AIBU yes I probably am. Who is mumsnet for?

[bluebeardsbabe]

I am a lone parent to a small toddler. I found this forum very useful during my pregnancy (when exp left) for legal information, handholding etc. I mainly lurk now but still dip in from time to time...which is how I noticed how many more dads seem to be posting here now. Now although my exp was a complete vile bastard to me so much so that I still have a hard time trusting men, I fully appreciate that there is good and bad in both sexes and men also need a forum to express emotions relating to single parenting and so on. it's just I'm not sure I feel it's here.

I joined mumsnet specifically to find a nurturing informative environment by women for women, a safe haven to express my emotions. Is it wrong of me to think dads should go off and form dadsnet? I realise my judgement is probably quite clouded like I say but AIBU to think mumsnet should be for mums?

Can you give an example? I haven't come across any.

In response to a poster seeking advice about a man who has:

Threatened to keep the baby after contact
Told the mother he wanted to mow her down and end her
Been verbally abusive
Been a "vile bully"

A male poster replied:

The dad may love his daughter and be feeling very powerless and insecure as to his future role. He would have heard stories about nasty mums blocking contact, there's the distance thing which must be awful and apparently there's some distrust and conflict between the parents. (Excuses for mans behaviour)
Nothing excuses bullying or general nastiness. But perhaps the dad and the mum both share some responsibility for their separation and both need to find a workable arrangement for the future. (Nice bit of victim blaming after token "bullying is bad" type comment)

Then the man goes on to recommending reassuring the man and recommends mediation before (in a further reply) using the child as a guilt trip by saying the child would want his parents to focus on him and talk.

(I'm sure you may recognise that poster).

Another man on the same thread basically says the man is probably very angry and has been provoked.

So, it's there and it happens.

It's massively for women by women.

The site is also supportive of a lot of bad sentiment against men which if the boot wad on the other foot would be viewed as overtly sexist.

There are some good points however lots of them get hijacked by the aforementioned eg Step Parenting goes through bouts of non Step Parents posting to flame the SMs who post because these women want to release their own anger at a target group.

Although I post and amuse myself with the IABU (not a typo) posts near daily I can't help think that the balance of support given is overwhelmingly emotional and circumstancial as opposed to practical and what may be in the child's best interests, prime example being how quickly mums post about stopping contact is supported wholeheartedly and yet when a dad posts similar wanting an answer he is scathed and scorned away

and another example of sexism on lone parents...

one poster asking if their living arrangement after much consideration would be acceptable to the ExP

a certain poster replied..

" In a shared house, you can't guarantee that there will always be safe adults in it. What if one of these professional women gets a new boyfriend?"

a man god forbid....a new boyfriend...the horror...because if the mum in that situation got a new boyfriend that wouldn't be an issue at all. If the gender was reversed and a women was moving in with two other women you would never have made that comment.

I know TAAT but it's only in reply to a previous example

I appreciate that you genuinely read into those (my) comments as being bad. I honestly don't. But even if you accept the posters narrative 100%, how does trying to defuse conflict or give an undestanding of a male point of view harmful? She will eventually face these issues in mediation or a court room, surely it is empowering to understand your ex's perspective.

Yes, I would have actually made the same comment. A woman moving in with two women still has the risk of those women inviting unknown men back to the house (as well as unknown women). If a mum got a new boyfriend, I assume she would vet him for a long while before introducing him to the child. You can't do the same vetting with a housemates boyfriend or one night stand.

Nice try though.

vetting? no ones doing CRBs

I'll assume the word nitpicking means you have nothing else to contribute. :)

dark, that's a fair point that she may come up against those opinions at a later stage. I do think it is wrong though to recommend the things you do, making the mans behaviour the woman's responsibility. It's not her responsibility to reassure him after he has abused her. Using the what the child would want angle to make it seem that way is unfair on her.

Yeah fairenough, i'll admit I didn't quite give your pp a good enough read and you make a good point. I apologise for that.

But I'll stand by my assumption that you wouldn't have explored the other partners point of view had the genders been reversed (rightly or wrongly as you have already corrected me on that).

OP, Women's Aid have a forum. I don't know how they vet posters but I imagine it is much more heavily moderated that MN and might be more of the safe place you are looking for.

Personally I've given up posting on a lot of threads as there does seem to be a fair amount of dv apologists on here (who annouce themselves as male and female) who seem determined to believe men are so hard done by. I think you shouldn't be allowed to post on LP or Relationships til you've passed an exam on the complete works of Lundy Bancroft...

OP I understand exactly where you are coming from.

I posted about dv issues and got tons of emotional support. Far too much actually, I over shared. Obviously I have no idea whether that support came from men or women, but it's natural to assume women. Then a man who felt the need to declare himself a man posted, and I instinctively felt like I had posted too much and it freaked me out. I don't really know why, can't articulate why, but it upset me in a way that I can now see was me being a bit unreasonable. I think there's a tendency to assume that you are just posting with a small group of people, especially on a long running thread, but obviously that's not the case.

Although with regards to my own experiences I have benefited from what can be perceived as a bias towards women on MN, I do think this bias means certain topics are out of bounds for anyone wanting a sensible discussion. Which is a shame, but it's probably a small price to pay as there's nowhere else quite like MN where you can get such a clear view on what is and isn't acceptable in relationships.

Advice remains the same trust nae fucker only share what's safe,mn public and visible
Daily mail et al lift stories directly from mn,biggest uk parent forum not a wee safe space
I can understand one wants affinity or assume posts will be sympathetically received.the reality is it's not necessarily the case

Mn was never a for women forum.and no amount of discussion about the words (oh I know it's called mumsnet) or hoping its a women forum will change that

The support,humour is available but be realistic.you're online with online strangers
Take support were you find it,but it's not safe space
Unfortunately there's been female and male trolls,false stories. Small minority, majority posters cracking

I think a forum where you need to upgrade to a higher status would be hideous! I'd hate there to be threads or sections on here where only 'gold' members were allowed to post and everyone could see a nice gold star and a little note saying how they'd been a member for 5yrs and had posted 1234 times. And I say that as someone who's been on MN for close to 10yrs.

The reason I'm finding it difficult to see it all in black and white gender terms is that the experience of many women is just as far removed from DV as most men. If someone posted that their normally rational loving DH of 10yrs has hit them completely out the blue so they've packed up and gone, I may be able to contribute. However, the whole concept of 'I've put up with this DV or EA for so long and I'm now struggling, should I leave.' Completely blows my mind because I literally have no comprehension as to why at the very first time of it or even hint if it, she wouldn't have been off. So I'd probably be able to offer less understanding that a bloke who's seen a close female relative or friend go through it.

I didn't seek out a lone parent thread to infiltrate it btw. This came up in active convos. I posted that the ops feeling may be understandable but were still unreasonable. In fact, that seemed to be what most people were saying so I'm not sure what the issue is at all.

This was discussed before and I think it would be horrible to have a higher status. There is a risk that it would give more weight to some poster's comments that aren't merited (I've been here 10 years this August).

Blimey, go away for a day and suddenly 7 pages! Glad to see healthy debate started on this subject. Not sure I have a lot to add although don't like the poster who made assumptions about me and the upbringing of dd. I am not a man hater, I am not scarred for life, I am not bitter. I have lots of male friends who have valuable perspectives, infact I know several single dads who guided me through the male perspective during my pregnancy. Dd is happy and has lots of male role models in her life. I am also dating again so not scarred enough to have crawled under a stone then eh!

What I guess I was trying to say was that I disliked the fact that some male, and yes they are male, and no not all male, posters, seem not to grasp the emotional connotations of having recently given birth, breastfeeding, being full of hormones and the incredible bond most mothers have with their child. That doesn't mean to say that men's perspectives aren't valid or that they don't also have very strong, close bond with their dc's. It just means I felt sometimes men barge on to a thread and give an opinion without actually understanding what that woman might be going through.

I am sorry if I caused offence to any men here saying their opinion was not valid. As I have said previously I actually came to mumsent thinking it was only for mums but then that is my fault for not reading the tagline properly. Yes I think women only forums are great and I am also in a small group for single mums with small babies where no men are allowed, and that is great too. Mumsnet is great for all its information but I have been put off recently by some of the attitude by some, not all, men on threads recently.

Think I may have gone off on a tangent here from my orignial musings, not sure I will have a lot more to add here but really enjoying reading everyones perspective.

Right now had a look through thread

Monetbyhimself I wish you'd all fuck off and leave the lone parents forum alone. After another shitty experience for Dd with her dad I want to post for support and an ear from other mums who go through this shit weekend after fucking weekend. But I can't cos the place has been infiltrated. So fuck you all with your gender bollocks. here, here

Darkknight while different perspectives are very helpful, I think the issues I, and a few others have here is not so much that the perspective is different but there is a lack of understanding. I don't need to be told that I should get in the car and drive 100miles with dd after having given birth to her on my own with blood and pus gushing out of my fanjo (TMI but this is MUMSNET after all) so that exp can play daddy! Sorry but that sort of advice shows complete lack of understanding of new mums!

Yes, this is the thread that sparked off my original post, glad someone is getting it :)

Sorry was trying to copy in BuffyX post about interpreting dv as being condoned by a male poster! Damn technology!

Bluebeardsbabe, I've just shown DH your comments to Darkknight and he has just said, 'well of course not. Why would anyone think that was reasonable to expect a woman who's just given birth to do that?' So I don't think it's a case that women would understand that and men wouldn't. Only tossers wouldn't, surely?

Oh and I said at the beginning that your views were understandable just, IMO, unreasonable due to the nature of the site so I think it's a bit off to echo the 'fuck off out of here' sentiment. Any poster who is too traumatised to engage with normal, rational men or indeed, normal rational women who just happen not to be lone parents really need to find a closed forum better suited to their needs.

If you're wishing posters would fuck off,you need to log off take a wee rest
If you need a women's space,no men,you'll need to post somewhere else
Not unsympathetic to people difficulties,but cannot demonise male posters on mn

I was being a bit ironic with that last post and if you have read my last few posts than at no time have I (I hope) wished that male posters would fuck off, I was quoting another poster in that post and thinking it was funny. I have lots of womens spaces online and in real life and I do enjoy MN...to an extent.

I think maybe some of what I was saying has been misinterpreted now and I don't mind being bashed if people are offended by what I said :) I am not at all too traumatised to engage with normal rational men, I do it on a daily basis IRL. I still say that there have been a few posts recently that have offended me in terms of their views on vulnerable women and in hindsight my thread should have maybe just reflected this and not come across as a traumatised, man hating woman. I fully admit I was very vulnerable when I came on here and to some extent still am a bit damaged from my experiences but not to the extent that I have become irrational, I hope!

Again want to reiterate, do not wish posters, male or females, to fuck off, I was just saying that I understood where that poster was coming from. I too have had days like that:)

Please don't apologise,your opinion is your subjective pov. I don't agree
Look I really get the need it vent,seeking affinity,and wanting to feel can vent
But bottom line is,one can't demonise by gender.some posters are trolly gits.male and female