Will it be porridge or curtains for Knob? Await a sensible and sensitive ending to That Storyline on The Archers thread.

[PseudoBadger]

Threads are moving so fast! Will this thread be here to welcome SOK?

Yes Gaspode I agree with you. Also redshoe I think that Hellin was looking for a 'perfect' relationship\marriage (she is gradually coming to terms with the failure of her dream) so the 2 dysfunctional views have created one hell of a marriage.

So why isn't it Bruce helping out and guiding Rob in his abuse? Nope, it has to be a woman.

You see it all the time on here. Man is a git- anything from not being able to make a cup of tea to domestic violence. I blame his mother. Never him, never his father. Always his mother. Oh, and the woman who "needs to show him how to make a cup of tea- it's not his fault if he's never been told. Or maybe you're too controlling about the tea............"

I am keeping up with the thread, but don't think I shall listen to this epi. Let me know when the grit cumuppance happens please. Or at least when Helen runs away.

I assume Bruce is still involved in running the family farm, or perhaps he just can't stand Ursula and was delighted to have time apart - or he can't stand Rob and wouldn't come to Ambridge. It seems abundantly clear from the hints that have been dropped that Rob's early life wasn't very happy. I doubt very much if the SWs expected us to blame Ursula 100% for that. I certainly don't.

Pseudo you are very right. At least, I'm not sure, I'll have to ask my (imaginary) husband ...

However, I think it would be an excellent idea to re-use the previous seasonal thread

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/2517892-Hes-behind-you-Robs-not-the-messiah-hes-a-very-naughty-boy-Watch-The-Archers-pantomime-here?msgid=57830419

• over Easter weekend. Then we could all take the time off from listening and posting and recover less stratospheric blood pressure levels.

I was still traumatised this morning.

I don't think for one minute knob is a nasty bastard because his mother made him that way. He's a nasty bastard because he chooses to behave the way he does. He may have inherited some sociopathic tendencies but that no ones fault as such. I think it's true life in that some MILs are hellish.

I can't see mysogeny elsewhere. Most of the female characters are just like normal people with good and bad points. Most seem quite pleasant (if irritating) . Or am I missing something?

Love the suggested thread title! I shall be abroad for the big episode (Sunday??) and think, after listening last night, that I shall look at the Plarchers rather than catch up with the broadcast episodes when I get home.

Oh yes, poor lamb. Such an unhappy childhood. It all makes sense now we've met his mother.

Oh, and Helen's mother. Why doesn't she intervene? Why didn't she make a better job of bringing Helen up? Why don't the women do something? The men? But they've got farms to run...........

Am sure Rob's father is dreadful too. Unfortunately script reasons would make it weird if Ursula stayed and ran their farm and he came and stayed in Blossom Hill Cottage. Presumably you could argue he would be supporting Rob rather than supporting Helen but unlikely he would have got so many invites to the womenfolk of Ambridge etc.

Assuming Bruce is abusive he's likely either a bit of a passive enabler of Ursula which wouldn't make a good storyline or a shouty fisty bloke which would have been obvious to Helen and more difficult to ingratiate with her relatives. No school run or childcare stories either. Someone just shouting about Helen's hormones would work much less well than Ursula's dressed up concern.

So you are stuck with a woman.

Which doesn't explain Pat at all. I haven't listened to the Archers long enough to make much comment on Pat but I get the impression she is a bit scared of Helen and doesn't really understand her that well.

Okay - we have yet to see Bruce, when we do it might become a bit clearer.

We know why we haven't seen Tony (the Actor is/was busy with other jobs), but he is also less taken in by Rob. From the table situation I think if he directly observed Rob and Ursula and Helen he might just charge in without over thinking too much.
When Pat did seem to worry the other week, unfortunately rather than just plunging in (a la Kirsty) she thought about it, and talked about it with Tony ( not Tom who has been worried himself) and went back to being too careful and cautious.
Tony likes to think well of people, so sometimes can mis seeing what is going on (at the cricket where he was umpire). But also can dig in when something very obviously makes sense, such as the tables. He is hard to manipulate - maybe Rob is maneuvering so as not to let Tony see what is going on directly, because he is hard to shift.
Pat by contrast thinks a lot and so has been easier to manipulate (admittedly some of it is just one SW trying to provide the motivation another one had neglected).

I actually think when everything explodes, a lot of people are going to feel very guilty - that they didn't see or do anything.

Dysfunctional families do tend to create people who go on to have dysfunctional families. To be honest if I met a Rob and Ursula, I would expect from my experience for Bruce to seem like the reasonable one, maybe the one who was being a bit controlled by his wife. But in my experience I would also expect him to have quite a bit of control, but you only see his manipulative/fighting side when his own wishes/interests were threatened.

Oh and Rob didn't have to be nasty - but I think he's basically lazy and has at no point decided to break away from his background and try to reinvent himself.

It causes a lot of emotional anguish to try to avoid becoming as dysfunctional as your parents as lots on MN could testify.

I think it's pretty clear that we focus on Pat precisely because she's supposed to be the feminist, and because we would expect a mother who is normally very supportive of her daughter to open her eyes more. From the SWs' point of view, it does make sense for her to be more involved because she's worked with Helen, done more looking after Henry, supported her during her first pregnancy even when she made it difficult; and, I suppose, dramatically it works because her blindness towards Rob - which was, in many senses, forced on her by Helen - has robbed Helen of the obvious safety net.

Bertrand let's not generalise here. Kirstie is a female and is coming to the rescue hopefully.

My ex dil is an EAer and so is her mother (we came to the conclusion that it began with her father ) because her 4 sisters are not like it. DIL is trying to break the cycle with our GD but it's difficult for her. It's just life. DH was EA and PA at school and carries the scars.

It can be caused by lots of different situations.

The calls for Helen's relatives to intervene have been directed at Tom and Tony as much as Pat, I would say. We've also all been keen for Helen's cousin and his husband to notice something, given that the used to be so close to Helen.

Off the top of my head, I can't remember a single comment from anybody that Pat should have made a better job of bringing Helen up. Pat and Tony, maybe. But not just Pat. Mostly, though, what I've seen is people remembering that Pat and Tony lost their eldest child in very traumatic circumstances and that both Pat and Helen have had mental health problems subsequently. They've had a lot of other stuff to contend with since too. This has been an unlucky family and a lot of the time they are feeling their way trying to work out how to support Helen.

Mummytime you have explained my image of Bruce much better than I have. That is exactly my experience of Bruce/Ursula couples and the gender is interchangeable. Generally everyone thinks the Bruce party is lovely and some kind of martyr having to be married to the horrible Ursula party (probably even their children will think so). This is the gain for the Bruce role. However if you suggest changing the status quo it turns out the Bruce role likes it this way and comes out fighting and will back up the Ursula role to the hilt.

So far their idea of supporting Helen has been to go along with everything she says she wants, or Rob says she wants, so they are unwittingly complicit.
Kirsty, OTOH, is persisting in telling Helen what she doesn't want to hear though I think it's interesting that Helen hasn't told her directly to go away and leave her alone.
In fact, Kirsty is the only person who is telling Helen that nothing is her fault. Everyone else must seem to Helen to be in some way blaming her for something or other.

Wolp agree 100% - I also said earlier that I don't think Pat understands her daughter very well and is a bit scared of intervening as it seems Helen is quite capable of soundly rejecting her and pushing her away.

And when she was thinking of intervening, Tony talked her out of it!!

From today's Guardian:

www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2016/mar/25/how-the-archers-abuse-story-helen-rob-titchener-has-divided-fans

In my experience: if Ursula and Bruce do conflict on anything important to Bruce, then Bruce might well be always the one to win. In fact some of the issues that led to Rob going to boarding school could have been his parents working out their power balance. (And maybe there were two sons because Bruce got his favourite, Miles, and then Ursula went on to get her "own" child., Rob)

I would also think if any of them got really challenged they would start talking about how they were "abused" by their own parents.

Just caught up.

He's a copper bottomed cunt isn't he. And that's putting it mildly.

Average age of listener 56? I am a spring (Fairbrother) chicken then.

glowfrog and mummytime I agree with both of you!

I don't think Pat know how to do right from wrong with Helen, is used to getting it wrong and so in the face of a barrage of misinformation from Rob, and let's face it Helen, is glad Rob is on the scene. She is going to feel awful when the truth comes out but also 'how did it happen to Helen' - which is a large part of why Helen doesn't believe it's happening now.

I also like the idea of Bruce and Ursula effectively having a child each - Rob really doesn't like his mother but it's clear she dotes on him in an awful dysfunctional way. As long as he remembers she's the Queen, he'll be the Prince, sort of thing. Horrible warped ideas of control rather than love.

I don't know how old Hell was when her brother John died, she was obviously traumatised, because she hasn't properly recovered since.

IMO she does need CBT, it may well help a lot more than knob realises and culminate in her seeing her life (and her marriage) clearly. Lets hope eh?

I think she was about 21/22. It happened on Tom's 18th birthday.

Thanks Gaspode So an immature early 20 year old. It seems surprising that Tom hasn't grown up with more problems ( I know his record with relationships isn't good but Helen's is worse ).