I posted a thread in AIBU yesterday (perhaps foolishly), which thankfully did turn out to be very helpful, but also turned out to be extremely hurtful. And while overall, I gained a great deal of benefit/clarity/insight from it, I also spent a great deal of the day in tears and/or raging, and feeling generally crap about myself.
The post was about a friend, which led a lot of people to think I musn't be that emotionally invested, because it wasn't about me.
However, I was emotionally invested because I felt like I was watching my friend potentially walk into a very, very dangerous situation (which could end up in her hurt or even dead), and worse, I had the realisation that I could not stop her, but could only try to, and may very well fail.
In the context of that worry, these are the specific things I am complaining about:
a) sustained piss-taking/mocking (which not only humiliate/hurt me, but distracted and derailed the thread, with others jumping on board)
b) failure/refusal to stop the piss-taking/mocking when asked nicely to, and despite my making it clear that I was finding it painful
LET ME MAKE IT VERY CLEAR - I have nothing against genuine concerns, disagreements, and even disbelief of my thread, or specifics in my posts if these things are stated outright (not passive-aggressively buried in in-jokes), and if the posters simply make their position clear and report to MNHQ.
There is a valid need for this kind of watchdog activity, and I am in no way trying to stop that.
But the mocking, especially the sustained mocking by some posters, and 'ha ha' twisting of my dilemma into a funny joke conversation... well that hurt. That really hurt. And I've been seriously hurt in the past (raped, beaten to broken bones), so am no hand-wringing wallflower. It was triggering.
I think that behaviour is wrong, and I think it is going to hurt a lot more people other than me. Perhaps it is already hurting people who have severe issues of their own, and feel they cannot post because they will be laughed at.
Anyway, I'm concerned about it, deeply concerned, and still a bit disturbed myself (although much emotionally cooler).
I'm also not sure how this fits into "Relationships", so apologies if it seems weird here, but I seem to be inviting more suspicion by posting in AIBU, so here it is, and I'm grateful to anyone willing to listen.