To ask why so many child-free people are on Mumsnet?

[DarlingClementine85]

I already know this is going to be divisive and I'm hesitating before I even type this. I don't mean this in a snarky or judgemental way at all. It's just a straightforward question that I've been pondering. It seems there's a lot of posters on here who are child-free by choice (I'm not talking about people dealing with infertility who would dearly love to be parents). And I was wondering why, as this is predominantly a forum for getting or giving parental advice? For questions about trying to understand their friends with kids, I absolutely get it. But I see plenty of threads about various parenting issues and there's always people saying things like "I don't have kids, but..."

TIA for not taking offence!!

Congratulations OP you've experienced your first Mumsnet pile on. How do you feel? Any death threats in your inbox yet?

I got told I should kill myself over what I thought was a very innocuous comment about surrogacy once. It can be a hive mind here sometimes and the hive is full of very angry hornets. Don't take it too personally and try and focus on the reasoned and measured responses rather than the bile!

It does happen that childfree posters post on threads about parenting sometimes I've seen it.

But what I have seen at least as often is people with children coming into threads about infertility or IVF to give unwanted advice about a situation they also don't understand (my uncles neighbours sister went on holiday and got pregnant have you tried stopping IVf and just relaxing etc) often on threads where people are equally vulnerable and emotionally fragile.

Parents aren't suddenly some perfect group of people who can do no wrong and childfree people aren't just a bunch of bitches.

I've also seen parents horrifically tear other parents down and childfree posters be the ones to defend them.

People are people, good and bad, someone's ability or willingness to procreate does not dictate whether they are a decent person or not or whether they can add value to a thread or not.

Ive recently posted on threads about a mother struggling with a child's spider phobia and another mother struggling with a child's food avoidance. As someone with a spider phobia and food avoidance I do genuinely think my advice on how I have dealt with both was better than the parents coming out with stuff like:

'Just stop helping her at night and leave her to cope'
'Children won't starve themselves'

Would the threads have gone as well without me, probably. But you could say that of any poster here. I would love to know what value the OP thinks she has added when she is new to the site before she tears into those who may have been adding value for years.

surely many teachers venting on Mumsnet about the annoying things their students parents do are parents themselves?

Any teacher I know socially is also a parent and it really doesn't stop them giving 'frank opinions' on some of the parents they encounter.

I've been getting some threatening personal messages now

Yeah sure you are, OP 😂

Any screenshots?

Without examples comments like that are pretty meaningless.

I am talking specifically about the ones who aren’t. It is quite possible that at one point it was just one poster who was a child-free teacher who posted a lot and gave the impression there were many of them. How can you know? Usually teachers who are also parents will say so too.

You do realise that you do not own this forum right? It’s not your job to decide who gets to post or who doesn’t.

Go make your own forum if that’s what you want.

That shouldn't happen and hope the poster got "perma ban" (not like it works lately....)

If she's getting messages like that she needs to report them.

I don’t care at this point.

I think that's pretty obvious. You're quite happy to throw unspecified accusations around.

Not much point in continuing to engage, I think.

I have given plenty of details, talking about teachers on chat. That isn’t good enough for you. I simply do not care about the arbitrary bar you’ll set for evidence before you will accept that someone sharing their experience truthfully.

@ilovesooty agreed

Taking about some random thread you can’t link to is not ‘evidence’.

Just admit you have zero examples.

Also, talking about teachers on chat is just in example of many. Maybe you could do an advanced search on ‘I don’t have kids, but’ and see what comes up.

I really have no inclination to spend my time doing the bidding of hostile people who aren’t parents, on a parenting forum, to provide them with evidence of people who aren’t parents, being dicks towards parents, on that parenting forum.

If you can’t see it you can’t see it.

Agree.

Oh I get you: child free people don’t know anything about parenting and shouldn’t have opinions on parenting. Do you hear how vile that sounds

Childfree people are members of this society as much as parents are. They pay taxes and have a stake in how that society runs just as much as parents.
Why shouldn't they have an opinion on something that impacts on society, ie parenting and how children are raised and educated etc.?

Some of the best parenting advice I've had was from my childfree sister.

I can't understand why you would be receiving death threats for what is essentially a "heated debate". Bizarre.

And I don't see a pile-on. Just people who passionately disagree. I would be hurt too if I posted and a lot of people didn't agree, but that's MN. Character building. We often advise kids to develop resilience. Same with MN. At least you had the courage to post, OP.

I've been getting some threatening personal messages now

Of course you have. So convenient. Poor wide-eyed innocent who has poked the hornet's nest.

Surely you can see that besides the 'becoming a parent' and 'being a parent' sections there are many more which have nothing to do with parenting / children?

Is your search function broken there OP 😉

Because it's a forum broadly populated by middle-class women who are roughly between the ages of 30 and 50 - and this is one of the few places on the internet that is women-focused, where we are with our peers.

I somehow doubt they are.