Why is everyone away with the fairies?

[xAwaywiththefairiesx]

Is it just me or have listening skills and attention spans declined rapidly in the last 10 years or so?

Nobody bloody listens or retains information any more.

Yesterday, I was at work. Patient transport turns up with a patient to transfer to us. I said, "Oh hi, have you got Mr Smith?" (All names have been changed) and the man says "yeah".
OK, great. I ring for the staff in the department that need to collect Mr Smith while patient transport guy goes to collect Mr Smith from the ambulance. I start typing up the paperwork to admit Mr Smith.
Our staff come down, with the necessary equipment to transport Mr Smith, and just then, who should come through the doors but a perfectly mobile Mrs Jones??!!
I said "that's not Mr Smith!!" and he said "nah" I asked him why he said it was and he just shrugged.
So I have to send the staff back again, with their equipment, get hold of the staff that need to collect Mrs Jones, and wait for them to come down.
All the while patient transport is stood there tapping his foot and looking at his watch like he has no idea it was him that caused the delay.

This is just one irritating incident. I find noone takes in information, noone listens, I have to send people times, dates etc 100 squilion times before it goes in. The parents WhatsApp group is full of questions the school has emailed to everyone already and all day long at work people reply to my emails asking stuff that is in the email they are replying to.
My husband has asked me three times today what shifts I am working next week.
The delivery people will completely ignore notes telling them where to leave parcels.
People in shops just stare blankly at you when you ask them very simple questions, or ask you to repeat yourself because they weren't listening.

I bet even on this thread, mumsnetters will comment having not read it properly.

Is everyone just away with the fucking fairies?!

We're going off topic but here's the problem with the "I'm entitled to my opinion" thing.

Free speech does not mean freedom from consequences.

You are entitled (in most cases) to voice and share your opinion. That's it. That is where your entitlement ends.

You are not entitled to decide what reactions you get. You are not entitled to not being challenged. You are not entitled to be agreed with

People are just as entitled to challenge you, or disagree or say your opinion is racist as you are to say your opinion.

But you seem to be able to manage this well, because if you're not good at handling reactions to your opinions then the best thing to do is probably to stay introverted as you have been doing

This book explains all.

If this is your preferred communication style at work then I think I can see where at least some of the issue is...

Your cant make people see thing your way only.
You do you.

No, I'm talking about WhatsApp groups. Mainly with family.

Yeah miss bossy boots.

Have you been drinking?

But actually, if people at work did this shit enough times, I'm not above doing it to them either. They, after all, are the ones being unprofessional by not bothering to do their job properly and repeatedly asking me to do it for them. I would happily give them the information required whilst pointing out that I've already given it.

Surely any one could tell the difference between mr smith and Mrs jones though? They are people not parcels

I was agreeing with you.

This is what i mean i try to interact and i fail sorry.

I'm not sure if you're agreeing or disagreeing.

Either way, have a good night

Hey, don't worry about it. Other people are quite clearly overrated.

I hope you're OK, don't beat yourself up. We all have different strengths. It just irritates me when people are in the wrong job I guess x

I perhaps hadn't realised how lucky I am that (although they probably wouldn't know how to search a WA thread) my in-laws are very organised and put everything in their diary. (I get to hear every piece of info from them multiple times, but at least they've retained it)

It's not the parents on either side that are the issue for me. It's the siblings and siblings in laws. My mum and my PILs are pretty good with diaries and things.

Siblings in law just ignore me and DH completely until the last few days before the event when I get DH to get on the case and get a fucking answer out of them because I am sick of sending polite reminders.
My siblings will enthusiastically say they are coming then act all surprised when I ask for final numbers and start with the what time and where shite followed by the lane excuses.

Reading ability in most people is now really poor. That means they'll do almost anything rather than read a piece of text carefully because doing that is HARD.

And it's scary because people are responding to sound bites and basing their opinions on headlines.

And they don't see an issue with it. My MIL for example can't stand Meghan Markle. On trying to discuss the issue she has with her a little deeper she openly and readily admitted "oh, I only read what the headlines say" and genuinely thought that was sufficient to form a deep hatred for someone.

This is an educated woman. In a high powered job.

I despair.

Ah but the kicker at our school is that they won't replicate the same message across the different platforms. They will send one message and randomly choose which platform to use. So one week the PE info is on Google classroom, the next it'll be on the app, next time it'll be in the newsletter on page 6 hidden between news about the lollipop man. So if you don't check them all repeatedly you'll miss info.

I'm thick too, but I'm not staying in.

Aw, do schools still have lollipop people? That's nice to hear.

I haven't seen one for ages.

And then if you get exasperated being people's shortcut then you're the unreasonable one. Bleugh!!!

The OP have a communication problem with multiple people, what’s more likely, they are all “away with the fairies” - incapable of doing their jobs, or something in the way she’s communicating isn’t working. If it was just one person, then fair enough it could be a them problem, but multiple people (who manage to communicate correctly with others at work to keep their jobs) aren’t able to communicate with theOP correctly.

There is clearly something about the way she talks to people fails to get appropriate responses. Yet her conclusion is everyone else is the problem.

Perhaps you don't speak very clearly or speak quite fast, and quite a lot of people have slight hearing problems that they refuse to acknowledge. On written things, people do have very short attention spans. I tend to write in bullet points if there are things I want people to really see, otherwise they tend to skim things and miss the vital bit. And of course they don't see what they don't want to see unless really forced to.

I find I miss important things my DH says because he tends to ramble on about trivial things, so I'm only vaguely listening, and then drops something in that I'm meant to remember or act on, and usually when I'm doing something else like preparing veg or sorting washing (and half watching something on the tv as well).

This was a you problem. Ask a member of staff where lighters are before joining the queue. Always have your id when you know you could be asked, you knew you would be buying those things

Interpersonal skills including communicating and listening have plummeted. I had a frustrating conversation with a call centre worker recently who just would not listen and respond to the question I was actually asking. She kept going off on tangents about things I hadn't asked about even though I kept saying, 'This is the question I want answered, please tel me what is...."

It took a whole 15 minutes for me to extract the answer I wanted. I should have hung up and tried someone else.

The other thing I've noticed is Gen Z customer service people inventing an answer rather than either admit they don't know or finding out the answer.

It could be me, yes.

But multiple people on this thread also agree with me and have experienced the same thing, and 90% of people don't think I'm being unreasonable.

So that evidence needs to factor in too.