Are people on mumsnet reflective of the online world?

[Ineverlose]

I used to love Mumsnet and it nearly always made me laugh, cry, giggle, or engage in some way. Over the last couple of years I’m increasingly horrified by it. Some of the comments I read today were so cruel that they stunned me. And this happens all the time. Aibu to think this is reflective of humanity having been on social media for 20 years and this is simple the way the online life is now? (Or has society itself become crueller? )

You can be anything you want to be online. I take the 100k + salary/went to a top university/winning at life ones with a pinch of salt. They protest too much on here.

Are you new? Only using trending threads?
I like mn threads that have some beef and substance. Often in legal or news or trans threads. I learnt a lot by following threads of legal cases, JKR, Maya Forstarter, the post office scandal, Kathleen stock. Mn posters are incredibly bright and informed.

People do this in in face to face conversations and they do this more on line where it is difficult to contradict.

I do wish MNHQ would disable the name changing feature as that is the main reason for why it’s so easy to bully others

Absolutely not.

I posted a huge amount about one of my children on here when I was desperately in need of advice. I did it under various name changes and still keep different names for different 'areas' because finding all of that could be embarrassing and hurtful to my (now adult) child.

Trust me that all of it together would be identifiable.

People have been saying this for thousands of years, y'know.

I honestly think anyone who thinks Mumsnet is more vicious than most of the online world must have been living under a rock for the past few months. Did anyone go on Twitter/X during the week the riots were going on?

Mumsnet is no different from any other online forum which reflects a broad demographic church. All (mainly female) life is here.

It’s always a cheap cliche to say that everyone is from a middle class “bubble”: these voices may be louder and self assured but there’s still a huge range of income profiles, political views, ideas etc. That’s what makes it interesting.

And yes sometimes people can be arseholes on here but worse than Reddit? I don’t think so.

Beef and substance from the transphobes? Really?

Well beef, certainly. Funny how when any other minority is discussed we should be asking them for their lived experience instead of wading in to shout over them, but not this one. Hmmmm.

am I wrong to mostly only use trending threads @Oblomov24 ? I presumed that’s what most people do? I do go on to specific boards from time to time

I hope not and think not.

Long time member of 20 years.It used to be an inclusive place for all parents,it’s not now. It used to be moderated effectively, it’s not now.

If you are disabled, poor, have children who are Autistic or have ADHD or you have either yourself, are in receipt of benefits,trans, anxious, part of a minority group….. you are not welcome here and you won’t be protected.

I think we all know this doesn’t represent real life and real life is a much nicer place.

Re the online world I think it’s worse.

No. This is mild. And online behaviour hasn't grown worse since COVID.

The old-school live chat rooms - harking from the noughties and now mostly died a death - make Mumsnetters look like a bunch of Mary Poppinses.

The worst you're usually likely to encounter from Mumsnetters is rudeness and condescension. I've witnessed behaviour in live chat (and some discussion boards) that falls well into the category of truly disturbing.

I actually think reddit, is less vicious than mumsnet

You realise that many MN users come from places other than 'England', within and without the UK?

Speaking up for the rights of (biological) women isn't necessarily transphobic though.

This! Even FB groups are more caringly moderated!

Ableism, hate speech, racism and more is rife on MN now. Never used to be.

Ableism, hate speech, racism and more is rife on MN now. Never used to be.

I've been here for aeons. The racism might have been more covert than overt in the past but it always existed.

Hate speech is not allowed under the talk guidelines: or, for that matter, the law. Moderation isn't instant or reactive, it relies on reports from other members and will then be taken down.

In the old chat rooms I have witnessed: compulsive behaviour and people remaining online all day for the purpose of tormenting others (the old-school and actually accurate definition of trolling), far right football thugs indulging in organised incitement and intimidating other chatters who didn't share their views, relentless tormenting of those who obviously had mental health issues and might have been pushed over the edge, incitement and goading to suicide, relentlessly trying to identify and track down other users, harassing them offline to the extent of contacting their employers or families, signposting toward other ominous and far more dangerous online groups including suicide ones, constant sock-puppeting intended to extract info from those who wouldn't have divulged it to the regular screen handle, and last but not least criminal activity arising out of resentment for something that was typed in the rooms.

It was frankly terrifying. I used these platforms across one period when I needed the distraction, there was a block facility enabling a lot of the toxicity to be weeded out. Also, there was a sense of community and I met and talked to some fantastic people. I also assumed that if you wanted to used interactive forums then you took the rough with the smooth.

I can in no way conclude from the above that online behaviour has grown worse - at least not in the context of this site. On the www, you'll find dicks everywhere. It's the decline of offline behaviour that has me far more seriously worried - I've been posting on here about how threatened I now feel on trains long before the report came out stating harassment/assault of women has skyrocketed over the past two years.

The proliferation of Incels on this site reflects this state of affairs - you can't wholly divorce online from offline behaviour. I also agree with the PP upthread who claimed that fluffy standards of behaviour are the more expected from a site with a predominantly female demographic. A thread only yesterday referred to 'girl codes' FGS.

The site is for adults.

I agree. I think this idea that Mumsnet is singularly terrible is a very sheltered one. I've had rape and murder threats on other platforms, as many women have, often with little action taken by the platform. On Mumsnet posters doing that would be deleted and banned. There are prejudices of course as there would be when any large group of women got together to talk. Report any posts you consider are hate speech or are personally abusive, but otherwise basically live and let live.

This! Even FB groups are more caringly moderated!

Do you know how many Facebook groups there are? It's not possible to state this as anything other than an anecdote of your own experience. It's certainly not mine, and the kind of posts that Mumsnet would delete are rife on Facebook. And Reddit. Reddit is a misogynistic cesspit of a site.

I think that there is a lot of unnecessary rudeness on here. Similar messages can be conveyed in much more diplomatic words. For example, when I asked a simple question, a poster replied ‘FFS, don’t do that..,’. Instead, they could have said ‘I wouldn’t recommend doing that..’. We should be here to help each other.

I agree with that. The other day I suggested something to a poster looking for careers advice and someone else jumped in to rubbish my suggestion in an unnecessarily rude way, along the lines of “I can’t believe you would give such shit advice you are clearly talking out of your arse”. All she needed to do was to say something like “my perspective on [what HCB please suggested] is a bit different, here’s my suggestion…” and let the OP weigh up the options. But it was clear that most of the kick she got from posting was saying things to people she would never say in real life.

I can’t get on with Reddit at all, I don’t understand how to read the threads with the posts moving up and down according to popularity and all the bits to click to expand. I love the simplicity of a Mumsnet thread format.

I agree about the Reddit format @HotCrossBunplease, I think you either like it or you don't. I will read occasionally but I find the format irritating.

They also display a peculiar lack of understanding of the modern workplace, and despite being "women supporting women" will violently rally against anything that promotes and facilitates women in the workplace and closing the gender pay gap (see WFH, flexible working, contractual and legislative responsibility of employers and that you're not totally out of order to ask granny to step in for a couple of hours in a childcare emergency).

@Tryingtokeepgoing 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣