WIBU to post this on every snitching or Covid judging thread?

[saraclara]

...because I really think that people should think before they run to the reporting website or make assumptions about their neighbours and community memebrs.

posterHandfulofDust People should have noticed and left earlier than they might have liked to to allow more people to enter or if it was too full people shouldn't have continue to flood in. Easy to think this way in hindsight. The Gov didn't for see the crowding at public places why would the individual? The local park I go to (that I can walk to) - I could walk for 2 hours before noticing that it had got busy on the way back- it's enormous, mostly it gets busy close to the carpark (most people don't walk more than 10 mins and it's not easy to know what's happening at the carpark when you are 30 mins walk away!

But it's easier to think badly of people, I mean that's the point of the OP's poster...and there's plenty of evidence on MN, of those that have decided to take the easy path.

they don't owe you an explanation.

That's the heart of it ime, a lot of people believe they are owed an explanation for another persons actions (and even if given one will likely disbelieve or say it's not good enough) I don't owe my neighbours an explanation, I would gladly give them one if they asked, but as I said in my first post, many don't bother, they're not interested in the truth because then they might be wrong. It's not nearly as virtuous to tell everyone you asked X and they gave you a reasonable explanation.

I don't like the curtain twitching idea but snitching is a blanket term also used to shutdown people with genuine concerns. A poor woman who'd been threatened with being spat on by a group of teens well known in our neighbourhood was harassed and ended up in tears when she 'snitched'. About 8 other people admitted to the moderator of the local fb site that they too had been threatened or actually spat on when it was reported on the site but were too worried about the 'snitches get stitches' brayers to post with their accounts.

There's a difference between someone doing or threatening something that impacts others and calling 999 as harriet from number 9 has been out for a 2 hour jog! I think the term snitches muddies it. Ithink people should consider reporting carefully, of course, but equally the term snitching should be considered too as it's used to shutdown legitimate concerns.

@STDG parents should be teaching children how to deal with bullies themselves, it a basic social skill. It’s not like your mum can call up HR when your line manager is being unprofessional.

Re reports to social services. If you know that a someone is being abused you should report the crime to the police. I’m more referring the kinds of posts where someone suspects their neighbour of being a prostitute and asks mn whether this should be reported to SS.

As someone who was the victim of bullies, from the age of 10, and all through senior school until I went to sixth form college at 16, who was having suicidal thoughts at the age of only 14, and who has a life long history of depression, anxiety and low self esteem as a result, @Reginabambina, I'm sorry, but I think you are wrong.

My mum's version of teaching me to deal with the bullies was to tell me to ignore them and it would stop, and to parrot the (stupid) saying "Sticks and stones may break your bones but calling names can't hurt you". I was left feeling that I was utterly alone, and no adult would help me deal with it. I also felt that, when the bullying did go on, I couldn't go back to mum and tell her so, because she'd just say I wasn't ignoring them properly.

I needed her support and encouragement. I needed her to intervene and help me. At age 10 I was too young to deal with it on my own, and there is no way I would expect any child to deal with bullying on their own.

If I had had the means to hand, your suggestion of leaving me to deal with bullying on my own would have ended up with me committing suicide in my mid teens.

@STDG I’m sorry that you had a bad experience but that’s just as bad really. I think the difference may be partially generational. We were taught at school from a young age how to appropriately assert boundaries, where to seek support (both in terms of dealing with bullies and with mental health problems). I never suggested that parents should tell their children to ignore their bullies. On its own this is bad advice. But intervention is just as disempowering. Children should be taught to assert their boundaries and to combat bullying in appropriate ways rather than to be passive (regardless of whether that passivity is in the form of being told to do nothing and ignore or doing nothing while mummy sorts it out). By the age of ten we were all well practiced in the art of ‘stop it I don’t like it’ and knew how to defend our friends against bullies and also knew when it was appropriate to ask a teacher to step in (for example when the bullying was perpetrated by a majority or where there was a risk of physical bullying). I’m not sure that I’d be in a good place if I hadn’t been taught to stand up for myself.