Anyone else feeling sick waiting to see what the PIP cuts will be?

[Somethingthecatdraggedin7]

Wondering if I will still be able to pay for the numerous services and things my disabilities necessitate.
I think, given I have such severe issues, that I may be one of the “lucky” ones as from what I have read so far I would still have enough pip points plus I am older and have stage 4 cancer (separate to my other significant disability) but who knows.
Even if I escape the cull I am sad and scared for others who may lose their award.

It's the extent to which they believe disabled people have the ability to live a normal life. If someone can't live a normal life, they're then accused of laziness, being weak minded, bringing their disability on themselves, and so on, all because able bodied people can do these things easily.

I don't get it. Why would anyone choose to be sick? Why would anyone choose to make their life significantly harder? Why would someone choose to live on a pittance? It makes no sense whatsoever.

I agree. Yet MNHQ intervened on a thread today which didn’t seem as bad as what we have to listen to.

Does Justine still have anything to do with MN because it seems to be a far cry now from the days when we had ‘this is my child’. People were so much nicer on MN in those distant days. MN saved me when my (very complex) dd was being diagnosed.

MNHQ now also refuses to remove it when people post incorrect information about disabilities and how they are diagnosed. I pointed out to them that they delete stuff about Covid when it’s misinformation - I received no reply.

@verysmellyjelly I have seen that thread too. Thankfully it is full.
So much abliest crap on it though. OP was worried about the changes to benefits and instead got a lecture on how opening a can of pop and a can of tuna are the same, and why cant her SN daughter not pull her weight at home.

There is this rhetoric which now goes ‘There’s no more public money so disabled people will have to fend for themselves’

Coming from a lot of people who, no doubt have forgotten the furlough payments made to all of them during Covid.?So they aren’t above state support when they themselves genuinely can’t work.

The root cause of most victim-blaming is a desire to believe that it won't happen to you or anyone you love. If people can pretend to themselves that the disabled person / rape victim / [you get the idea] did something to cause the disability / rape / [other bad thing], then they can pretend to themselves that they won't ever be disabled / raped / [whatever] because they are far too clever to do such a silly thing.

Recognising that anyone can be hit by a bus / alone with a misogynist / [etc] and so you cannot be immune to bad outcomes is really scary, so people prefer illusory safety over facing reality.

I've already hidden AIBU. I'm seriously considering hiding Chat because there's so many awful threads.

Not just able bodied MNetters. Some of the disabled posters can be just as bad. Lots of *I have this condition and work, why can't you?" sort of thing.

I've also thought that's part of it. Of course if they developed a painful and crippling disease, they'd be able to carry on working, washing, dressing, walking etc.

It's a bit like first time parents who are blithe about the grenade waiting to go off in their lives. All parents know that it really isn't so simple.

No one can guarantee good health throughout their lifetime. It should scare everyone, ill and healthy, that the government plans financial destitution for the disabled.

Yep, I've seen that too, with their smug superiority.

(1) No one intends to become disabled and some people are born disabled. We all intend to retire, so we should plan for it.
(2) The people who promised each other Triple Locked pensions based on an assumption that the economy would continue to grow indefinitely should have thought about the risks of population stagnation, longer life expectancies, and deindustrialisation of the economy before putting their faith in that Ponzi scam.

It really shouldn't be hard to understand that the same condition comes in varying levels of severity. Someone who gets four migraines per week is unlikely to be able to work. Someone who gets four per year might hit sickness absence triggers but will be able to work in most jobs. Both have migraine.

I disagree:
(1) You can plan as much as you like, but nobody plans to be too poor to save for retirement, nor to find that life events mean they use up the money saved.
(2) Yes, we should all plan for things that we can't predict. By that measure perhaps people should have had insurance against health conditions and then they wouldn't have drained the state. You are making the same argument against older people that has been made against the disabled - that they shouldn't have expected state support and don't deserve it.

On a number of occasions they have said that the threads are "educational". I have never understood how bullying and discrimination are educational.

That is a bit of a stretch.

To be fair to MNHQ they did delete one particularly vile post, but I'd like to see them be a little more willing to press the delete button.

If someone complained about racism it would be deleted in a second - possibly the entire thread. And that is for a "minor" comment about race. Although I do agree that there should be zero tolerance of discrimination. But age and disability discrimination seem to be quite acceptable provided you don't step too far over the line. Not that I am sure where the line is, because some of the stuff I have seen on here....

They deleted a few but not nearly enough. What I find so confusing is they deleted a comment of mine recently because I said someone was being “intentionally nasty”. They specifically said it was those words that led to the deletion as it was considered a personal attack! I was surprised because I thought it had to be more aggressive (not just an opinion) to be an attack; anyway, I asked how I could have expressed my view so as not to be deleted (explaining I was autistic), and they literally refused to tell me!

But they then won’t delete comment after comment after comment of people laying into an OP who has posted for support, and attacking her for supposedly eating badly. Blaming her for her situation, in essence. Saying “everyone gets tired” to someone with ME! I don’t even have ME but surely it’s freaking obvious that you don’t say that to people with severe energy limiting illnesses.

Also the hypocrisy of how they claim to have improved and listened to autistic MNers and yet when I directly asked them about my tone and wording, they refused to help me. It just proves how shallow their commitment to disabled posters is. Exactly like how they willingly host full on hate threads about us.

It is awful. I hide most of the threads now. Do you think MN is representative of how people in the real world think? I like to think that the Internet attracts the bigots and people who just like to be nasty, but I do wonder.

Unfortunately I think that the majority of people on sites like this are representative of how many people think. You are going to get a cross-section, obviously, but I suspect that if people in the real world were truthful, you'd find that the proportionate breakdown is similar across the board of views. To me, the big difference is that on an anonymous site people can say what they really think without the veneer of "behaving well". In the real world they'd be castigated for the things that they openly say on here - sometimes by those who agree with them but aren't stupid enough to say so. I recall (because I am old enough) the haydays of "racism awareness training". What is produced more often than not was not less racist people, but people who had learned how to be more cleverly racist. I think we live in a society like that where many people hide who they truly are.

@verysmellyjelly What I find so confusing is they deleted a comment of mine recently because I said someone was being “intentionally nasty”. They specifically said it was those words that led to the deletion as it was considered a personal attack!

I suspect that two things are at play. The first being that the written word, especially out of context, is imprecise and can be read in many ways. I've had posts deleted because MNHQ haven't read the thread or the debate, just one post out of any context, and it hasn't said what the poster thought it said. It isn't just about autism, it's about the fact that things can be read in different ways. In my experience they delete if someone complains, not if there is actually something wrong - and I agree with you that if someone is being intentionally nasty they should be called out on it.

But for the future - it's ok to say that something someone has said is nasty. It's the "intentionally" that makes it a personal attack. Although I am not disagreeing with you, people do go out of their way sometimes to intentionally offend. But MNHQ don't care about that. In all honesty I think that they like having outrageous stuff on the site, because it's clicks. Obviously, not outrageous if it is something that will reflect badly on them, but attacking certain groups - people with disabilities, the elderly (especially "boomers") and the like don't matter to them because nobody in the real world really cares about that.

In all honesty I think that they like having outrageous stuff on the site, because it's clicks. Obviously, not outrageous if it is something that will reflect badly on them, but attacking certain groups - people with disabilities, the elderly (especially "boomers") and the like don't matter to them because nobody in the real world really cares about that

You are absolutely right. I was quite shocked to see MNHQ actually driving traffic about disability benefits to the site by sign posting threads on X. I almost deleted my account when I saw them doing this. I mean, we all know how toxic X users can be.

We all also know that it is thanks to Musk, Trump and their friends that many women in the USA are seeing their abortion and other rights disappear. So quite disturbing that MumsNet (the hint is in the name) are on X anyway. I have never been on it, but the socially conscious are now leaving in droves. Perhaps MNHQ don't care about women either?

And they're off again .... second post into thread asking about PIP / mental health mandatory reconsideration, and the entirely irrelevant reponse is "do you work?" https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/feeling_depressed/5307039-pip-mandatory-reconsideration?reply=143270425

I have just come across your comment, and will refute what you are saying here. It is not true that MNHQ are delete happy when it comes to racism, in fact I would say it is the opposite. I get tired of seeing some posters always asserting that they are fast to act, because it is about racism. MNHQ have a very poor record of dealing with persistant racist posters on this forum. It is about time that comparison was dropped, because it is obvious that the people saying it do not even seem to recognise the racism when they see it, or choose to ignore it, or put it down to being "minor". It is not helpful to compare, and does nothing to help the situation at present.

I agree, I think it's like when people say rubbish like "well you wouldn't deny a ramp to a wheelchair user" in response to reasonable adjustments for other disabilities being denied. (I'm white so I don't know, but I'm guessing it's frustrating to hear the attitude that your experience of discrimination must be better because of xyz)