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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think a town can be unfriendly?

225 replies

Midnightpinot · 18/04/2017 16:01

I'm aware this sounds ridiculous. A while ago DD 8, my DH and I moved to a new area. The old area is consistently touted as one of the worst places to live in the U.K, due to poverty etc but we were happy where we lived and my DD had plenty of friends. These school children generally were quite immature, still enjoying a lot of Disney etc and very friendly.

The new area has actually been voted one of the best places in the U.K. to live. Lots of lovely places to eat, parks and country walking etc. We moved there because of this, but also out of necessity for my DH work.

Anyway I really, genuinely feel like the adults and children here are less friendly. I noticed straight away how the kids seemed really mean, making nasty comments even about adults, rolling their eyes and making 'whatever' faces I've only ever seen on teenagers before. No smiling or laughing here (unless in a nasty way) My DD is a very positive person and said everything was fine, but has now admitted that she doesn't have any "real" friends like her old friends and she can't understand why the girls at school are so rude and bossy. She's also developing problems with food as the girls at school worry about weight and call each other fat (at 8! WTF!) It's not just that school either, I've seen it whilst generally out and about.

We've been to many children's parties now where we are blanked by other parents except to snatch the present away. I'm completely thrown by it and an feeling immense guilt over the move.

We had a party for DD recently where lots of the parents never even bothered RSVP-ing. The children/parents that did turn up wouldn't listen to the woman managing the party at all, were picking on DD old friends or generally being disruptive as their parents stood and watched.

Everyone drives their cars like maniacs or are warring over parking spaces. No one lets anyone out and god help you try and cross a road without a pedestrian crossing-no one is stopping for you unless forced. The Facebook group they have is mainly people taking pictures of bad parking, dash cam footage of bad driving or slating of local businesses.

So, AIBU to think one small town can just have a bad culture? Everyone here is very proud of their 'Lovely, friendly town' and I just don't feel it at all. So sorry for the long post!

OP posts:

EweAreHere · 18/04/2017 17:07

I have noted that the smaller the villages, the smaller the minds in our county. A lot of cliques, snobbery, disdain for outsiders. Mind boggling.

SpreadYourHappiness · 18/04/2017 17:07

god help you try and cross a road without a pedestrian crossing-no one is stopping for you unless forced.

You shouldn't be expecting traffic to stop if you're not at a crossing; that's not how it works.

User543210 · 18/04/2017 17:07

I moved from Liverpool to down south. The people back home are so friendly, will help anyone (despite our reputation )

Down south no one will even look you in the eye for fear of starting a conversation at the tills it seems :(

VelvetSpoon · 18/04/2017 17:11

Horsham is very very insular Imo, I wasn't surprised to see it mentioned! (I don't live there!)

This thread is worrying as in a few years I'm thinking of moving to another part of the country (classed as one of the best places in UK to live) and I'm now a bit worried that under the surface it's all really cliquey and I'll be an outsider!

morningconstitutional2017 · 18/04/2017 17:12

It's funny you should say that. I've a pair of cycling pals who often pedalled through a town on the other side of our nearest city. They frequently admired it, thought it was pretty, naice shops, etc. When they retired they moved from our side of town to this other place and then realised what a mistake they'd made on the people front - they found them rather snooty and unfriendly.

VelvetSpoon · 18/04/2017 17:14

User, Liverpool is my favourite city, I have never been anywhere where everyone without exception is friendly, helpful and tries to start conversation. As a born and bred Southerner (always lived in London area) I found it a bit weird at first but I love going up there now.

ChrisYoungFuckingRocks · 18/04/2017 17:15

I lived in a small village - one famous for various reasons (it's in Essex). It's a beautiful, picturesque, cricket on the village green type place, and everyone is envious when they learn you live there.

However, if your family hasn't lived there for at least 300 years, then you're an outsider and get treated as such. I lived there for over 3 years, and the only friends I had was a foreign couple who were also outsiders. My children were targeted by the class bully and the head teacher wouldn't do anything about it. Partly because of this, seven months ago I moved to a very large town (one of the poorer, rougher towns in the UK). The difference is astonishing! People are friendly and accepting, and though it's a decidedly not-pretty town, it's such a relief being out of that miserable pretty chocolate box village. I now warn people not to move there.

MrsTerryPratchett · 18/04/2017 17:16

You can't compare places with Liverpool! That's just unfair. Everywhere is less friendly than Liverpool. I loved living there.

cansu · 18/04/2017 17:16

I am always struck by how friendly people are in my home town in the north. Whilst it is a big city, people just seem to be generally nicer. It is v weird as there is undoubtedly much more crime and more social deprivation.

fluffywuffydoda · 18/04/2017 17:17

Totally know what you mean op, I moved from a very very friendly city to a town and I just couldn't get my head around how different it was.

I found it had a very small town mentality amongst some locals and had really old fashioned views. Although they could be friendly and ask how you are it just never really got past that point due to them sicking to their own friends, I always felt like an outsider. It was my dps hometown but I just hated it, luckily he thought the same and we've now moved to a lovely town but the vibe here is so different, everyone is so friendly and approachable.

User543210 · 18/04/2017 17:17

Velvet and Mrs! Thank you! I love my city, I miss it a lot. When I'm down south it feels like someone hears my accent and they think ''don't look her in the eye'' incase I talk to them

MadisonAvenue · 18/04/2017 17:19

cricketballs I live in Staffordshire (have done all of my life) and we moved to this particular part just a few years ago and people are friendly. I was told that they would be by my hairdresser who'd grown up here but alarm bells rang because I thought they'd be that way to locals only, and in fact it's a village which has grown over the last few years with new build estate so there are lots of us 'outsiders'.

She was right though, I remember walking my son to school two days after we moved here and various people said hello as we walked along, and soon afterwards I was waiting for a bus outside someone's house when the lady came out and told me that she hadn't seen me there before and that the bus shouldn't be too long but was often running late at that time of day.

Carrotgirl999 · 18/04/2017 17:21

Sounds like Harrogate to me xx

Wando1986 · 18/04/2017 17:23

OP did you move to Formby?

Only place I've ever seen OAPs have handbags at dawn over a parking space at Waitrose.

Wando1986 · 18/04/2017 17:25

User543210, also from Liverpool. My favourite game when going to visit friends in London is to make eye contact on the tube and smile!

shellhider · 18/04/2017 17:26

I think we live in the same place.

Sirzy · 18/04/2017 17:27

I live just outside Liverpool and do love how is most areas locally you can talk to anyone.

In the lakes last week we bumped into a couple from Glasgow and where having a great chat - they now live down south and said they hate where they are as nobody talks!

Heathen4Hire · 18/04/2017 17:30

I have lived in East Dulwich for 16 years. I find the amenities and surroundings to be lovely. However, there is a social divide, and I struggle to make friends with many of the more "middle-class" inhabitants. The parents are very competitive and look down on us. I find my tribe from a council estate near me. They are much more friendly and approachable. They help each other out, and conversation is easier. I don't think the wealthy families intend to come off as unfriendly, it's just that their interests and priorities are much different from the lower income ones.

I am hoping to move to East Sussex next year. I know Brighton and Hove well and have toured the surrounding area. The folks are generally friendly, good fun and easy to talk to. I'm looking forward to it.

DailyMaui · 18/04/2017 17:31

I live in a really friendly market town - they're not all bad, honest! But before this I lived in a naice very leafy part of Surrey. Gorgeous place, great gardens ;), but the people were seriously unfriendly. Broke my heart going to (expensive) toddler groups and being totally ignored. I made one friend! It was unbearable. I'd smile and chat with people and it was as if I had farted in their faces.

Glitterywillows · 18/04/2017 17:32

@PrivatePike yes it is probably me!. I'm a miserable git most of the time .

Alwayshungryforcrisps · 18/04/2017 17:34

Is it Moss Side/old Trafford to Didsbury?

scaryclown · 18/04/2017 17:36

Totally.

I live in a town where what I consider advanced social skills - friendliness, humour, mood lifting warmth - are considered low class and embarrassing.

Its also a town with an extremely high level of mental health charities, half-way houses, people on MH drugs, and suspicion of foreigners - including (still) the Irish.

I have been snootified just by saying 'good morning' out of turn with some weird anglo-french idea of who should be respected and who shouldn't.

There is a gentleman who I think the town would see as the supreme example of 'correct' behaviour- every sentence is down-toned at the end, he wears trousers and braces, vicar glasses, and never makes eye contact with anybody. Oh and a panama hat in summer.

Its actually quite scary - I keep meeting people who are articulate and intelligent, friendly and worldly, who have clearly spent their lives feeling marginalised and excluded. The same people in some places I have lived would be the heart and soul of the towns social life. In my town they are regarded as near retarded.

helpmesusan · 18/04/2017 17:36

Yes that is a thing - in some places!

I moved somewhere super unfriendly for 5 years, then escaped. You are not BU

CotswoldStrife · 18/04/2017 17:37

I moved from the NW to the SW and it is completely different! I come from the friendly city quite a few have already mentioned.

I would move back in a heartbeat tbh but my DD is in the school system here so we have another decade or so to go

cricketballs · 18/04/2017 17:37

MadisonAvenue

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