Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think there is a lot of double standards on Mumsnet

108 replies

DreamChaser23 · 09/07/2020 16:52

Take cheating for example. I have seen many posts where the men cheat and they rightfully get blamed and vilified which they should.

But when a women does the same thing some posters don't have the same outrage instead try to find every little thing to justify it.

Just cause we are the same gender as someone does not mean we support them even if someone did something wrong. Right is right and wrong is wrong. I am a BAME person just because I am BAME does that mean when a BAME person does something wrong I should ignore it and try to find justification for them?

Another is people on furlough OR benefits. "why am I working while these guys get free money"
"my neighbour is a benefit fraud he gets more than I do working"

Now some of these people who complained about those on benefits are on it and claim it is too little.

OP posts:
ShebaShimmyShake · 10/07/2020 14:19

Like the affair man, I've seen threads on here where the wife says, my dh wants to take a lower paid job. Unilaterally, the response will be - that's family money and he needs to think of his dependents. Not - well hey, maybe he's an individual and his sole role in life is not providing you with hair and nail appointments weekly. While paying for private school and horseriding and ballet etc. etc.

Well with respect, it's usually a bit more nuanced than that, especially if there are kids. Not saying the husband is always obliged to burn himself out in a well paid job that's destroying him, but it isn't usually a case of a lady of leisure worried about maintaining her manicures.

edwardson · 10/07/2020 14:21

"short of going after them with a butterfly net, they can't be stolen.*"
*
Haha I love this - temptresses in the bushes swooping nets at unsuspecting husbands 😂

GimmeAy · 10/07/2020 14:22

Sheba - you'll find those threads usually are in fact ladies of leisure. It's never 'my DH is a delivery driver and he has decided he wants to write a book', it's always, my DH earns 6 figures and wants to change to a lower paid job. Honestly if you can find me one that's different, please do produce it.

ShebaShimmyShake · 10/07/2020 14:23

@edwardson

"short of going after them with a butterfly net, they can't be stolen.*" * Haha I love this - temptresses in the bushes swooping nets at unsuspecting husbands 😂
I think I've found my post lockdown career change.
GimmeAy · 10/07/2020 14:23

As for 'family money'. Lol. I don't think that there's a phrase on MN that I despise more.

ShebaShimmyShake · 10/07/2020 14:26

@GimmeAy

Sheba - you'll find those threads usually are in fact ladies of leisure. It's never 'my DH is a delivery driver and he has decided he wants to write a book', it's always, my DH earns 6 figures and wants to change to a lower paid job. Honestly if you can find me one that's different, please do produce it.
Well, it's not my recollection but I'll keep an eye on it. I can't be bothered to trawl the archives.

I don't have an objection to "family money". This is pretty much the point of marriage. I very much believe in "mean with money, mean with love". That doesn't mean he has to shower you with expensive gifts, just that what you have, you share if you love someone, and certainly if you're going into a division of labour based around provision and childcare. I never met a mean, stingy person who was otherwise totally emotionally available, loving and giving.

GimmeAy · 10/07/2020 14:28

Well my money is mine - all mine. Lol. Not married ;)

GimmeAy · 10/07/2020 14:29

It's never the giver of the family money who's mean, it's the recipient of it who can tend to claim all!

Hearhoovesthinkzebras · 10/07/2020 14:34

@AryaStarkWolf

I mean there's a thread going at the moment about a man leaving his cheating wife and I don't think a single person attempted to justify the wife's cheating?
No, but a fair few are condemning him for the way he is choosing to leave ie giving her no advanced notice because he feels controlled by her.
Hearhoovesthinkzebras · 10/07/2020 14:41

The other double standard on here is with regards to step children.

If the op is a step mum most posters will tell her that she's not responsible for the step children in any way, that it's up to the dad and ex to sort childcare and pay for them yet if it's a step dad he's criticised if he dares to object to financially contributing to the children or mucking in with the care of the children eg I've seen a mum complaining that she's running around after her children all day and posters told her that when the dh gets in he needs to do his bit while she has some time to herself - but they are her DC. I've never yet seen a step mum told that she should let her dh have a rest while she looks after his DC.

ShebaShimmyShake · 10/07/2020 14:43

@GimmeAy

Well my money is mine - all mine. Lol. Not married ;)
Sure, and that is rightly very valuable to a lot of people. Marriage isn't an obligation. If two people have agreed to have kids together (this is more the sticking point for me) then it's often in their best interests for one parent to take a hit on earnings. Usually the woman. That being the agreed division of labour, it does seem wiser to me to have a legal agreement in place in case things go belly up which, as you rightly say, they easily can. It's a recognition of the main carer's contribution, which may not have been financial but was still important, and protects them. Put it this way: knowing I would be the one to have a hit on my earning power, I would never have had kids with a man who wasn't prepared to give me that protection. As it happens, although he earns more, I come from a wealthier background and I brought more money to the marriage initially. That's family money too. I love him.

I realise of course that there are lots of single parents who work full time and get on with it alone, and I know I'm not supposed to say how fucking awesome they are but, well, they are. But that's precisely because they don't have the help of a supportive partner. A life partnership is supposed to make things better...

Doingtheboxerbeat · 10/07/2020 15:02

I think the busy beach anology has sailed right over peoples heads - if you are posting on MN, you are MN.

AryaStarkWolf · 10/07/2020 15:13

I think the busy beach anology has sailed right over peoples heads - if you are posting on MN, you are MN.

Exactly. It's a bit like saying "I'm not like the other girls" :p

Loveinatimeofcovid · 10/07/2020 15:23

Well on the infidelity front I’d say anyone involved is vilified unless there are some significant mitigating circumstances.

But the attitudes towards sex more generally do tend to reveal a double standard. It would seem that men are expected to remain faithful and attracted (but without showing that attraction without explicit instructions to do so) to a woman who has completely let herself go since having children (giving up exercise/career/hobbies/lost all sex drive/become a bit boring or unpleasant etc.) simply because she’s given them children but women are told that they deserve to have every single need met within a relationship all the time and if their DH isn’t doing that he’s abusive. The mind boggles.

ZombieLizzieBennet · 10/07/2020 15:32

@GimmeAy

Obviously I don't track individual posters, but it's noticeable when their is a shift in the majority of thinking. Somebody has changed their mind!
How would you track what the majority are thinking, though? There's never going to be a thread that contains more than a few hundred posters, since even on a full thread it's going to have some people making multiple posts rather than a thousand one offs. So on a board with thousands and thousands of posters, you're never going to get anything other than a snapshot of what some of them are thinking on an issue.

And even where you can say, most threads took X view 6 months ago but now the majority actually go for Y instead, without actually tracking individuals, how would you know whether it's been mind changes rather than just some people having left the board and others arriving?

Goosefoot · 10/07/2020 15:35

I find this interesting, yes OP.

Obviously individual situations can look superficially similar but be different.

But overall, at times there is a tendency to look at similar situations very differently depending on who the people are.

GimmeAy · 10/07/2020 18:22

So on a board with thousands and thousands of posters, you're never going to get anything other than a snapshot of what some of them are thinking on an issue.

Look at polls - they don't question every individual in the country, but they get a mood swing from the various they poll. MN is no different. It's as accurate so say that most posters on MN hate cheating women as it is to say most people in the UK voted for Boris Johnson.

XDownwiththissortofthingX · 10/07/2020 18:32

Of course you can have double standards on a forum, even one that is frequented by millions of users from all over the planet.

You see it once you go into the more specific subforums. No single topic attracts the opinion of every single one of those millions of users, but you see the double standards on display once you examine the topics by theme. Relationships forum is full of it

Man complains about having an unhinged/deranged/crazy ex - This is an enormous red flag, a surefire sign he's a gaslighter, and you should run for the hills. All of this repeated ad infinitum, without any hint of irony, in a subforum where the users do virtually nothing but complain about how unhinged/deranged/or crazy their male partners are.

Hopoindown31 · 10/07/2020 18:45

I think the busy beach anology has sailed right over peoples heads - if you are posting on MN, you are MN.

That's because it is a crap analogy. By being on the beach you contribute to it being busy. By posting on MN doesn't mean you are contributing to the ridiculous double standards by other posters on here. Each poster is responsible for their own posts.

ZombieLizzieBennet · 10/07/2020 18:51

@GimmeAy

So on a board with thousands and thousands of posters, you're never going to get anything other than a snapshot of what some of them are thinking on an issue.

Look at polls - they don't question every individual in the country, but they get a mood swing from the various they poll. MN is no different. It's as accurate so say that most posters on MN hate cheating women as it is to say most people in the UK voted for Boris Johnson.

Which polls? Because there are some that take great care to ensure they poll a representative sample, that people aren't voting more than once under different names and lots of things that MN in no way does, and those are the ones that get the most accurate data.
SummerCherry · 10/07/2020 19:21

Wow there is some seriously mean and awful justifications for behaviour on here! People calling other women ‘smug’ if they ‘don’t think their husband will cheat’ - and it’s only the men to blame - and I don’t regret having sex with some poor woman’s husband.

Blimey - I thought this was a thread calling out double standards.

And yet this thread is so FULL of double standards and some pretty mean girl crap!

Thankfully there are many lovely women and men out there. Who don’t cheat, don’t have sex with other woman’s husbands, don’t cheat on their wives, don’t laugh at other women just because they are gullible enough to trust their partners... the world is a better place than this thread THANK GOD!

Graphista · 10/07/2020 20:33

@GimmeAy you speak as if you had no choice, no agency in the matter when of course you did.

Many of us have been propositioned even heavily pursued by married men or when we were married ourselves - difference is we upheld our morals didn't excuse and justify making an immoral decision - repeatedly!

Legally money of married couples belongs to both, that's one of the points of marriage it's a legal contract to mainly cleanly set out financial obligations.

GimmeAy · 10/07/2020 23:34

She wasn't some 'poor woman's husband'. She was some rich woman's husband if you want to be pedantic about it.

Where have I said that I had no choice in the matter? I never said that I was raped or coerced.

GimmeAy · 10/07/2020 23:37

Or he was even.

maddening · 10/07/2020 23:40

I think that people like to post to oppose the op - eg should I report my friend on benefits who is definitely committing fraud- you get called a grass, told to myob etc., I want to go on benefits so I can do a course - you are stealing from the tax payer etc. Some people like a pile on.