Math
You seem very offended by my posts.
[ApplePaltrow]
"But the worst for me is the poor analogizing (especially on the relationships board)
OP: Last night I came in late and my husband hadn't done the dishes. AIBU to be angry?
Poster: Not at all. I know exactly how you feel. My ex-husband didn't do the dishes once. Later that night he shot my best friend and burned the house down. Call Women's Aid. LTB!"
How jolly it is to make fun of
(a) People who post their problems on Relationships.
It is a well known fact that most people who post there are not bothered by anything more than husbands not doing the dishes -- so well known that ApplePaltrow can make a little joke about the usual scenario.
Nope, I think you may have missed the subtlety of that joke. I related a typical negative scenario: an unequal distribution of domestic tasks in a relationship. Most data suggests that most relationships are unequal on this front. I would expect most women on every board to be able to state something like this.
The husband is 95% likely to be in the wrong here. But he can be in the wrong without being abusive. But the relationship is immediately cast as an abusive one. That makes the way forward very clear. Once so categorized, there can be no attempt to make the relationship equal, no attempt to fix the relationship. Even attempting to ask for more information is aggressively shouted down as victim-blaming or being a "cool wife". Everyone immediately (aggressively) moves to LTB.
It's like people don't feel like inequality or being unhappy is enough of a reason to leave. Only abuse is enough. So everything must be coded as abuse in order to give people a reason to leave. Like the cake-abuse guy. The poster probably wanted to make the OP feel better but the only bad = abuse... so he must have been abusive.
Do you really think that this is giving women the tools they need for the rest of their lives? It's like the difference between fear and anxiety. Now they are afraid of everyone and everything, they can no longer rely on their fear instinct to guide them. They are probably more vulnerable to future abuse than if they received slightly more nuanced advice.
and (b) People who post there to give advice, and posters who relate to their own experiences.
Yeah, because it is well known that people who give advice on Relationships are stupid and irrational hmm.
Yes, I was definitely clearly making fun of them! Everyone single person on mumsnet gives advice and relates their own experiences; I don't think you should be mollycoddled for it. Hell, posters asking for advice in terrible situations are torn apart half the time if they use the wrong word or happen to read unsympathetically. Even self identified victims of abuse get serious nastiness if they refuse to take people's prior advice. I think people take themselves way too seriously if they think that they should be lauded and beyond criticism just because they take the time to post on the relationships board. Scary that you think otherwise.
Let's be honest, most of the posters there lack humility and any doubt in their diagnoses whatsoever but they don't have the skills or experience to do anything other than diagnose abuse. They don't know how to fix relationships. They don't know how to build self esteem or boundaries. They're not trained therapists. And when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.