to think there are a LOT of harsh, angry people on MN at the moment?

[ChamberLink]

I've been on MN under various user names for over 12 years and I am struck by the vitriolic posts made by so many posters these days. It seems that so many people are angry and bitter and take pleasure in spreading this around.

I don't remember it being like this before. AIBU was, perhaps, more predominantly light hearted. These days it's an ugly pile on usually at the expense of some vulnerable person who has posted for advice / help.

There's such harsh tone to so many people's responses and it growing worse.

It this a symptom of increasingly difficult circumstances for so many people these days? I am not British and it's jarring to read so many hard line stances and so many fractured family dynamics.

What's going on with people? Where's the empathy gone?

At the moment?!?! cough cough

It's always been full of bitchy, judgy, pious keyboard warriors with far too much time on their hands.

Unless ofcourse you agree with their opinions & comments then these people are lovely I'm sure.

If you ever watched one of the episodes that Derren Brown made with his experiments. When people become anonymous, it has always stuck with me. Society anonymous, the internet in many way enabled that anonymity and distancing.

I haven’t been on MN all that long, maybe a year or over, but I have only mostly lurked. I have commented genuine advice in an effort to be helpful on seriously situations like domestic abuse, health/mental health problems, but I have been too terrified to post for help myself.

So I would appreciate any of you that can also include me in the PM list of people looking for a gentler and more fun and uplifting space. Many thanks.

Some are definitely very spiteful on here, the lack of compassion or empathy just reflects their state of mind. I have always felt that those who post vitriolic replies must have unhappy lives and we all get to see it. Sad really I just hope that those op's don't take it to heart and see it for what it is, a random angry unhappy stranger hiding behind their keyboard unknowingly airing their laundry for all to see.

I think people are, sadly, extremely stressed. They are impatient and snappy as a result.

Politics is vicious.

I think we've lost something as a society.

There was a pause during the pandemic where everything (except medicine) slowed and stopped. It was eye opening.
It picked up again pretty fast, and everyone found ways to operate again, but there was a brief pause which was healthy and unusual.

I don't think 24 hour busyness is healthy.

Couldn't agree more.

As someone who started a once-in-a-blue-moon non-Aibu thread this week, I was shocked by the quality of the moderation.

Since the Meghan-hate, it feels to me as though there has been a noticeable increase in name-change to respond, following across threads and low-level off topic having a go. But it's 'troll-hunting' even to hint something might be going on.

That's fine. We're big girls, but I had no idea how unpleasant it is to be an OP. The Mumsnet response is that it's all six of one and half a dozen of the other, only it isn't because as the OP it's taken as read that you have invited it and have a duty to respond. I was left thinking how horrible it must be if you just wanted help for something to do with your children, or frail parents.

This thread has been an eye-opener. I wouldn't be an OP again, and yet it's such a pity, because 90% of the responses were so helpful and informative.

I asked the mods to consider whether some guidance on responding to OPs could be considered, bearing in mind that lots of people who post are making themselves emotionally vulnerable to do so. They haven't responded.

Yup. People seem really angry at someone for daring to complain, judgemental at people for different opinions, jealous of success or wealth. They assume all men are cheating. And all women are either pushovers or manipulators. Then that behaviour becomes contagious, people copy the tone.

Though I should add there are some people posting helpful and kind messages too. You can only post if you're in the right mindset I think because either you and/or others mentioned in your post will be judged and harshly criticised. It gets very personal.

There’s always been some pretty judgey posts but in the last few months there have been some odd ones! The poor poster who asked “what was the last straw for you in ending a relationship” and SO many posters told her she was high maintenance and her partner was great … like pages and pages of those responses. (Her experience was something like she’d been late for work, perhaps a small accident, and her workplace called her DP as emergency contact to see if she was ok, and he didn’t know. And he didn’t think to once contact her to see if she was even alive, she just came home in the evening to him having barely remembered it!!)

Anyway…

I think there are an increasing number of angry men on here pretending to be women.

Life is faster and people are more stressed than in the past. They don't have time for bullshit. Everything is more extreme these days and abuse seems to be the default manner to address anyone or anything you disagree with.

See politicians like Jess Phillips or the SNP guy (Ian Blackford?), I've never seen them on TV when they weren't attacking other people. That's their default, attack, demean, never be positive or constructive.

See news coverage on TV - always someone moaning or criticising. You never watch a report then have an "expert" come on and say how everything is just great.

See entertainment generally - gone are the days of programmes where contestants had to think to win like 3-2-1, Treasure Hunt or even Bullseye for that matter, it's all "screw people over" stuff like Traitors or The Chase.

The online world is just a reflection of the offline world, but one where people usually feel freer to let rip because there is still a disconnect between online reality and physical reality. In the same way most people don't regard things in their dreams as being equally real as the rain pouring down on them while they're waiting for a bus, online is not seen as being as real as offline.

Generally my advice to people who dislike a particular thing that is not necessary or essential for them would be to find something they do like instead.

I like (hate) the one-upmanship. If you're disabled and struggling, well, then someone will come along to tell you that they're a disembodied head who's allergic to all carbon based substances and they still hold down a job in finance, run a marathon a week and why don't you just meal prep???? Meanwhile poor OP feels hounded and gets no advice.

I agree - unless I’m posting somewhere where the topic, thread content or level of support is pretty much guaranteed (pregnancy for example), there’s people who just seem to think it’s a free for all to be awful.
Half of the time they’re not even answering the posters question/offering advice, but making more personal statements or looking to blame the poster somehow for something they’ve, usually, misread or misunderstood.

We have to stay and continue contributing positively, or else it will be left to the jackals!

^^ Absolutely this and very much agree with picklemewalnuts

I just think people like that are not that happy IRL and we're seeing it here.

If someone finds it's affecting them negatively, maybe this isn't the place to be?

@lightand

Could you DM me as well please. I’m becoming increasingly fed up with the tone of a lot of posters, particularly on threads where the OP has asked an innocent question.

@lightand Could you PM me too please? Thanks.

Totally agree! I posted once in a really vulnerable position, just needed a bit of reassurance and almost every comment was so so horrible. It was so unnecessary and no one would ever speak to anyone like that in real life (I’d like to think)! It’s as if it’s just online bullies who have no other outlet for their frustration. I actually tried to remove the thread and MN replied to me saying it was because I had posted it on AIBU and people aren’t usually as harsh on some of the other sections. So it’s okay to rip people apart if they’ve had the misfortune of posting it on AIBU? 😂

I was so naive I thought it was literally only about pregnancy, parenting and baby stuff 😳. Then once I joined and saw all the forums I was baffled followed by surprised at how ruthless and rude the threads can be. It seems really toxic so I just avoid it as much as I can other than gardening forums and baby stuff. Probably once my little ones get out of this early phase I'll delete it again. I was just wondering to myself this morning whether society really is how mean people are on mumsnet after reading a few thread responses this morning. When I meet people out and about no one seems this negative but who knows what people are masking.

The moderators could be trained to change the tone of the site, but I'm guessing that they like it this way.

MN isn't here to help people. It's a business intent on making money.

My experience is that MN admin is generally much better than many other forums I've visited - but they do seem to only intervene when a post is reported, and only on that specific post.

There's clearly some posters that use this fact strategically as a tactic to 'win' their internet battles. They escalate an issue with increasingly hostile insults, wait for retaliation, then ask for that single post to be removed. The effect on the thread is confusing, as a removed post is also removed from places it has been quoted, and some comments no longer make any sense or have any context.

A better system would be to mark offensive posts with a yellow card - a signal to all reading a thread that this post was adjudged to be against guidelines, with perhaps a 24 hour ban from posting on that thread, and a red card - for repeated or grossly inappropriate posts, accompanied by a longer ban from posting on all threads, and then the offending post would be removed.

I'd be against that Mark- on the Feminism boards, the modding is extremely tough. People getting a 24hour thread suspension there would be hugely detrimental.
You can get deleted for all sorts of unexpected things. Quite often people have to rephrase their point, as the original was considered inflammatory. It's already hard to post there, and hard to follow discussions.

Couldn't agree more. AIBU has turned into Relationships, and not in a good way. MNHQ should do something about it as they did with COVID and the royal family.

The voting system encourages knee-jerk reactions.

Gransnet is very nice though.