AIBU to think leaving a WhatsApp activity group without a word is rude?

[girlfriend44]

Aibu to think it's rude when people leave activity groups that they were welcomed into. (What's App) Without saying anything?

We welcomed two people they were friends to an activity, made them welcome and they said they enjoyed it and would come back and looked forward to it.

Fast forward a while we have not seen them or heard at all. Today I noticed they've both left the group, one and then the other followed shortly after.

Can't they just say thanks for welcoming us or nice to meet you, but we are unable to attend anymore and then leave.

People are so bloody rude.

It would finish it off much better if they communicated and you'd think much more of them.
Makes you wonder why you bother?
Perhaps when they attended we should have been rude and unwelcoming instead of friendly.

I think people need to stop making groups for everything. If you have a hobby or club you can make “community” groups - which are much more protected and run by admins.

Other people can do whatever they like but you don't have to be in any of their groups.

I am sorry but who are you to be owed a message? Did you spend any money to add them into group, did you bake a cake, did you put bunters with "welcome" in the house? Are they friends or family, did you do anything for them? No? I thought so.

They clearly didn't enjoy it as much as they said but were too polite to say it to your face. Or they enjoyed it in the moment but then decided it wasn't for them. Or their personal circumstances have changed and they can't attend anymore and CBA to make polite chit chat with virtual strangers online.

I'm old and remember when the bank branch I ran first got a PC (just one) and an internal email system. It was a revelation - I could message HO and say "please send me a copy of the deeds to X house, Postcode x22 x34' Thanks Namechange'. It saved hours of ringing up and introducing myself , then chit chat about the weather and how busy we all were, whether anyone was attending the upcoming training week, and repeating the account details twice and reiterating what branch I was from. I can remember going home and raving to my husband (who worked in the city) about this wonderful invention of digital comms and us both agreeing it was going to revolutionise the world of work.

And I think for work and finance it has, but for personal interactions it has thrown up a whole new set of unwritten rules that can trip people up.

Omg this is the message of the thread.
I couldn't agree more.....I hate WhatsApp groups, too much trivia, too much pinging. Do I comment? do I just read ? do I need an emoji to reply? Do I leave?
I've literally left a WhatsApp group this evening for all the reasons you outlined in your post.

Did you say goodbye ? 😂

You really are overthinking it. I think WhatsApp groups are a really useful way of communicating as long as nobody takes the piss. If a small number of group members are having a conversation that I'm not part of I just mute it for a while.

@girlfriend44 Evening OP, I posted on your thread a couple of pages back. I'm just stopping by to say thank you for the opportunity to air my opinion on your issue. I fancy watching the telly now, so won't be back. It's been lovely, but I best be getting on. Best wishes for your future endeavours. Toodle pip

Social cowardice has taken me out...😂

Idk, if I were them I would be a bit worried any sort of message before leaving would come across a bit "yeah I don't actually like your group/activity so I'm off" and that would feel rude, also a bit attention seeking. Having been to an activity once and not a member for long why would I think myself important enough to need to announce I wasn't coming back?

"I joined a yoga group - to do yoga. But fuck me the messages on the WhatsApp group were too much.
So I left the classes and the group."

Why didn't you just mute the group???

I think this often depends on if they are the sort of people who have very busy social lives and are on lots of WhatsApp groups or not. Also if they are younger generation they all leave groups all the time.

Because like me they probably don't want archived, muted chats clogging up their phone data?

What do you mean by clogging up your phone data? That's not a problem these days surely?

Unnecessary old crap on my phone? Why would I keep it? And, FYI, I'm not someone who can afford the latest IPhone or whatever, nor an expensive contract- my perfectly serviceable 4 year old Samsung works brilliantly- but better if not clogged up with said unnecessary old crap. People not bothered about that likely have a £600 phone I guess.

If people send memes and pictures the default setting on Whatsapp (I think) is to save autonatically so I end up with a lot of junk in my phone. But texts, I don't think so. Saying that, my phone is clogged up with junk, in order to install an apl I had to uninstall another. So not sure what do you mean by these days, I don't have unlimited storage space.

I couldn't agree more. I was added to one a couple of weeks ago that pings away and I haven't been at that activity for months. So now I am faced with either muting it or leaving it. I do wish people making these groups would check out beforehand whether I want to part of it.

I've got a cheap-ish and old-ish phone - I can't use those things that charge it just at the back for example - and I'm not aware of having any problems because of old wa messages. I remember in the past not being able to have all the apps I wanted, but those were even older phones.

Exactly, why should I be digitally tidying up after someone else?

You can change the setting for photos etc.

You can change that setting 😊

Still makes no sense to keep junk on my phone I don't even want...!?

Yeah you can change it to only download media once you hit download

I find the fact that the overwhelming majority voted “it’s not rude” quite depressing. I would just leave quietly if a big group but smaller groups definitely I would message one of the admins at the very least. Otherwise it’s got a bit of a door-slam feel about it. But kind manners are often very subjective, I know

I am sure you can, to be honest I did not go that deep into it, is easier to complain about it and do nothing until my phone self-destructs for lack of TLC