AIBU to think there is often really terrible advice on here?

[Ahmadame]

I mean, people suggest completely random shit and then get quite indignant if an OP says they won’t be taking it.

I don’t know if it’s just me but I regularly see weird suggestions on here, or suggestions that are clearly unworkable (like ‘home school your kids’) and I sometimes don’t know if they are serious or not.

What’s the worst bit of MN advice you’ve seen?

I love the "grow your own vegetables" statement when people put on how they are struggling financially or worrying about how they can stretch their money
So are these people suppose to just go hungry until their carrots and tomatoes have grown!!!

I am always baffled by people who give advice about things that they clearly have no idea about.

I think it has already been referenced upthread, but there is a recent one about sellers not being moved out at completion.

Many of the responses are from people who have never bought or sold a property. "Oh, it's only one night OP, just let them stay" "they were probably busy" "just tell them you will be back in the morning" "they can't possibly be expected to pack/clean the house by 2pm".

Boggles the mind.

And where precisely are they meant to grow them? It boggles my mind the number of people whose advice will reference ‘the garden’ without actually asking if the OP has one. I’ve seen more than one thread from an OP at her wits’ end trying to entertain two children in a small flat with replies saying ‘Can’t you just stick them out in the garden for a bit to give yourself a break?’

A lot of MNers don’t understand a world where you don’t live in a three-bed semi in a mid-size town where everyone has a garden, travels everywhere by car and the most likely caller at 11pm at night is a poor lost pensioner with Alzheimer’s in desperate need of help.

I love the "grow your own vegetables" statement when people put on how they are struggling financially or worrying about how they can stretch their money

I genuinely can't keep plants alive!!

There was one on here years ago about a woman in the supermarket with her baby.

Basically her baby was tiny, and was crying, the woman was pushing the trolley and so op offered to hold the womans tiny newborn as she shopped, the woman declined ops offer, and then her mum came along and took the trolley or the baby, I cant remember which.

The op followed this woman, and her baby and her mum around the shop, gossiping about her to staff members on the way and was then so concerned she posted a thread about it.

So many people came along to wind the op up which ended in the op deciding to go back to the supermarket, ask for CCTV footage of the carpark, to get the numberplate of this womans car, so she could then find out who she is and report her to social services in case she had PND and killed herself and the baby.

I was honestly gobsmacked, loads of people were agreeing with the op "just in case it was a missing piece of the puzzle".

It was bloody ridiculous.

@PeacheyPeach

I love the "grow your own vegetables" statement when people put on how they are struggling financially or worrying about how they can stretch their money So are these people suppose to just go hungry until their carrots and tomatoes have grown!!!

I know, it's bonkers! One woman was advised to go foraging.....

@Bexxe

My pet peeve is whenever someone writes of an issue with their DP, even if its something that could clearly be worked on, there is atleast 20 people going 'sack him off' 'leave him now' ' get out of there as fast as you can' - a lot of the time just saying that without offerring any reason or explanation to their logic.

Like they want everyone to be alone for the sake of it instead of working on their relationship - drives me mad.

Yes this really bothers me, as if you just return the faulty goods and get a better item. And woe betide anyone who suggests trying to see his perspective or doing a little self reflection.

I'm not talking one sided or unhappy relationships at all. I mean when somebody wants to work out a relatively standalone issue.

It particularly boils my blood when there are children involved. I am not from the UK so I don't know if Mumsnet is a good representation but these complicated setups of various DC from previous relationships, shared DC are very unusual to me. I had some really aggressive poster one day basically abusing me for not packing my bags and charging out of the house with my child. I mean I'd rather work things out or at least try before having my child live between two houses for her whole life.

I see a lot of suggestions to "go part time" to solve various problems. No job I've ever had would have let me reduce my hours, and in many cases people usually need all their income? I'm in the US so maybe it's more common in the UK but part time jobs are not thick on the ground here.

@BookFiend4Life

I see a lot of suggestions to "go part time" to solve various problems. No job I've ever had would have let me reduce my hours, and in many cases people usually need all their income? I'm in the US so maybe it's more common in the UK but part time jobs are not thick on the ground here.

That's often better advice than you'd think, especially when the poster isn't a particularly high earner and has higher childcare costs. Not particularly uncommon to be working for very little or a loss on the 5th day.

I'm imagining the OP where someone's partner presented her with a thread from his blokes' forum where he'd OPd about a problem he was having with her.

"Here, look at these 500 posts from people who think you're an unreasonable bitch and I should leave you. Then you'll understand why you're wrong and I'm right"

No money? Give up takeaway coffees and you'll have saved up a deposit for a house by Christmas.

Stressed? Just get a cleaner so you don't have to worry about the housework.

Husband left the loo seat up? LTB, he sounds like a narcissist.

It's hard to tell. Most 'interesting' threads here get deleted anyway 😂 🤷🏾‍♂️

Really terrible parenting advice for Troubled Teens. Variations of:

Take away everything
Lock them inside
Kick them out

So much #facepalm

@euromamaAussieKids yes! I get so annoyed when people snitch and get the thread deleted.

Too many LTB over trivial things. Or things that might better be addressed in counselling first at least. Not talking DV or EA or infidelities etc of course.

And even if the LTB is possibly good advice it’s not that fucking easy - if you share a house; children; a mortgage/ tenancy & you are not wealthy enough to buy him out/ buy you and DCs a new place etc what are you supposed to do? Waltz out with your kids broke and homeless? It’s a long involved and very awful abs difficult process.

I’ve seen a mix of bad and good advice. It’s up to you whether you take it or not.

I thought the armchair lawyers were the worst offenders for bad advice. But along came COVID and suddenly people who’ve never completed even an hour at medical school are diagnosing people and using all the latest terms that they picked up from the Boris Briefing that morning. What really made me laugh was the number of people who fell in love with using anti-bac hand sanitizer at every opportunity like this would save the entire human race. It’s a virus. Anti-bac won’t be much use.

And don’t get me started on the “essential item” experts.

Not exactly bad advice but it does irk me when people whose only experience of the US is 2 weeks on a Virgin Holidays package to Disney think they know everything about living here. Healthcare, politics, guns, education, Trump, you name it….they are an expert on an absolutely everything here. I am particularly amused by the “everything’s cheaper in America” type comments. Aside from petrol and fast food (and occasionally housing, depending on which cities you are comparing), everything here is more expensive than the UK. But, yeah, you’re an expert on the whole country because you’ve been to Florida once….

For me it's the advice to just ghost people. It's so rude. There are occasions It's warranted but there aren't many of them.

@DeepaBeesKit

Fucking hell bluntness you've literally posted while I was typing. Ha!

I wouldn’t fangirl too much about certain posters, when much of the time their MO is just to berate an OP, wherever they stand in any situation.

A happily pregnant woman with a toddler posted because she was understandably cross the her husband had gone out and got pissed and missed something they’d arranged.

The usual LTB responses came in. But the one that really shocked me was ‘he’s an alcoholic abuser - get an abortion now and leave the bastard’.

Several times on the legal board I've seen advice starting: "I am not a lawyer, but I would imagine that ..."

Why on earth the vivid imagination of someone who by their own admission knows nothing about it will help is beyond me. At least they're honest

Oh, and "always trust your gut" is terrible advice. And it seems to be code for never trust men or anyone or anything that your children might come into contact with. It's part of the "anything-could-happen" philosophy.

Posters who think their partner is just fine, or their ten-year-old child could go to school on the bus never get told to trust their gut!

Oh, and "always trust your gut" is terrible advice.

Any mention of ‘spidey senses’ also makes me mentally dismiss a poster.

Not exactly bad advice but it does irk me when people whose only experience of the US is 2 weeks on a Virgin Holidays package to Disney think they know everything about living here. Healthcare, politics, guns, education, Trump, you name it….they are an expert on an absolutely everything here. I am particularly amused by the “everything’s cheaper in America” type comments. Aside from petrol and fast food (and occasionally housing, depending on which cities you are comparing), everything here is more expensive than the UK. But, yeah, you’re an expert on the whole country because you’ve been to Florida once….

The same goes for Canada, albeit from a different perspective. If you believe what you read from some MN posters, Canada is some kind of Utopian paradise.

I remember a thread from a Canadian woman moving to the UK who wanted advice on places to live near Alfreton. People were aghast. ‘No way would I swap Canada for Alfreton! You’re MAD!’ was the general gist. It was the most ridiculous comparison. You don’t swap an entire country for one town (to which most of the posters probably also hadn’t been). Even making a ‘Canada vs. UK’ comparison is much more complicated than that. How did they know she didn’t live in some complete dump? You’re not telling me the second biggest country in the world doesn’t have less salubrious parts somewhere!

Actually the truly worse horrific advice is on the weightloss boards and competitive under eating, I stopped reading after a poster said she regularly went without food for three days, and was recommending it to others.