house, and her car? You could be using that money to get some good solid legal support and I seriously think you need that.

SardineQueen · 17/03/2012 12:10

You said that what Nyac had posted about was

"statistics (which are not facts, by a long chalk), conjecture and personal opinion"

And thus dismissed her entire post, which listed a host of appalling terrible things being done to women all around the world.

auschopper · 17/03/2012 12:11

Yup, also she apparently was going to call the police for something really stupid, when normally the only reason people call the police is for something serious.

Exactly.... in this case no....

God, didn't want to have to write this but anyhow, it may give a bit of clarity to the situation...

Firstly, we attended marriage counselling. First few sessions, she didn't agree with what the counsellor was saying, so she stormed out. Sometimes she would storm out after 15 minutes. After a few of these tantrums, the counsellor said, there is something seriously wrong with your wife, and you need to be as supportive as possible, and she agreed that I was doing everything possible to keep the marriage together. The counsellor then said to exDW that she needed to go to extra counselling alone, as she believed the behaviour very odd, and that she suspected that she suffered from a borderline type disorder.

Then exDW went to counselling on her own. Next minute I am being told that I am emotionally abusive, according to the "wheel". When I asked, what exactly that entailed, one issue was brought up, and one only. I must say at this stage I was in complete bewilderment of what was happening, and thought, hang about am I being emotionally abusive. Now, the issue that was brought up was one day, when I was looking after our son in the morning, still in bed. exDW came from the shower with a towel on her head. I use to get great giggles out of him in the mornings as we were playing hide and seek. I said, "Quick lets hide from mummy, as she hasn't got her make up on". Now, firstly, it wasn't an attack on her, it was just to get our son to hide... When I was a kid, it was something that we always use to joke about with our nanna... she would say, quick hide, i haven't got my make up on.. Now, when I saw this upset her, I apologised straight away... I definitely didn't say it to insult, or make fun of in any way... Maybe it was the wrong thing to have said, but then again, who doesn't make a stupid mistake in saying something, because had i known it was going to upset her, I wouldn't have said it. So anyhow, when I asked what else there was, that upset her, there was nothing. The thing that I was trying to come to grips with was, firstly, emotional abuse is constant and degrading, and is absolutely horrible.

I then got given a book, by exDW that she said her counsellor said I should read, and that was an absolutely great book on Emotional Abuse. It actually wasn't until then, that I realised I was actually in an emotionally abusive relationship.

The list became endless when I started to look at it... Firstly, I was aliened from my friends. I never had any friends, and when I did start to meet people, when they came over, she would make a massive scene and start yelling at them. She had made threats of killing herself, has had a history of this, but wasn't aware of it until after we were married. All I could see is my exDW wanting help... and I was unable to... as I was becoming greatly depreciated. It was constant choas, where our neighbour had given us a cook book, and it wasn't until I went, wow, want to use that cook book, that I found out that she had put it in our neighbours bin so that they would find it, after she had fallen out with her over a comment that she had made about our dog that my exDW had taken the wrong way.

Anyhow, all I can say, is that I am not at all emotionally abusive... and there definitely wasn't any domestic violence. I was brought up in a household were that was not acceptable, and it is a value that I really believe in..

The main problem is that her father and her family knows that there is something wrong with her and that she needs help, but can't do anything about it either. They just get yelled at and blamed, and have just accepted that it is part of her personality. The father in law, has tried to bring my son down to visit me, but then he gets threatened with all sorts.

SardineQueen · 17/03/2012 12:11

This list

"Male hatred does not exist.

Where are the mass rapes of men by women such as the ones are going on in the Congo and Darfur at the moment?

Where are the one in seven men in Niger who will die in childbirth because their wives won't stop fucking them?

Where are the young boys whose bodies are destroyed by childbirth because they gave birth to early because women just couldn't stop themselves from penetrating them?

Where are the women marrying 10 year old Afghan boys because they claim that god gives them the right.

Where are the 100 million missing boys and men in India and China, aborted, neglected or even murdered in infancy because they are the unwanted degraded sex?

Where is the female supremacist culture where women hold almost all the political, social and economic power and systematically exclude men from it.

Where are the one in three men who are beaten by women in relationships or the one in four men who will be sexually assaulted by men.

Do you need a longer list?"

SardineQueen · 17/03/2012 12:13

Have a little bloody humanity.

SigmundFraude · 17/03/2012 12:20

I know that appalling terrible things are being done to women (and men) all around the world. I'm simply a little fed up with having this statement used as a way to silence me whenever I say something you don't agree with.

auschopper · 17/03/2012 12:20

droves : He is 2 years old... and while I constantly tried to have him over nights, this was withdrawn because she wanted to punish me, and also get more money through CSA...

Note to any literalists, I am not serious as I suspect the (entirely appropriate) response from the police would be "fuck off go away and stop wasting our time".

Nope, the police have to act and report... that is what they have to do... If they gets reports, they have to act on it, and that is it...here in the UK, they don't get involved in civil disputes.... they are all about keeping the peace..

NowThenWreck · 17/03/2012 12:26

Wow auschopper. From what you say she does sound quite unstable.
I agree that you need to focus on the right things in this situation-your son, and try to consolidate all these assets-the houses etc, spilt the money and become two separate entities entirely.

OP posts:
flippinada · 17/03/2012 12:28

auschopper - if your wife is so awful (as you describe her) and you have evidence to back this up, why on earth haven't you tried to get residence of your son?

I'm presuming that you have a good job (profession) and therefore are able and intelligent?

SardineQueen · 17/03/2012 12:28

I thought that Nyac's list was nothing more than statistics (which are not facts, by a long chalk), conjecture and personal opinion.

That has really upset me. I don't understand how you could read that list and come up with that response.

PosiePumblechook · 17/03/2012 12:34

Flip. I was just about to post the same especially as her disorder would be one that could diagnosed.

flippinada · 17/03/2012 12:35

Also this:

"If they gets reports, they have to act on it, and that is it...here in the UK, they don't get involved in civil disputes.... they are all about keeping the peace.."

I'm not sure what you mean. I can accept that people contact the police with spurious complaints and they have to be dealt with. I can't help but wonder what their response was to this bizarre complaint. It's not the police's job to make absent parents pay maintenance. What did they do?

auschopper · 17/03/2012 12:35

flippinada : Firstly, I am a bloke... and well I have tried and tried, because I think it is right for my son, but the courts have a different opinion. Even though I have brought all of these things up, including, that exDW sits and screams hysterically at our son they did nothing.

I have had so much evidence, and now, that I have the financials can prove that everything that was said in the child case were lies, the court system just ignored them. Yes I can keep fighting and fighting and fighting, but at what cost?

I could keep spending £10's of thousands, and I would if I had the money, but having spent looking at the bill now, which is a lot more than I thought I had spent, works out at about £6k just for the child side of things. And well, where is it going to end... I so desperately want to do what is right for my son, but I don't get any support. Not to say I am not going to stop fighting for him.... when he is older, and if he wants to come and live with his dad, I will fight to make it happen. However I do think that he is going to be poisoned against me, and well, that is something that I am going to have to deal with...

auschopper · 17/03/2012 12:37

I was just about to post the same especially as her disorder would be one that could diagnosed.

Yes, but firstly, it can only be diagnosed if she went to treatment... and well, she wouldn't, especially if people told her that she needed to.

PosiePumblechook · 17/03/2012 12:42

Aus. I can't believe that this is the end of your fight for now. You seriously must have a rubbish lawyer.

auschopper · 17/03/2012 12:44

I'm not sure what you mean. I can accept that people contact the police with spurious complaints and they have to be dealt with. I can't help but wonder what their response was to this bizarre complaint. It's not the police's job to make absent parents pay maintenance. What did they do?

I don't know, as I left her parent's house, and didn't hear any more about it. Although, didn't stop her from getting the police to arrest me for another matter , and then having to go through the court process twice to prove my innocence, and I was found not guilty and the magistrates wondering how the hell it got to court in the first place. I don't want to give too much away in this regard, but was completely unrelated, but it didn't stop the police from seizing my vehicle, and then me trying to get it back.

To be honest, I have just had to really distance myself from the situation, because it is only going to get worse as the desperation increases. I am actually going to move back to Australia, as I have had enough and hopefully that will help distance myself even further from the vindictive nature..

flippinada · 17/03/2012 12:45

I know you're a bloke, there are several who post on MN that are resident parents, so it's not unheard of at all.

I do acknowledge that its a lot more unusual for a man to be the resident parent. Perhaps you could start a thread asking them for advice?

Am I right in my understanding here, you were offered access at a contact centre but chose not to take that option - can I ask why? If it was me I would put up with any inconvenience to see a child I loved desperately.

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