To think everyone here is a doormat?

[sallyballynally]

Might not go down well, but is anyone else irritated by the amount of posts where everything could be solved if the OP stuck up for themselves.

Example:
OP: My SIL and BIL do stuff that is rude and that I don't like
Reply: Have you said anything?
OP: No, I don't like confrontation.

My god. I can understand not wanting to square up with a stranger, but posters are usually talking about family or friends who you really should be able to say something to. Does everyone on Mumsnet never talk to family and just live in a world of passive aggression?

You mean everyone on here is a doormat except for a) the majority of MNers who haven't started threafs like that and b) the tons of people who turn up on those threads and tell the OP not to be such a doormat?

What Lazy said.

Don't be a silly billy

I think on balance there are more non-doormats than doormats but I am sometimes astonished by how passive some posters are. Especially when other posters are clearly offering solutions to help them and they simply won't accept any solution which requires them to take action, however mild it may be.

Theres a lot of posters that refuse to say anything in case the upset someone even tho that someone is upsetting them.
Fuck that.

I'm not a doormat generally but my SIL was really rude to me a couple of years ago and I haven't confronted her since purely to keep the peace and we generally get on well. Though our husbands (who are brothers) did discuss it, which is even more passive I guess. I will never see her in quite the same way but don't want a family feud. If it happened again I wouldn't be such a doormat.

It’s kind of inevitable that the ones who find confrontation hard are going to be the ones asking for advice about it, aren’t they? And those in good relationships don’t ask for advice about them either

Better than being an antagonistic twat.

Everyone on mumsnet except you right?

The weird thing is, if someone is rude to me & I stand up for myself right at the time, even if they never apologise or even continue with similar behaviour, I can deal with them in peace. I had my say & the air is cleared, I find.

Whereas, if someone upsets me but I never tell them off properly then I end up just avoiding & being upset by them forever.

Standing up for self turns out to be the best option.

As other pp have said you wouldn’t be on here asking for advice if you could always stand up for yourself.

I must admit though I do find it strange that there are people who can’t say anything they want to partners/friends/close family but I suppose I look at that from my experience with close relationships and need to realise that others obviously have very different experiences of close relationships.

Unfortunately standing up for oneself in some families means the family turning on them and the situation becoming so intolerable that they've no option but to either back down or go NC. I know because I've had to do it!! Some people can not hold a sensible discussion about a difference of opinion or situation where one party felt unhappy with their treatment. They can only be aggressive/bullying/make it the other persons fault/problem.

Just to add, having been on mumsnet on and off for over a decade, I don’t see much evidence of MNers avoiding conflict

Some posters might be doormats. Is that what you mean?

I'm more surprised by threads where people can't navigate simple friendships and get dreadful advice from similar types.

Example:
OP: "I feel awful because I vaguely got to know 3 mums in DC's class of 30 over the last few weeks, then I just found out they went to lunch without me last week."
Others: "Oh that's terrible, I had a similarly awful time with this school gate bitchiness. Now you know not to bother with them again, stop talking to them and make new friends."
Normal people: "Er, nobody will invite all 30 mums at the school gate to lunch at once, calm the fuck down and just arrange something yourself if you want to hang out with someone in particular."

I'd say it's not "everyone here" being a doormat, but more that the less assertive out there tend to end up with these problems that an assertive person would have spoken out about before they had chance to evolve into something.

It's a British thing.

It's a British thing

No, it really isn't. I'm British and I know plenty of other British people who have no problems with managing conflict and confronting people as and when necessary. But there seems to be a subset of MN posters who who are so terrified of standing up for themselves or even disagreeing slightly, that they get themselves into some bizarre situations.....that could have been dealt with early on if they'd actually spoken up. Instead they come on MN handwringing and ignoring any advice which suggests they actually do something.

Friday night
Start a fight

I usually avoid confrontation by dealing with things as they happen, stewing in things tends to result in people being too upset or that no one understands why something is being brought up weeks/months later. A quick reaction is usually the safest option.

And yes, a few posters seem to be s bit wet, lol

Nope not a doormat
I'm quite good at telling folk to fuck right off

You also hear a lot of posters who have had massive family fall outs when someone has aired a grievance

I have a lot of sympathy for many posters that seem to have quite nasty family or MILs but recently there seem to have been a dozen or so threads where the OP seems incapable of just saying 'err no, that's not happening' then when told by numerous posters what to say and how to turn it around just seem to whimper 'oh but I can't'. It does frustrate me. I want to send them all on assertiveness training courses!!

Sometimes being assertive doesn't get you anywhere and you end up being forced back into your box