To think that people using GoFundMe for personal life choices, like weddings or holidays, is tacky?

[ThatPoisedNewt]

Everyone seems to be crowdfunding everything these days. AIBU to think it’s inappropriate to ask people to fund personal indulgences?

Vets bills aren't a luxury though. Of course if one has a pet one should make sure they can afford it , that said, people genuinely fall on hard times and are desperate . If its the case of someone who is able to afford it and just doesn't want to and is asking strangers, that is pretty poor behaviour . I must admit if a stranger asks me for money I would tend to think it's a scam. I give to legitimate charities on the rare occasions I have money to do so but every random internet stranger asking? No way.

I was about to start a thread about this, funnily enough!

I have a colleague right now who has a grandaughter who is going on a trip to Kenya with the school in Spring 2026, and her mum has set up a GoFundMe. This woman keeps asking people to donate to it, and has asked me THREE TIMES now to donate. It is just a massive jolly for the girl, - 4 weeks in Kenya, and the cost is £6000! I am not giving a fucking penny. I don't even know the girl, and I'm not helping to fund a trip to Kenya for some random child I don't know.

The girl's GoFundMe page says 'my school have given me a wonderful opportunity to go to Kenya during the summer of 2026, where I will work alongside the locals on community, environmental and wildlife projects.'

It's basically a big fuck-off holiday to Africa that she and her mum (and nan) are expecting other people to fund! The cheek of it!

(The girl's GoFundMe has £603 so far by the way, and 21 donations. 6 of them are her parents and grandparents and 2 aunts, and they total £350.) The other 15 have paid roughly £13 to £18 each.

I had a cousin who wanted people to fund him running in the Boston marathon . Because he always wanted to do it. Not fundraising not donating to a charity but just so he could go there . A total of none of our relations contributed .

I’ve had one emailed directly to me for the funding of a relative’s wedding dress. I ignored it.

I suppose I move in fairly middle class circles (not Mumsnet middle class but normal average type of person middle class) and so I've never been asked to donate to a GoFundMe.

I've had the usual hundreds of sponsor me things (some of which I'm happy to do). The only thing that made me bristle slightly is when a FB friend (not a close friend, just one of those people you pick up along the way and don't bin off FB because you don't dislike them or anything) asking for donations to her dd's dog's surgery. Her dd was about 21 at the time, living with a boyfriend and they'd bought a dachshund ffs!

Something that sticks in my mind is a man doing a GoFundMe for his family Christmas and I think he was asking for £8,000? It was in the news, didn't reach me personally.

@LindorDoubleChoc

Something that sticks in my mind is a man doing a GoFundMe for his family Christmas and I think he was asking for £8,000? It was in the news, didn't reach me personally.

Oh yeah! Probably not the same one, but I remember a man on Twitter (some 5 years ago) was begging on there and saying he's broke and he needs donations for his Christmas. If he didn't get donations, he won't even be able to afford a mince pie. 😢 He put the GoFundMe link on Twitter, and he got around £1100 in about 3-4 weeks.

Cheeky c*nt. 😆 I unfollowed him and blocked him. I thought 'what a fucking cheek!'

It's fortified begging. Same as a lot of the charity stuff. An acquaintance is rowing the Atlantic. They want £50 to find their dream for 'charity'. The charity will get about £5k by my estimation. So people who need repatriation because they didn't take travel insurance. If you can afford the holiday stick another £29 on for insurance.

Some fuckers do try on everything. Shameless people!

Glorified!

The ones that’s are set up for chemotherapy or life saving treatments I don’t mind.
Its the go fund me holidays and weddings I find greedy and disgusting.

Agree with you on the Xmas presents but I have donated to vet bills where the dog has been attacked by another dog (usually a pitbull type), just awful.

Again my contents insurance is £52 pa (buildings is via service charges).

Some people have zero financial priorities. More concerned about their acrylic nails, highlights than insurance.

I will not fund these things due to the ignorance, stupidity and lying (like the @Grassgreenblue neighbour claiming she is a single mum when has a partner etc) of people

I actually remember some 10-12 years ago, a girl (Louise) who was a friend of my 2 DC, had a friend who was transgender - female to male - boy in a girl's body... (His name was Kit.)

Louise started a GoFundMe for Kit, begging people for money for his top surgery (having the breasts removed.) It was going to be around £7000 at the time. Kit did nothing and Louise did it all. Begging people on Twitter and Facebook! She even messaged celebrities begging for money, and asked for donations from various Trusts. She got a few responses from them saying 'sorry but we don't fund this kind of thing.'

Long story short, around £1000 was raised in about 3-4 months. Nowhere near enough, so Louise left it running. . All the money went into Louise's bank account, and when it got to £1350 it stalled ... After a further 2 months she shut it down, and she transferred all the money to Kit.

Kit went off to Uni 2 months later and never contacted Louise again. DD said she felt like a right mug! I don't even know if Kit used the money for the top surgery. He could have spent it on a holiday!

Louise did get very annoying with the constant begging and pleading for people to give to Kit's top surgery fund. (I gave nothing by the way. I didn't even know him!)

The height of brazenness IMO
Just begging with another name.The people who donate money are just as bad as they are encouraging it.

We had something similar at work a few years ago

The woman who owns 20+ of our restaurants set up a gofundme for some charity bike riding trip abroad with her (loaded) husband

Loads of posters up at work,telling us to donate via this link

She's a multi millionaire

I'm on minimum wage

Nobody donated and we kept getting snotty messages via fb urging us to 'just give £20!it's for charity!'

Not one of us donated (I think some of the main managers did but they earn more than us and seem to enjoy licking her boots)

She's got more money sat in her bank account than I'd earn over 10 lifetimes-she can pay for her own bloody holiday!

I had an acquaintance in Uni who became one of the success stories in our old Uni circle. He was in a pharma multinational and he spent some years in various locations abroad. He then moved to central Europe to lead a Dept at European HQ. He got married and had a child. He sadly died very suddenly from some unknown defect and of course we all heard the news. He was buried abroad but his family here were having a memorial so there was a lot of communication among our old network about this, via a WhatsApp group. It seems a friend from his work set up a Go fund me for his widow and child and there was a lot of speculation about what his true financial situation had been, had he debts, had he talked up his job, had he no insurance etc so people started to donate. I hesitated because the phrasing said something about 'continuing to maintain the same standards for his daughters education'. It seems his daughter went to an extremely expensive private school. Soon after a friend met his family member and heard that he was in fact a very wealthy man who had provided very well for his DD and was insured etc. They were absolutely furious and mortified that someone, however well intended, had done this in his name. They said he was a proud man and would be turning in his grave. I thought it was a very sad upsetting thing for a family to deal with.

Did anyone donate? Apart from her parents

I've never come across this other than reading about it on here. I've only ever seen charity fundraising requests.

People donating to these grifters is even more bizarre. Who does that?

Yes of course it's cringe, as are the people who donate. Although I notice that no one has been dumb enough donate to kitchen bloke from the link up thread, so there are are some standards out there still at least.

I feel like donating a quid so I can share some "words of support"

The charity ones get me , £5k to climb some mountain in the name of charity - surely that would be better just all donated to the charity !?

Or to stupid not to get it.

I paid £50 for someone with a brain tumor to go to Disneyland. Don't regret it. No ones forcing anyone to give