Jack Monroe off Twitter

[beammeuphottie]

The latest in the ongoing saga is that JM has left Twitter after being 'hounded off'. The incident that seemed to provoke this...someone critiquing a photo of her mums roast potatoes. It just gets more and more bizarre.

To be clear, I don't like to see public pile ons and some of the abuse directed at Jack has been unpleasant. But a lot has also been reasonable, polite requests for information regarding her patreon which have largely been totally ignored. And her supporters have to be some of the most cruel people on Twitter. It seems like it's fine for JM to voice her opinion but as soon as others do the same they are called out for bullying. And ironically subjected to vile comments from her followers. Go figure.

Am I the only one who thinks she's probably best having a little Twitter break? But eventually if she's ever to redeem her reputation she needs to show some transparency regarding public donations.

To be fair, that could be a photo that someone sent to her on WhatsApp that saved in her film roll. Not that people should be sending photos of pints to recovering alcoholics, of course.

I wondered if it was more to do with the Tiffany earrings furore...

She brushes off accusations of lying, fraud and theft fairly easily. Someone slags off her mum’s roast potatoes or comments on her Tiffany earrings and she loses her mind!

She's in Cardiff on Wednesday speaking at a conference about social inequality.
Nice little earner, but I would like to know what qualifies her to speak about policies in Wales. Couldn't they find anyone else. Maybe someone who actually lives there.

Yes - but her MOTHER is DISABLED!

(So are a lot of the people you scrounge money off, Jack - and they don't have family wealth to cushion them.)

Maybe it's because of her publishing part of a DM conversation with someone, and that person then publishing the rest? That person being super pissed by the way JM has treated her (and apparently struggling due to a change in life circumstances).

So many reasons to choose from. So much mess. 🙇

What's that all about? I think I missed that.

If you're on twitter, you should be able to track at least some of it down.

Think it starts with the person challenging Jack over the teemill money. Not sure about giving their handle on here.

"Again, it’s the REST of the money, for the “other foodbanks” as confirmed by TT, that there’s no evidence for.

You know this, surely it’s easy to just show receipts and end this?

And now you’ve stopped me replying to you for pointing this out @ bootstrapcook"

No one can possibly believe that teemil made 11k in such a short time and the £280 or something like that in ALL that months after

Of course not. Yes it would have made far less when she stopped actively promoting it, but it would have been a slow downward trend, not a fall off a cliff.
She also asked her followers to recommend worthwhile charities for the rest of the profits, which many did. She ignored all this and gave the £280 to a local (to her) charity.
But also… why did she stop actively promoting it after 2 days? If it made £11k for Teemill in 2 days, why not carry on promoting and raise equal amounts for other food banks? Her ‘promotion’ was just some tweets anyway, and we know she spends most of her time on Twitter so hardly onerous for her. The whole thing just makes no sense.

I've seen some people speculate that she misunderstood her sales (maybe thought gross total was profit?) or just straight out exaggerated sales in her excitement. And then ended up being pushed to show the money was donated, so she covered up out of her own pocket. 🤔

But it's surprising what people stump up.

I find it hard to swallow lots of people would buy that stuff tho.

I used to support Jack Monroe, in a very lazy sort of way (ie I never looked at her too closely but broadly thought she was doing a good thing, albeit I could always tell she was middle class) but since this thread was started I've done some more research and I now understand all the naysayers on this thread. She does appear to be quite contradictory in things that she says and there does seem to be a lack of transparency in her fundraising.

If she wants to fundraise for charity I don't understand why she doesn't become an official ambassador for an established charity and just direct donors to the charity. From what I can tell, what she actually does is run monies raised through her own bank accounts. I think this leaves her vulnerable to accusations of fraud as there's less transparency than if she was just directing people to charity.

The thing that she does that I have never liked is to imply that she will hurt herself in some way when she is criticised. Like other mumsnetters I have been affected by suicide in my family and I don't think making these sorts of threats is a very moral way of behaving. Especially for a charity campaigner. When you're in the charity world you have to adhere to a high standard of behaviour in my opinion.

Having said that, I found the blog by Awfully Molly and thought it was a bit hard on Jack. I think she's not well mentally and that's why a lot of the contradictions arise.

Well said @potniatheron

I've said she could turn things around. Working for an actual charity and giving the social media accounts over to someone else to handle might be a good start.

That would be actual work though and don't you know she's EXHAUSTED from tweeting. She's been doing this for TEN YEARS.

I’m not sure Molly’s blog is ‘hard’ on Jack, it’s literally just Jack’s own words. Some of the inconsistencies can potentially be explained away but many are just outright lies.

I think people have tip toed around her for too long as the mental health card is pulled out every time she has been questioned/criticised. It’s why she’s gotten away with things for so long.

If charity money goes through your accounts, I imagine it would be a total nightmare for the tax to sort out. Regardless of the fact there is no reason to manage charitable donations through personal accounts, no decent way.

That would be actual work though and don't you know she's EXHAUSTED from tweeting. She's been doing this for TEN YEARS.

I know! I can't see her changing.

To quote Father Ted...

I think people have tip toed around her for too long as the mental health card is pulled out every time she has been questioned/criticised. It’s why she’s gotten away with things for so long

Agreed. She's presented a version of herself that's a fragile, smol pixie who is forever teetering right on the edge of a breakdown when in reality she has more front than Blackpool pier and her meltdowns are really narc rage when someone dares to question her. She's incredibly manipulative, from her poverty porn essays to her alleged alcoholism. She knows exactly what she's doing.

But she should try.

I know she works 20 HOURS A DAY and only pays herself 4p a fortnight or summat and she is TIRELESS in her FIGHT AGAINST POVERTY, but because she is too EXHAUSTED to answer the questions (and anyway DOESN'T HAVE TIME, because she is BUSY,) she's dug herself into a hole (which is a sort of well. I believe).

I think the Mail article might be the beginning of something serious for her. Donors had been contacting Action Fraud in relation to the Patreon and Teemill funds. When enough people have the same complaints, it becomes difficult to ignore.

The DM article itself is very careful to reinforce how the TT have backed her. It doesn't read like a hatchet job esp with the moderated comments.

The DM may be waiting to see which way the wind blows. They won't want to make any accusations if she keeps her popular support, and if it transpires that there is no hard evidence against her.

The only thing Jack Monroe is interested in raising money for is Jack Monroe. She has no interest in helping anyone apart from herself.
See:
Kickstarter
Media training
Fix my website
Legal fees
Can’t pay my rent (this one’s a regular)
Patreon
Teemill
All of these, off the top of my head, have seen her begging for money on Twitter. There are more.

The Awfully Molly blog site seems to have been "off for maintenance" all day. I wanted to read the next post.