Mumsnet #2

Kaylon8083 · Sep 7, 2021

I bet some of them can be demanding princesses too. There was a thread recently asking what things you do to annoy someone and there were some charming posters who did some truly nasty things to their husbands that the posters would be told were abusive if the shoe was on the other foot.

Also another thread was calling men Neanderthals - again if that was anything else the thread would have been taken down and deleted.

Gym&Tonic · Sep 7, 2021

Abuse and violence against men is alway dismissed on there. Just recently there was a posted who admitted she‘d chucked a glass of water over partner during a now, and every comment was pretty much saying how he’d driven her to do it. Had that been the other way around she‘d have been told to ‘LTB’, call Women’s Aid etc. The double standards are shocking.

doctordoctor · Sep 7, 2021

Yes, the double standards are dreadful. When a man has an affair, he’s every name under the sun! Women will often be told not to be too hard on themselves, they’ve made a mistake, it’s because theyve felt lonely in their marriage…not every poster says it, but I’ve seen it a lot

Yel · Sep 7, 2021

On one thread people were saying how misogynistic tattle was, a hotbed full of it allegedly. Their evidence? Posters saying that Stacy Soloman plays a ditzy character and is smarter than she lets on. Eh?

The money posts are ridiculous, people are quick to call a man financially abusive but if the situation is reversed they egg them on to do exactly the same thing they said was abusive with "all money is family money." I do hope no one actually takes these loons advice seriously.

Gym&Tonic · Sep 7, 2021

doctordoctor said:
Yes, the double standards are dreadful. When a man has an affair, he’s every name under the sun! Women will often be told not to be too hard on themselves, they’ve made a mistake, it’s because theyve felt lonely in their marriage…not every poster says it, but I’ve seen it a lot

Either that or what they call an ‘exit affair’ - a means of getting out of an unhappy marriage, funny how it’s not like that when the man does it though isn’t it? People who are happy in their marriages or relationships don’t have affairs!

FrannyGallops · Sep 7, 2021

Yel said:
The money posts are ridiculous, people are quick to call a man financially abusive but if the situation is reversed they egg them on to do exactly the same thing they said was abusive with "all money is family money." I do hope no one actually takes these loons advice seriously.

There was one recently with a woman who had claimed tax credits for four months after she’d stopped needing them, to the tune of £6k and it appeared that HMRC had taken the repayment money from her husbands wage (who didn’t know she owed the money). She was a mother of teenagers, didn’t work, and her husband gave her £600 a month from which she paid the dog groomer and Netflix. It also turned out she’d hidden a council tax debt from her husband as well.
The amount of posters rushing on to tell her that HE was financially abusive left me like . If it had been the other way round, he would have been called a cocklodger and they’d all be telling her to LTB.

heretoreaditall2019 · Sep 7, 2021

FrannyGallops said:
There was one recently with a woman who had claimed tax credits for four months after she’d stopped needing them, to the tune of £6k and it appeared that HMRC had taken the repayment money from her husbands wage (who didn’t know she owed the money). She was a mother of teenagers, didn’t work, and her husband gave her £600 a month from which she paid the dog groomer and Netflix. It also turned out she’d hidden a council tax debt from her husband as well.
The amount of posters rushing on to tell her that HE was financially abusive left me like . If it had been the other way round, he would have been called a cocklodger and they’d all be telling her to LTB.

That’s truly mortifying for the husband as the employer will have to be informed that he’s not repaying the money he owes so they’ve had to put this charge in! If my husband did that I would go absolutely ballistic and move job out of the shame of it all tbh.

Also another story that doesn’t really add up - surely if you’re eligible for tax credits (and especially £1.5k a month?!!) you’re low income so how would you be getting an “allowance”? And is it really an allowance if you’re having to pay household bills out of it lol, some prestige domestic accounting methods over on MN

ETA - btw hoping the tax credits statement isn’t offensive, genuinely don’t know what they are/are for tbh?

HockyRorror · Sep 7, 2021

My favourite MN thread that I caught in “real time” was the woman who said she was so disappointed in her holiday and how the hotel was dire, food awful, completely not what was expected etc… and then another user posted and said she was on the exact same holiday and hotel and then they managed to find each other and updated the thread with all the goings on and photo updates. I was shamelessly refreshing every 5 minutes

FrannyGallops · Sep 7, 2021

Apparently the husband was out of work at the time they started claiming but when he found another job, she didn’t inform the tax credits, she just carried on claiming. None of it added up tbh. Posters were saying he should be giving here more than £600 a month as he was a high earner, but why couldn’t she go and get a job?!

heretoreaditall2019 · Sep 7, 2021

FrannyGallops said:
Apparently the husband was out of work at the time they started claiming but when he found another job, she didn’t inform the tax credits, she just carried on claiming. None of it added up tbh. Posters were saying he should be giving here more than £600 a month as he was a high earner, but why couldn’t she go and get a job?!

This is where I think they use the term high earner / well off very, very generously over there

Are tax credits not only for working families anyway? They’re obsessed with each other’s finances and having numbers to give each other aren’t they, that’s why I think they keep on the antiquated idea of an allowance so they can compare purchasing power parity. Doesn’t rly count if he’s making you use it for domestic bills tho

FrannyGallops · Sep 7, 2021

heretoreaditall2019 said:
This is where I think they use the term high earner / well off very, very generously over there

It’s a very strange place. They’re either earning a 6 figure income, or claiming every benefit under the sun (nothing wrong with that btw). There are no average wage earners who are getting by ‘just ok’. It goes from one extreme to the other depending on the topic. For example, if someone starts a thread saying anyone over 80 should have to have to retake their driving test or have a medical exam, you’ll get lots of people who apparently know 101 year olds who are single handedly building drystone walls as a hobby then go to nightclubs til 6 in the morning, 4 days a week and still have 20/20 vision. But if anyone suggests state pension age should rise by a couple of years, the thread will be full of 45 year olds who are already starting with arthritis and need help getting to the toilet because they feel elderly.
(Note: I don’t hold strong views on those topics as they’re just examples but there’s no chance of any kind of calm, nuanced debate on there)

heretoreaditall2019 · Sep 7, 2021

FrannyGallops said:
It’s a very strange place. They’re either earning a 6 figure income, or claiming every benefit under the sun (nothing wrong with that btw). There are no average wage earners who are getting by ‘just ok’. It goes from one extreme to the other depending on the topic. For example, if someone starts a thread saying anyone over 80 should have to have to retake their driving test or have a medical exam, you’ll get lots of people who apparently know 101 year olds who are single handedly building drystone walls as a hobby then go to nightclubs til 6 in the morning, 4 days a week and still have 20/20 vision. But if anyone suggests state pension age should rise by a couple of years, the thread will be full of 45 year olds who are already starting with arthritis and need help getting to the toilet because they feel elderly.
(Note: I don’t hold strong views on those topics as they’re just examples but there’s no chance of any kind of calm, nuanced debate on there)

I think they’ve got a step parenting forum that I ended up down through a AIBU? Where conveniently every resident mum is labelled as a retroactive gold digger, clearly out for the 15% that equates to a couple of hundred quid a month from these perfectly average men these new partners seem to think are HNWIs? And the critiques of how resident mum spends her money as if she’s gonna have anything left out of it after covering a growing child’s food and clothing and wrap around care It’s wild, this has made me miss them actually I’m gonna go take a look and see what some poor 24/7 resident mum dared buy this month. New SHOES??? For WINTER???

FrannyGallops · Sep 7, 2021

heretoreaditall2019 said:
I think they’ve got a step parenting forum that I ended up down through a AIBU? Where conveniently every resident mum is labelled as a retroactive gold digger, clearly out for the 15% that equates to a couple of hundred quid a month from these perfectly average men these new partners seem to think are HNWIs? And the critiques of how resident mum spends her money as if she’s gonna have anything left out of it after covering a growing child’s food and clothing and wrap around care It’s wild, this has made me miss them actually I’m gonna go take a look and see what some poor 24/7 resident mum dared buy this month. New SHOES??? For WINTER???

It works the other way round as well. Step mums are the literal devil. If you love the kids like they’re yours, you’re overstepping the mark and if you’re nice to them but keep your distance, you’re not doing enough and should love them like they’re yours Again, it’s one extreme to the other

heretoreaditall2019 · Sep 7, 2021

FrannyGallops said:
It works the other way round as well. Step mums are the literal devil. If you love the kids like they’re yours, you’re overstepping the mark and if you’re nice to them but keep your distance, you’re not doing enough and should love them like they’re yours Again, it’s one extreme to the other

Omg I’ve just returned and fucking hell none of them like those step kids do they

I just wanted to see if she’d dared got her nails done and I’ve read nothing but pure childhood trauma! Bring back the HNWI husbands pls

TheDragonWithAFlagon · Sep 7, 2021

Satisfying Click said:
Yet they can’t recognise half of the troll threads

“Help, I’m down to my last £10, my twins are 6ft athletes and are wolfing down the contents of the fridge. I’m a size 8 and can manage with dust on a rice cake. My exH is a high earner but pays nothing, he had an affair and the OW has just parked her Mercedes in my drive blocking me in!”

There have been a couple of 'I have cancer, I have to go private because the NHS won't treat me because of Covid/my ex has left because I have cancer and I'm going to have to give up chemo halfway through my treatment because I need to go back to work to feed the children' ones recently. You just know there are people PMing for PayPal details.

AlanBanan · Sep 12, 2021

FrannyGallops said:
It works the other way round as well. Step mums are the literal devil. If you love the kids like they’re yours, you’re overstepping the mark and if you’re nice to them but keep your distance, you’re not doing enough and should love them like they’re yours Again, it’s one extreme to the other

I don’t have kids, but shouldn’t it be a lovely thing that a step parent loves your kids, spends time with them and treats them well? Because I know if I had kids and me and my partners relationship broke down and they got with someone else I’d be happy if their new partner was good to my kids and my kids loved them and they loved my kids. Because it should be the kids opinion not theirs. Your kids feelings trumps your bad relationship with your ex and their new partner

Theshamedame · Sep 12, 2021

Hi I'm new to tattle and used MN once, about 10 years ago probably, tbh I can't really remember but it was years ago and it was like being in the playground, so I never used it again. Just rife bullying.

To clarify Tax creds, we get them, 3 kids we've got, but can't claim for the youngest after he was born after the 2 child cut off was brought in.

So my hubs earns just over 1100 a month, full time work and I don't work now because of childcare with 2 autistic kids, not really possible, we have 3 kids in total.
We get an additional £800 a month to top up his wages, without that we'd starve.
Our mortgage is 500, council tax 100, and that's not our only outgoings etc.

Before I met my husband I worked as a care assistant in a nursing home for £6ish an hour, 48 hours a week and got quite a decent amount tax creds because I was paying insane amounts in childcare. I would get about £970 I think.
They're very needed for low earners like ourselves. It's all well and good we get "better" jobs but who is gonna look after peoples grandads and nanas?

heretoreaditall2019 · Sep 12, 2021

Theshamedame said:
It's all well and good we get "better" jobs but who is gonna look after peoples grandads and nanas?

Heya - I mentioned tax credits so just want to clarify it was by no means a judgment on “better” or “not better” jobs, it was a comment on that particular user saying her husband was a high earner which I’m sure you’d agree is contradicted by her reference to tax credits.

Firstly the value of a job is rarely captured in its salary, eg look at the key worker debate of the pandemic - all of those roles are underpaid if not low paid work yet absolutely essential for our survival/society as you’ve pointed out re elder care. Tax credits are a benefit to companies not families, businesses should be paying their staff a fair and living wage that doesn’t require government top ups to ensure people can afford to live a baseline standard of life. Absolutely no judgment here and sorry if you felt that comment was in any way shitty, honestly not my intention at all.

Theshamedame · Sep 12, 2021

heretoreaditall2019 said:
Heya - I mentioned tax credits so just want to clarify it was by no means a judgment on “better” or “not better” jobs, it was a comment on that particular user saying her husband was a high earner which I’m sure you’d agree is contradicted by her reference to tax credits.

Firstly the value of a job is rarely captured in its salary, eg look at the key worker debate of the pandemic - all of those roles are underpaid if not low paid work yet absolutely essential for our survival/society as you’ve pointed out re elder care. Tax credits are a benefit to companies not families, businesses should be paying their staff a fair and living wage that doesn’t require government top ups to ensure people can afford to live a baseline standard of life. Absolutely no judgment here and sorry if you felt that comment was in any way shitty, honestly not my intention at all.

Absolutely no offence taken, I completely understand why it confuses so many people!
It's shitty that wages are so low for some people, especially keywokers etc that a wage top up is necessary. I remember a teacher yelling in my face I wasn't smart enough to stack shelves and I thought at that moment, "that's because those people pay attention, I dont", I have wild ADHD, yet years later I looked after his aunty in a nursing home and he behaved like we'd been best friends

It's such a strange thing, how people view it, some people will say, "I don't work to buy your kid shoes", but what kind of society to we Live in where a family can't afford to clothe their children?

The whole situation needs revamping, affordable housing and better wages, the fact is, not everyone will have a decent paid job and people shouldn't be made to feel scared to ask about benefits, nor judged.
People would be so much happier if they understood what they were entitled too and I think people who have a bit of a penchant for poverty porn, if they understood the reality, there would be alot less division.

I hope I helped, I definitely didn't feel judged etc, just hoping to clear it up a bit, someone struggling may read this and wonder if they're entitled and apply etc so I'm an open book! X

Yel · Sep 12, 2021

Theshamedame said:
It's shitty that wages are so low for some people, especially keywokers etc that a wage top up is necessary.

I find this is the crux of quite a few problems. Tax payers end up subsidising private companies in order for them to maximise profits and pay workers less. A whole load of money is swallowed up with the bureaucracy. People get trapped being dependent and people without children lose out as they can't get the top ups.

It seems fundamentally broken for these top up benefits that are often long term. They do help many people, such as buy to let landlords by keeping rent highs. Of course so many MPs are into this that it suits them just fine.

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