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?

@Jennifer2r

A recent one where someone was upset about a date not texting them back and the advice was to text them saying "you snooze you lose"!!!

Also posters who don't understand the complexity of leaving a DV situation and post things like "leave. Freedom programme. Now" etc. Or 'call the police immediately' without considering that that's the most dangerous time in a woman's relationship with her abuser...

I agree there is a lot of terrible advice around DV.

@yamadori

There are some occasions when all the experts in the world would not be able to give the OP the correct advice. It usually starts with:

'Can anyone tell me what type of plant/tree we need to buy here?'

And then a whole list of totally impossible requirements - it must be fast-growing to cover an eyesore, but as soon as it reaches the required height it needs to stop growing immediately and never grow any bigger. It needs to be evergreen. It needs to have lots of lovely flowers (preferably pink or white) all year round. It must cast no shade whatever at any time of year. It must require absolutely no maintenance or watering. It must be strong and robust enough to withstand footballs, random intruders and dog attack, yet must also be feathery, delicate, without any thorns and definitely not poisonous. It should not produce the sort of berries which children like to pick. It needs to be able to grow in deep shade / full sun / and either bone dry or permanently boggy soil. It must never overhang the neighbour's garden and must not drop so much as a single leaf. Ever.

Good luck with finding all that on a plant app

maybe build a brick wall and paint a tree on it instead

Hilarious -love it!!!!!!

On an old account I asked for support and advice because I had (unbeknownst to me) fallen pregnant on the depo shot and didn’t find out until halfway through the pregnancy. I was devastated as I already had 3 DC, was nearly 40 and felt I couldn’t cope. I was however, happily married and lived happily with my DH & DC.

One posters suggested I should just give away the baby. When I politely requested that nobody suggested that as I’m pretty sure my DC & DH would be traumatised, a poster called me a cunt and then inboxed me to find where I worked so they could come and batter me.

So that was nice.

If someone's partner has checked out of the relationship. Everyone saying that there is someone else, is not helpful. People check out for all sorts of reasons. Not just that one.

@Hoolahupsaresquare

Actually I’d like to add to my comment - I think a forum with so many users has simply opened my eyes to other people’s outrageous behaviour, bonkers thought processes and naivety amongst other things.

This. Mumsnet is a parallel universe.

@OlympicProcrastinator

On an old account I asked for support and advice because I had (unbeknownst to me) fallen pregnant on the depo shot and didn’t find out until halfway through the pregnancy. I was devastated as I already had 3 DC, was nearly 40 and felt I couldn’t cope. I was however, happily married and lived happily with my DH & DC.

One posters suggested I should just give away the baby. When I politely requested that nobody suggested that as I’m pretty sure my DC & DH would be traumatised, a poster called me a cunt and then inboxed me to find where I worked so they could come and batter me.

So that was nice.

Wtf? What's wrong with people. I am sorry that happened.

Though I did get a dm the other day,
which appears to be questioning wether I am a celebrities mother because on a thread, from weeks ago I didn't agree with them that he was a complete cunt. Pretty sure the celebrity in question is older than me.

I say 'appears' because it's not very well written. The thread was so long ago and I can't remember it in detail, it doesn't make sense and they blocked me so I can't ask them what they are talking about.

Baffling.

Someone was struggling to get time off for interviews so a poster suggested that they quit their job with nothing else lined up, to make them available for interviews! This was in 2020 when we didn't know if the economy was about to implode!

YES absolutely - often the advice here is terrible!

I am the naive kind and do listen to others quite a lot but was finding much of the advice a bit baffling, until the penny dropped and I started to look at subjects in which I have some expertise, not just professionally but life evidence, such as where to live in my home town etc.... and the advice is often not only debatable but incorrect.

I think what I do get from this is a sounding board, self reflection and hearing some different opinions and points of view. Not taking it too seriously - which must be difficult, however, for people in severe situations looking for support.

One thing I also do not really understand is why here it's all the married men who have affairs? In real life I know many more married women who had affairs than men. Is that because if women admitted to that they'd be flamed here? Or maybe my evidence is skewed.

One thing I also do not really understand is why here it's all the married men who have affairs? In real life I know many more married women who had affairs than men. Is that because if women admitted to that they'd be flamed here? Or maybe my evidence is skewed.

I think its a few things. If a husband cheats on his wife, she is the injures party and is more likely to go to a women centered forum and post anonymously. Lots of people dont feel ready to talk to the in RL, so this is a good place.

Less people, who are cheating will come looking for advice here.

I also think in Real life, women cheating is talked about less. Men, are less inclined to tell everyone she cheated and the women are less likely to brag about it in public.

I find the advice given to stepmothers the worst. I'm not a stepmother, nor do I have one. It's the managing to twist the narrative so that everything becomes the fault of the second wife, regardless of the circumstances. I understand pain and bitterness - my ex hasn't had any contact with our DD since she was five (she is 24), he lives overseas with his new family and has never paid a penny - but that doesn't impact any threads on here. I never comment because it isn't a race to the bottom, but so many stepmothers sound lovely yet are berated horribly.

I posted once about moving house, in that I didn’t want to buy rest of my family did. Quite a few posters saying I should just leave my husband and family and let them get on with it. Made me laugh out loud.

I started to look at subjects in which I have some expertise, not just professionally but life evidence, such as where to live in my home town etc.

Yes! I always find those threads amusing - esp when OP is like I have a budget of £80k, where in Birmingham can I live and people are like well if you can stretch to £350k you could live in x, y, z !

Sometimes the house moving to different areas gets good advice, schools, areas, what your budget would get you etc. However, the commuting times to London are usually wildly underestimated. People that need to commute into central London being advised to live in Northumberland or Blackburn.

@XDownwiththissortofthingX

"What would he say if you were masturbating to photos of Jason Momoa or some random with a huge cock?"

Invariably appears in any thread where a DH has been looking at porn. The hilarious thing about it is the vast majority of men are perfectly familiar with the concept of 'fantasy' and the difference between that and 'reality', and this wouldn't elicit any more than a shrug and a 'carry on'.

Men who watch porn clearly have no issue with masturbating to images of people other than their partner, so why MN'ers seem to think they'd give a flying fuck about their DW masturbating is beyond me. The issue here lies with the person incapable of discerning fantasy from reality, and that isn't the wanking DH.

Oh be careful posting such logical, sensible comments about men who dare to masturbate, as you’ll soon be called a cool girl or worse, a handmaiden!

@Toddlerteaplease

If someone's partner has checked out of the relationship. Everyone saying that there is someone else, is not helpful. People check out for all sorts of reasons. Not just that one.

Absolutely. And when a woman posts about wanting to leave a relationship she is told (rightly) that anyone can leave a relationship for any reason. But what they actually mean is, a woman can leave a relationship for any reason. If s man ends a relationship it’s taken as incontrovertible proof he has been cheating.

One of my favourites is where a single parent is told 'I've never been stopped' when asking if they are allowed to travel abroad with the kids without the other parents permission.

Firstly, because a very cursory Google would tell them that no, legally they need the other parent's permission, in writing, or a relatively cheap and easy court order. And secondly, why risk getting to the check-in desk to be told that your child can't fly?

If a couple split and the guy doesn't want to see the kids then he's an arsehole (rightly), if he wants EOW then he's out having fun while the OP toils, if he wants 50/50 then he's taking the kids away from their mother, if he wants full custody then he's an arsehole.

The posters who think they're in a soap and queue up to tell OPs in delicate situations to make it worse with passive-aggressive (or just aggressive-aggressive) words and actions - the worst.

The genre of awful advice that does my head in is the hypocrisy around mental health. Most of MN talks a good game about the importance of protecting your own mental health ("I need my husband to go to the office... because of my mental health", "I need to go trailing around shopping centres for leisure in the middle of a pandemic... for my mental health"). The minute someone else's mental health mildly inconveniences or upsets you? They're a cheeky fucker, they're making it up, you shouldn't take them seriously, you should bin them off, and if they're your husband then he's a pathetic unmanly wuss and you couldn't possibly be attracted to that.

The worst one I ever saw was someone complaining about a man who had wronged her (I can’t remember what he did - it was a few years ago) and another poster asked her to private message a screenshot of his Facebook profile so she could start an online rumour he was a paedophile (which he wasn’t) to ‘get back at him’. The OP definitely sent the stranger his profile because they were making jokes about photos of him and the new girlfriend on the thread.
I was so shocked. I reported the thread and told the OP how wrong she was to do that. The two of them (who both sounded incredibly immature) had no remorse and it took Mumsnet ages to take the thread down. I’ve no idea if she followed through on her intention to do that to him - ruin the life of a complete stranger.

@gannett

The posters who think they're in a soap and queue up to tell OPs in delicate situations to make it worse with passive-aggressive (or just aggressive-aggressive) words and actions - the worst.

The genre of awful advice that does my head in is the hypocrisy around mental health. Most of MN talks a good game about the importance of protecting your own mental health ("I need my husband to go to the office... because of my mental health", "I need to go trailing around shopping centres for leisure in the middle of a pandemic... for my mental health"). The minute someone else's mental health mildly inconveniences or upsets you? They're a cheeky fucker, they're making it up, you shouldn't take them seriously, you should bin them off, and if they're your husband then he's a pathetic unmanly wuss and you couldn't possibly be attracted to that.

Well, 'twas ever thus.

I'm not sure the nature of dialogue around mental health is the most helpful. Obviously it depends on the condition and the situation, but I do think there's too much focus on what you should expect other people to do to support your mental health, and not enough on techniques for managing it yourself. There is plenty of focus on comparing it to physical health, but there's also an expectation that you'll make time to do your physio exercises.

Telling people to claim housing benefit or tax credits when claimants haven't been able to make new claims (apart from in a couple of very specific scenarios) for ages isn't that terrible, but it makes me chuckle and could cost people a few quid if it means they delay starting a UC claim.

@Darkpheonix

One thing I also do not really understand is why here it's all the married men who have affairs? In real life I know many more married women who had affairs than men. Is that because if women admitted to that they'd be flamed here? Or maybe my evidence is skewed.

I think its a few things. If a husband cheats on his wife, she is the injures party and is more likely to go to a women centered forum and post anonymously. Lots of people dont feel ready to talk to the in RL, so this is a good place.

Less people, who are cheating will come looking for advice here.

I also think in Real life, women cheating is talked about less. Men, are less inclined to tell everyone she cheated and the women are less likely to brag about it in public.

Whenever a woman posts that she is cheating she is bullied mercilessly. Either directly or insidiously, with 'advice' that will effectively punish her for her misdeeds. I understand people have strong views on this, but if its such a trigger it would be better not engaging rather than turning the OP into a proxy emotional punch bag, when she is generally already at a low point to be posting in the first place.

Anytime someone composes a message for OP to send. Always makes me cringe.

I'm not sure the nature of dialogue around mental health is the most helpful. Obviously it depends on the condition and the situation, but I do think there's too much focus on what you should expect other people to do to support your mental health, and not enough on techniques for managing it yourself. There is plenty of focus on comparing it to physical health, but there's also an expectation that you'll make time to do your physio exercises.

IMO the bit everyone avoids talking about is professional mental health services and the funding of them. It's a political issue.

But I've also seen that people who take steps to pre-emptively protect their own mental health are also castigated (especially when this mildly inconveniences others).

I think you have to read it through a lens of hoping there is a nugget or two of information you didn't know and that might be helpful and try not to take any of it to heart.

A superficial interaction only and the vital info will lodge.