To be fed up of the political manipulation on mumsnet

[ZenNudist]

It's incessant and it's wearing. It's been going on for years and I'm fed up of the massive amount of tory party generated and lobbying content blocking up mumsnet.

I appreciate mumsnet is seen as a key voter demographic but a lot of the threads being posted are so transparently fiction.

The billion VAT on school fees threads must have been a mix of real people and tory HQ.

Fake outrage started immediately and now well into saying that with less than 4 Months of government and before enacting their first budget the Labour Party are apparently making a mess of everything and reversing the great gains made during tory rule. What great gains? I don't know. I saw one post trying to take tory credit for reducing inflation like that was Rishi's doing, laughable.

I also have seen a few fake scenarios for adverse impact of the budget on inheritance and small business taxation. Speaking as someone who will be adversely affects by increasing employer NI and the reduction in business property relief I still support these changes. My friends who are small business owners feel the same way.

Labour promised not to put up the main rates of income tax and employee NI. They were clear that measures would need to be taken to increase the tax take. They still are trying to drive growth because at the end if the day increasing the tax base is the best way of increasing revenue to the exchequer.

I know a lot of mumsnetters say they can't spot trolls or AI threads. I also think a lot of people will not spot the blatant manipulation by lobbyists and tory campaigners.

Tory party now playing a long game.

The Tory party is funded by the rich for the benefit of the rich. The rest of the middle, the poor, the marginalised have almost no voice and no one funding a political machine to work in our favour.

So all businesses should be punished because there are some which are bad? That probably actually sums up Labours attitude towards businesses.

Maybe all those who lose their business, and staff who lose their jobs will all gain employement in the public sector.

@schloss No, what I am saying is we need to remodel the economy so that these bad businesses can fail rather than continue existing on the grace and favour of less than ideal government policy. There will be some pain in the adjustment but it will be worth it.

Labour been in power for a few months, Tories - 14 years. And yet we are fucked because of Labour.

Budget - was there the same wailing re Lizzie Truss and her mate Kwasi? Who LITERALLY fucked up the country. Probably not, as she is Tory. And of course Kier is much, much worse.

And all the threads re VAT on schools - boohoo, think about the children, Labour are against people wanting education. Literally cant read this crap anymore.

Eh?? Why are you so personally triggered over my post? What an odd response?!😆

I was 🤨 at that. Where is this block function that allows you to tune out all the shite? I'd be all for it.

Who supports child marriage? Genuine question.

We should put listening and respecting all opinions back into the school curriculums. It’s a key life skill and a democratic society relies on it.

I agree.

If someone has a different opinion and can articulate it without calls to silence me/curtail discussion then yes I respect their views.

If they trot out 'educate yourself" or 'check your privilege' and provide no substance, then no, I don't respect them.

@Maria1979 you are making my original point for me that not all of mumsnet can tell the difference between the real and fake posts. I don't think this makes you stupid.

It does raise the question if mumsnet should make it clear that this kind of political targeting of its user base will not be tolerated. Like they have done on other issues in the past.

If lobbyists are willing to do the hard yards of actually building up a rounded posting history on a range of topics then cant stop that. It would be good if MNHQ could cut down on some of the absolute slew of lobbying crap that the site is now beleaguered with. It would be good to cut the AI accounts or ones that just troll us all day long on both the left and the right.

I"m not sure it's lobbying though in the sense that people are being paid to post.

People have very firm/ robust opinions. In the real world we can't often be so robust in our beliefs because unless we moderate we might find a few personal relationships difficult.

Online we can say what we think and many of us do (edited to add obviously within the confines of Mumsnet Moderation).

Child marriage is legal in 38 US states. It's also incredibly common, we're probably the outliers in the UK. Who supports it is a trickier question but it's not banned in an awful lot of places.

Americans apparently.

@ShinyShona but there is a reverse side to this- at the moment we really aren't that far off the minimum wage in Denmark, Sweden etc - I lived there and I kid you not. The big difference was absolutely masses of good quality social housing and people paying £700 a month average rent - and £230 a month childcare - so most parents both worked full time. The ethos was to work full time or maybe 4 days a week- Buying too is a fair bit cheaper than Uk in many areas outside of Copenhagen - The reason we are doing so much 'topping up ' here is due to far more part time working parents than I saw in Denmark and very high private rents - Many have very high mortgages too due to ludicrous prices in some parts of the country - also just looking at the population I really hate to sound judgemental but far more levels of obese and sick looking people under retirement age and not working- it really isn't all to do with wage - much of it is to do with costs - that are out of kilter to wages.

Maybe you can't tell either.

There have been plenty of times I've seen someone accuse a post of being fake for no reason, even with long time posters making the post.

It will take take time for the new government to fix the balls ups of the old one. And let's face it, the Tory party wrecked the UK on multiple levels.🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Only the stupid believe it could be fixed in weeks. Only those hostile to the UK push that message. And again, only the stupid buy it.🤷‍♀️

Ah and there it is, this belief that if you wait a bit longer, pay more taxes everything will come good.

NO, IT. WONT!

You are being lied to.

The NHS is mathematically completely unsustainable regardless of what party is in charge. The social care crisis is fucking eye watering, and will sink eventually. We are running out of housing stock, prison space and basics such as GP care. Why? Because we are absorbing millions of new people every single year.

It is unsustainable.

And that’s before we talk about the debt levels. We are living well beyond our means and have been under almost every party since the war.

Until people face up to the harsh reality of what we are actually facing - rather than blaming the ‘tories’ for everything. You have a very hard correction coming, please don’t say we didn’t warn you.

Everything is unsustainable, we're just watching it collapse in real time. Those with vast amounts of money are laughing at us like we are drowning rats.

The rich won’t escape the fall out, no one will. It’s not just confined to this country either. Certainly a large part of the western world, and beyond, anyone seen the latest figures from China? A hard correction is coming. It is unavoidable.
We need to start facing up to it, and to talk about potential solutions, but that won’t happen as the public seem to believe they are entitled to a prosperous life and stuff for free.

We can not carry on living on the never never. Hoping we can grow our way out of ballooning debt. Whilst ignoring the immigration crisis.It’s fairytale thinking.

The idea that Labour will turn this around is laughable, if it were not so serious.

The other issue is the cost of borrowing is going up, that takes more tax to service and pp will say see higher taxes mean it’s good

And the markets push up the cost again. It’s a loop and we all pay more.

The doom loop is real. Those calling for breaking fiscal rules haven’t clearly weighed up the consequences. You are absolutely right, and it’s not like the investment is even visible. It just gets swallowed up all of the time.

The loss of hope is a huge thing to put on the electorate, at some point someone is going to have to deliver the news, and put an end to the delusion, that a change of party will magically fix everything and we can borrow our way out of this. The tories are to blame for it all is way too simplistic and totally untrue. As I say it’s going to obvious soon enough.

I don't think it's a given that the government will even be able to sell enough bonds, or not at the rate they're hoping.

We'll see!

Why? Because we are absorbing millions of new people every single year.

The hyperbole doesn't help any argument you may be trying to make. At best it's ignorance.

Those calling for breaking fiscal rules haven’t clearly weighed up the consequences.

That was a massive decision by Reeves and co. If we get stuck in that loop I wonder how she can continue. Of course Labour may well just stay with that trying to sell in higher taxes again

I agree OP and HRTFT because know how it will have gone. Many of the comments have also got very little insight to actual economics (as oppose to politics - v different) and we get this short-term polarised view constantly. It’s tedious.

When you say 'the silencing of real opinion all of the time', you mean the silencing of right wing/conservative views don't you?

Which is completely ridiculous and a great example of projection on your part. You are used to a Conservative government fucking up daily and yet still having the obsequious support of all the right wing press.

The referral by Tory MPs of Angela Rayner (council house gate) and Keir Starmer (breaking lockdown rules gate) which turned out to be totally false and both of them exonerated was over the front page of the Daily Mail for about 12 days running (the accusations not the exoneration).

Saying that many on here would be happiest in Russia, China or NK sounds like something that Tories would accuse Labour of in the 1980s. The people cosying up to Russia, China or NK are the extreme right wing supporters of Donald Trump, who I'm sure you support, not people who vote Labour.

As for squealing, I've never seen such thin skinned whining on here before as I've seen since the election, with the number of threads about VAT on private schools, the 'won't someone please think of the multi millionaire farmers', and the (groundless) sobbing about a possible increase in inheritance tax.

All this from people who are supremely comfortable with child poverty in the UK and posters on here that talk about the 'deserving' and 'undeserving' poor.

I read it all with amusement and how everything is just blamed on either party, when ultimately, most situations are due to economic movement rather than political ones.

When the UK have had good years, so has most of the rest of the world and vice versa, regardless of the party in power at the time.

All what we moan about in the UK, so do people in the US and Europe moan about!