Another who has been here many (10) years, though in my case I lurk much much more than post. The tone from posters (generally) and MNHQ has changed in that time, and not for the better, but I think it is because of something like this:
(NB: Big boss - Justine. HR - MNHQ. Staff - long term/regular posters. Customers - occasional posters/lurkers)
A small family firm is set up. HR are basically some of the staff with extra duties. Everyone knows everyone, from the big boss down to some of the regular customers. HR knows which staff/customers to believe when they point out something is wrong, and which staff/customers are likely to be causing problems.
Over time the firm grows. A merger happens. The big boss is less involved in the day to day structure and HR move towards becoming a separate department. Some of that 'one big family' feeling is lost. Some staff leave, some customers move on.
A second merger occurs. Now the big boss has no involvement in the day to day running of the firm, unless a big problem occurs. HR are totally devolved from the staff on the shop floor, with little knowledge of peoples personalities and behaviours. Customers are just numbers to justify the firms existence. Now when staff member A points out to HR that staff member B is being very economical with recording the holiday they take, staff member A is labelled a trouble maker. The same happens when staff member C notes that there is a person paying exclusively with 1p coins again - despite the fact that every time a person (the same person in a different outfit) comes in paying in 1p coins, half the stock in the shop goes missing. However when customer X complains that staff member D has been rude to them, staff member D gets the sack. Because HR have no knowledge of the staff and customers any more, they don't know that staff members A&C are usually totally correct at seeing suspicious patterns of behaviour and flagging them up correctly, that staff member B is known to push boundaries when there is a new line manager, and that customer X is in the process of an acrimonious divorce with staff member D and the accusation is totally malicious.
So some staff are sacked, other staff walk away - indeed they are told that if they don't like their jobs any more, they know where the door is - and are now easily replaced because the firm is well known in the area and can easily afford to advertise vacant positions. Because of the adverts, new customers constantly come and browse, some apply for and gets vacant staff positions.
And through all this, the big boss and the firm are holding onto the 'one big family' idea that the firm started with. But it isn't the same one big family any more. In fact it is several generations, with second and third cousins, step parents/siblings/children and many other family member types not found in the original family set-up.
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Personally, I have learnt an awful lot from MN over the years, from the feminism boards, relationships, the SN sections, even aibu and _chat. I have read threads with so much support given to the OP, for so many reasons. I have read threads that have made me laugh out loud, I have shed the occasional tear. I have silently cheered people on, I have shut threads in disgust at the attitude of the OP. Over the last 12-18 months I have been shutting threads more often than not because of the attitude of the posters on the thread towards the OP, rather than the OP's attitude itself (and that's ignoring the number of threads I quickly back out of because they scream troll at me). I wonder how threads would go if they were posted now, rather than when they were. A poster asking WSBU to ask her DH to pick up some milk and a loaf of bread on his way home from work. A poster posting in total disbelief having come home from work to a house which has been stripped of everything owned/bought by her DH. A poster who has children with disabilities and a partner diagnosed with a terminal illness. They may or may not get support, but it would be very different to what the actual posters I am thinking of were given at the time they were posting.
I don't see any way of getting it back though.