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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Is this rude?

208 replies

spicysauce · 25/11/2020 07:41

So my sister has a boyfriend and they are expecting a child together, due in May 2021. I haven't met the boyfriend yet ( they don't live close).

My sister, myself and my partner share a WhatsApp group with my mother where we exchange photos of our children and discuss daily matters.

Two days ago I added this boyfriend to our WhatsApp group in order to "welcome him to the family" before we get to meet in real life.

He thanked me for adding him to the group and I asked him if he was looking forward to being a dad and he said very much so.

Yesterday I discussed something with my mother in the group. It wasn't a lot of messages, maybe ten and they all occurred within an hour.

Later on there was a notification that my sister's boyfriend left the group.

AIBU to think this is rude? He could have muted the group.

I asked my sister why he left the group. She said she didn't know, but perhaps the messaging was too much for him.

This is hard to believe for me, because when my sister visited me, she was on her phone all the time WhatsApping with him.

OP posts:
Pechanga · 25/11/2020 17:01

I think you should have conducted the chat with your DM on your own WhatsApp chat so as not to 'bog down' the group chat with messages just between you. I think that's a bit rude tbh and I probably would've left the group too.

notacooldad · 25/11/2020 17:05

I left out a bit of my sentence!!!

I'm sure they do but what is the point IN BEING IN A GROUP that is not currently relevant to you? is what I meant.

MilerVino · 25/11/2020 17:22

Do some people not know how to mute conversations?

I know how to mute things. I don't use WhatsApp but I'm sure I could work it out. Thing is though, why should I? It's just another task to add to my day. Amongst all the other things I don't want to add 'periodically mute conversations on WhatsApp, after having read at least one message and decided it it needs muting' when I can just leave the group. It's one less thing to bother with then.

Ginfordinner · 25/11/2020 17:30

On WhatsApp you can mute for 8 hours, 1 week or always. If you mute always you only need to do it once, but you can still follow a conversation without "adding another task to your day".

And you won't upset anyone by leaving the group Grin

I'm sure they do but what is the point IN BEING IN A GROUP that is not currently relevant to you?

However, I agree with you

MerchantOfVenom · 25/11/2020 17:37

Sorry OP - but I really think family group chats are really just for long-standing family members.

Come on - does he really want to be part of your every day back-and-forth with your Mum?

Fair play to your DH (you’re married!) if he plays an active part in the chat (does he?). But this chap is too new for this sort of group.

I think you were being way too hasty to include him (although I fully acknowledge it came from a nice place).

Let him get to know you and vice versa, before taking this step.

FYI - my DB, his partner and I have a group chat, but DH isn’t part of it, simply because daily inane messaging is just not his thing.

ruby4ever · 25/11/2020 17:47

I really hate when people have one to one conversations on WhatsApp groups! If the mssgs are intended for one person why not just mssg them separately on their private chat. We all on the group don't need to read nor want to receive unnecessary notifications. 10 is actually a lot of mssgs on the group within the hour when it concerns no one else in the group except your mum. I've often been disturbed in the mornings/evenings because people are having one to one convos on the group chat, 100s of pictures and videos of diy projects they've completed! First thing I do is go on camera roll and start deleting as they automatically get saved!
Your sisters bf sensed straight away what it's going to be like remaining in that group which is why he left. Yeah he could've muted it but that would mean if you asked him anything on the group he would miss the mssg and so you wouldn't get a response

grumpygiraffe · 25/11/2020 17:55

It wasn't a lot of messages, maybe ten and they all occurred within an hour.

I’d have left long before the tenth message.

Palavah · 25/11/2020 17:58

My sister, myself and my partner share a WhatsApp group with my mother where we exchange photos of our children and discuss daily matters.

I'm going to wager that your husband has muted the chat, that 70% of the messages are from you and your mother, and the remainder is your sister.

sammylady37 · 25/11/2020 18:17

I've often been disturbed in the mornings/evenings because people are having one to one convos on the group chat, 100s of pictures and videos of diy projects they've completed! First thing I do is go on camera roll and start deleting as they automatically get saved

You can turn this off for each group or conversation. I figured out how to do it when someone started sending me endless ‘hilarious’ lockdown memes and it was really wrecking my head!

phoenixrosehere · 25/11/2020 18:31

Yabu.

He could have muted but you could have also messaged your mum privately instead. I use Facebook Messenger and I have a mix of groups and some that are between me and another person. My parents and sister are on a shared chat with my husband and I, his siblings, sister-in-law and I are on a different one. If I need to ask something to one of them, I private message them. It seems rude to have a conversation with one person that is specific to them when you’re in a group chat.

MerchantOfVenom · 25/11/2020 20:21

This is hard to believe for me, because when my sister visited me, she was on her phone all the time WhatsApping with him.

Kindly ... there’s a big difference between him directly whatsapping someone he knows (and has met Grin ), and being witness to irrelevant back-and-forth between two people he’s never even met.

You must see the difference. He’s not being rude, he’s not not interested in your comms with your Mum. That’s entirely fair enough.

Meraas · 25/11/2020 20:46

I don’t think he was rude. I hate texting/WhatsApping everyone except DH, but I I’ve seeing friends/family in person. Sounds like he was polite when you added him, and he was nice about your baby, so I’d let this go. Let him make the effort next time.

Meraas · 25/11/2020 20:47

*i love seeing

Ontheboardwalk · 25/11/2020 21:04

Another vote for he's not being rude. You shouldn’t have added him if private chats were happening

I mute all messages after just getting on motorway for an hours drive and having 70 notifications about sports bants in a family chat by two family members

Most annoying thing is I listen to music via Bluetooth on my phone in the car and it kept constantly interrupting my music

I won’t leave as I enjoy interacting with some messages but they should be relevant to the majority of people in the group

Original poster
spicysauce · 25/11/2020 21:08

He's met my mother though. The only reason why he hasn't met me yet is because I don't live close.

OP posts:
MerchantOfVenom · 25/11/2020 21:17

Nonetheless ... Confused

He’s clearly not interested in your Mum’s random texts with her daughter about stuff of zero relevance to him...?

Surely you can appreciate this?

This thread has altered me to the fact that you can mute group chats. I have now done this on some of them.

MerchantOfVenom · 25/11/2020 21:17

*alerted.

MilerVino · 25/11/2020 21:21

OP if I were you I would just see it as a difference in messaging etiquette. You think it's rude to leave a group chat. He seems not to want to be in a group chat that includes a lot of personal messages not relevant to him. Neither of you is necessarily wrong or rude, but it is a different approach.

peboh · 25/11/2020 21:22

We don't include husbands/partners into our 'family' group chat (myself, 3dsis and mum) as none of them want to be involved in the chats we have, or the debates.
He wasn't rude.

StillCoughingandLaughing · 26/11/2020 00:03

I would have thought most people would find the immediate family of their partner/mother of their child to be of some small relevance.

But they ARE essentially strangers at the moment. In a normal world, the sister’s partner would have met the family a few times for dinner, at family parties etc. and have been gradually introduced. The family could have asked him questions about his family, his career, hobbies etc... the conversation would have been a bit more natural. Instead he has to try to get to know people via typed messages - and instead of a ‘meet the family’ type conversation where everyone makes a special effort, he got a lot of irrelevant chatter about who could meet who when.

Yes, muting would probably have been more diplomatic. But if he isn’t a regular WhatsApp user, he might not even know you can do this, or that the others would get a notification that he’d left the chat.

My sister set up our family WhatsApp when lockdown started and didn’t even add her own husband - and she’s been with him for 20 years! I suppose she figured that they were locked down in the same house 24/7; if there was anything particularly relevant to him, she could tell him.

MerchantOfVenom · 26/11/2020 01:22

I’d be really interested to know the extent to which the OP’s partner participates in these group chats.

Perhaps he is really active, and this has given the OP a false sense of how much partners are actually interested in the daily minutiae of back-and-forth chat...

CuppaZa · 26/11/2020 01:35

Yabu. It would drive me barmy. He is not rude

GoldfishParade · 26/11/2020 04:46

God this is so weird, people's answers on this thread. It's been a long time since I've lived in the UK, are people seriously that rude there?

Yes, family group WhatsApps are boring, but the OP was just trying to bridge the gap of the physical distance between them. It's not wrong of him to want to leave but it's so rude not to leave a quickly friendly message saying goodbye, or messaging the OP privately afterwards to say he doesn't do group chats.

It is really rude OP, especially when directed at your sister in law who you haven't met.

This thread doesnt show it isnt rude, it shows how low standards are in a society that's becoming increasingly narcissistic. It would have taken 20 secs to say goodbye.

FortunesFave · 26/11/2020 05:00

The thing is Goldfish not everyone is used to these groups. I wasn't for a long time...and probably did all sorts of things which would be deemed rude. He probably didn't even realise people would know he'd left! What's rude to me is assuming he'd WANT to be in the group...being added to a group without being asked is rude.

MerchantOfVenom · 26/11/2020 05:59

So what exactly could he have said as a ‘goodbye’ text that wouldn’t have been rubbing salt in the wound?

There really is no polite way to say, ‘this isn’t personal (it’s completely personal!), but you’re all dull as shit. I’m off’.

Really - it’s just easier to leave.

Clean break. Let’s just converse in person.

I know the OP was going a nice thing - totally.

But actually, it’s pretty rude to force private conversations on someone you’ve only just, or not even, met.