WTF are Frothers? Have you seen them around and wondered? Not a quiche, but a protest group. Tory, Labour, Lib Dems - Common Goal - Protest Against the Cuts

[MmeLindor.]

What are the Frothers?

The term "Frothers" came about one dank and dismal November day in 2011. A frustrated user of the parenting forum Mumsnet started a thread about her dismay at the cuts that the Conservative/Liberal Democrat government was inflicting on the British public.

She stated that she was not "quite a frothing berserker but I am getting rather cross with our government messing with the good stuff".

The good stuff - policies, benefits, institutions that had taken years to achieve were being cut for no good reason, often leaving gaping holes in the fabric of British society.

The NHS, with which we Brits have a love-hate relationship, but like a favourite sibling, we wish to protect from harm.

Sure Start, a successful scheme that supported parents who were struggling and offered children from deprived backgrounds a better start in life.

Universal Child Benefit was cut for those families who had one earner bringing in more than £44k a year. If both parents each earn less than £44k, they keep their UCB payments. This obviously hit single parents and families with a single earner hardest.

Disability Living Allowance and Employment and Support Allowance - which enabled those with disabilities to live a decent life, without feeling that they were begging for assistance or were a burden to the taxpayer.

Student Fees, the introduction of which, contrary to Lib Dem pre-election promises, means that a whole generation of young people will have to think carefully before applying to higher education.

These and many other cuts are being made in the name of austerity. We are "all in this together", but some of us are deeper in this than others.

We all understand that there are sacrifices to be made but why should these sacrifices be borne by those who already have so little?

The general public seems oblivious of the dangers being faced, they are unaware of the injustices being wrought on the already disadvantaged.

The government is winning the war of the headlines. They have blasted the recipients of DLA and ESA as scrounger and cheats so often that the general public believe it. They misinterpret data to "prove" their points. Teachers are painted as being irresponsible and greedy, while the bankers rake in the money.

The poster on Mumsnet was not alone for long. Within a few days, a group of over 30 posters had formed. They asked themselves, "What can we do?".

The idea of a blog was born. Three days later the blog had over thirty authors signed up, a Facebook page and a Twitter account.

The Aims:

• to open the general publics' eyes to the injustices being created by the governement

• to inform those who are facing cuts about their rights

• to link with other activists and charities, in order to put pressure on the government

Are you a Frother?

Come and join us.

BLOG

FACEBOOK

TWITTER

Very good, that clip. Great to see it getting some airtime, the Spartacus Report.

Sue is very ill, I read this morning. It must have been very hard on her, these past weeks.

It's sad she has ended up so ill fighting for her rights. She has got some backup though, look what UK uncut are up to:

"Cameron, Osborne, Clegg and Co. are choosing to inflict suffering on sick and disabled people rather than tackle rich tax dodgers, because they think the poor and vulnerable are invisible ? that they won?t or can?t make a fuss, and the rest of us don?t care.

On Saturday 28th January, we're going to show them that they?re wrong. A brave group of disabled, sick and elderly people are going to engag...e in a hugely daring and disruptive act of civil disobedience, and they?ve asked for our support.

Meet at 11.30am at Holborn tube station with a charged Oyster card, ready to travel to a secret location. The government are going to discover that the vulnerable can be very visible indeed, and that the rest of us do care. Please 'share'!See more
Message from the Invisible: scrap the Welfare Reform Bill!
‎28 January at 11:30 at Holborn Tube Station"

I saw it on facebook just a minute ago.

oh, that is FAB.

FFS, there is thread atm about Tracey Beaker using the word "shit" on Cbbc with people ready to write to the BBC and the press about it.

Sorry, but there are so important issues that are being bloody ignored. If this gets in the press, I will explode with frothyness.

I am sorry that I am not doing anything practical like blog posts right now to help the cause - maybe I'm just all frothed out with RL right now. Seeker is irritating me in AIBU, spouting about how I should be buying free range eggs and chickens. I'd like to see people saying stuff like that try to shop healthily and ethically with my budget. I have £2.86 per person per day for food, cleaning products and nappies. For 3 meals and any snacks. I can't afford to replace my broken mobile phone, which is my only phone. I can't afford to get my hoover fixed (the repair is going to cost me £30 that I just don't have ), and am resorting to cleaning my house with a dustpan and brush, putting extra strain on my joints, which are bad due to the EDS. (Bear in mind that I have an 8yo that suffers from pica due to his Autism, and a crawling baby, I can't NOT clean IYSWIM).

I guess RL is getting me down a bit too much. I had someone today call me a 'spaz' in Tesco's cafe, because I had a partial seizure, and dropped my drink on the floor. Apparently I splashed them, and I shouldn't be allowed outside, and I should have my children taken off me. And how dare I breed and have a disabled child to boot. And I should have been sterilised at birth, so that I didn't have disabled children, and how much of her taxes was I scrounging and spending on luxuries like bottles of water in a cafe? I used to have a rhino skin, but it appears to be thinning. Maybe that happens after nearly 14 years of dealing with people like that?

I'm going to lose my home, I don't know where we will end up, I will be passed as fit to work (and I have found some hints online that it will be from 3yo for people with dc born in 2011, rather than 5yo), yet no bugger will employ me, and no bugger will look after DD. I'm losing sight of the light at the end of the tunnel, and I don't like that feeling.

Hi Hunty at whoever called you a spaz. The only thing I can help with is I have a phone which works. It isn't new but it's a solid old Nokia 6600. If you want it let me know. I'll post it to you.

I'll be fine. I just need to insert my own boot into my own rear end and apply pressure...

(i.e. a swift kick up the arse to stop me feeling sorry for myself and normal service will be resumed...)

Im sorry to hear about what happened today Huntycat. The person who called you that is clearly a cold hearted bigoted uneducated idiot.
It proves that what Francesca Martinez said last night was right though.
And the presenter of This Week and those other two KNEW she was right but didnt want to admit it!

Hunty, please take up Hedley's offer of a phone. It would help you. After all, if we can't look after each other, who else is going to? Not this bloody government, that's for sure.

I wish I'd been there with you at Tesco. That lovely lady would have had things explained to her in strongly worded terms.

I'm normally such a diplomat but I'm struggling with that at the moment

Have just caught up with the thread . I'm sorry I haven't been frothing with you (although I have done the odd retweet here and there).

Mainly it's down to guilt. I've been exploring and have just booked an expensive holiday for us in the summer, and I do feel really bad about that, in the context of frothing. My fear, too, is that my being here will add fuel to the fire amongst those who think people like me have no right frothing, or that I'm hypocritical in some way.

However.

Hunty - my heart goes out to you and your situation. It must be beyond intolerable and frustrating. But one thing occurs to me, thinking about your desire for computer training. There must be plenty of us here (not necessarily on this thread, but on MN as a whole) who could help you? Some kind of distance learning, if you like! Would that be worth considering?

I also have DS2's old mobile phone (he got his new one for Christmas) which is going spare, if you need another one? You're welcome to have it/borrow it - whichever you feel most comfortable with. It's a PAYG.

I am so pleased that that bloody Dorries woman has been put back in her box - at least for a while. I can't understand why she gets the time of day from anyone, never mind other MPs. And she dares to call herself a feminist!

Dorries is about as much of a feminist as I am a millionaire!

Feminist, my arse!

BIWI, it is vital that you continue to froth. Put the guilt thing aside for a minute, the whole point of the Frothers is to shout about the impact of the cuts on real people.

For example, the changes to DLA won't affect me financially. I do not recieve it. However, I strongly believe that I should shout about it. Look at what campaigning has done to Sue Marsh: she's in hospital now. I need to stand up for people like Sue. The changes are wrong. The government is wrong.

It is not about how the cuts affect me, it's about how the cuts affect real human beings. It's a humanity thing. The government lacks it. We don't.

I know, Knotty - just don't want to attract unwanted attention from the Benefit Basher I'm Alright Jack types who so love to have a go, and therefore detract from the work that frothing is doing, IYSWIM?

But will jump (back) to it!

The I'm all right Jacks will sit in their comfy bubbles with their fingers in their ears and their blinkers on. Until the cuts affect them of course. They are entitled to their opinion. just happens their opinion is wrong

I understand about attracting unwanted attention too. I don't want that either.

Time wasted trying to educate those who just won't listen. Unnecessary personal attacks.

The guilt is due to social conscience. If doing away with the guilt means losing that, I'll live with the guilt. we need to be proud of this humanity that some others see as a weakness. It's not

Right, off my box and back to family duties

Hmm. I wonder if there's a frother/blog post about this? 'Just because I'm lucky doesn't mean I don't care', kind of thing?

Or would that make it overly political, you know - the whole 'Champagne Socialist' kind of thing?

Hunty - can I just say fuck fucking Free Range Eggs there's no guarntee it's any better for the bloody chickens and even if it is I don't give a shiny donkey's poop!

A while ago we were utterly utterly brassic and I was buying loads of battery eggs because you can get 15 portions of protein for 1.25... I was desperate that we kept our protein levels up because we'd just got out of nearly a year of bDH being a student/benefits and not eating much meat because I wanted free range. THIS WAS FUCKING STUPID. DH and I were both skinny anyway, he lost 2 stone, I lost 1 we were both really underweight, toddler DD had dropped 25 centiles.

So back t obeing brassic, a thread came up in AIBU about how evil people were that didn't eat free range and I got so incredibly upset. Some people are just wanker's to read about other people struggling and still tell them what they're doing isn't good enough. Expat was great on that thread though

Anyone, stupid free range threads get hidden now.

Take someone up on the offer of a phone, they'll just be kicking around in drawers not being used, call it a borrow and send it back when you've got one yourself.

I think the problem is, Hunty/TeWihara, that some people really, really don't get just how skint some people are and what it's really like. Their hardship is about having to shop at ASDA instead of Waitrose.

That's not to say they're not nice people, they just don't get it.

No, BIWI, to me that's a really important issue. If people think they're not 'allowed' to care that only adds to the mass of idiots who don't care. Lead by example, along with t'other comfy frothers

Somebody asked me if I'd be so worked up about it all if I were still the 'old me'. Yes, of course I would! I would have protested, activated and written fuming letters to MPs. It's far more immediate to me now because I'm directly affected. But the 'old me' had greater access to resources - energy, money and contacts - so might well have been a more effective frother.

Yes actually BIWI, there were a few people on that thread who when we started talking about the actual budgets of some people's food shops and how many people it had to feed did say that they didn't realise it was so bad for some people.

So I guess a bit of good got done, it was just far too close to the bone at the time, as I felt I was being told to neglect our health for the sake of some chickens.

Also really interestingly someone posted saying that free range on a large scale can be worse for chickens, as the dominant chickens block the exits leaving the majority of the birds stuck inside in an even smaller space that usual and just a small percentage with access outside.

Not a bad analogy for what's happening to the UK, Te!

Ive just been in a similar debate on car seats poster couldn't understand why some people cant afford£200 for a car seat when they run a car. Didn't get through. :(

BIWI - I?m not as articulate as Knots, but wanted to add my bit. I can?t stand the lack of humanity that so many show in everyday life and on MN, and being modelled so effectively by our government. I can?t stand the benefit bashing, the narrow mindedness nor the spite. But they are all in the wrong.

These cuts don?t affect me directly at the moment, but they are affecting people in our society, and that is why we need to stand together, it is our business, it should be everyone?s business. The cuts are wrong. We need to say so. I have empathy and I care, and that is important to me.

So don?t stop!

and stupid free range threads, that?s just not getting it isn?t it? Not much empathy there.

and Hunty unbelievable, I'm really sorry you had to go through. People like that make me so angry.