I think the entire world is stressed out lately between the economy, political situation, and terrorism on the rampage and this is contributing to people being thin-skinned and touchy. The news is just constantly bad these days, there's not much going on to generate optimism and hope. People lash out at the least little thing and have lost their ability to "make nice." Shoppers who think they have been wronged by an MSC or are frustrated with fees are looking for someone to blame. So threads are started attacking MSC's in hateful ways -- instead of trying to work things out with the MSC. When they aren't met with tea and sympathy, they start name calling. Shoppers who thought this was a way to make a lot of FUN! EASY! money are wondering where all the good shops are -- and get testy when told "we can't tell you" or "you have to earn your way to the plum jobs." They come here expecting to get answers handed to them and get annoyed when they're told to do their own homework.
There's a mismatch of expectations and reality in this business. And a lot of judgmentalism over anyone they think might be impeding their unrealistic dream of the glamour and fun of mystery shopping.
If I take a shop at $5 from someone who won't take it for less than $15, they call me stupid, instead of considering that people who are desperate will do whatever they have to to get by. This is a highly competitive business and with so many people turning here to make ends meet because the economy of the last several years has sucked and still sucks it just makes it worse because every new shopper puts downward pressure on the fees.
I've often wondered if we are doing ourselves any favors at all by trying to help newbies succeed.
But yeah, the forum is cranky lately and I lay that directly at the feet of one certain person from Texas with an axe to grind against one MSC who started several threads under multiple aliases to stir the pot. As each new thread was revealed or suspected of having been started by the same person under a different name, we had a sense of being tricked or deceived, and this added to the crankiness because they were trying to manipulate us into expressing sympathy for some cockamamie story they came up with to try to prove that a well-respected MSC should be boycotted.
I myself have become very cynical about the forum lately and am trying to stay away from here because I also have the stress that comes from trying to prepare tax returns for about 150 clients (I've done 45 already) and I don't need any more added right now. I've also had some personal issues adding to my stress -- the death of one dog, kennel cough and an ear infection in the new dog I got three weeks later, and surrendering two of my cats to a shelter because I was at the end of my rope dealing with conflicts between those two and the other four cats. I feel horrible about giving up one of the cats I surrendered because it wasn't really her fault and I'm worried about her finding a home because she's extremely shy and timid. (The other cat was very loving and outgoing and was adopted 48 hours after his ad came out) So this has been weighing on me for the last month.
Cranky? Sure. I'll admit it. I'm cranky as hell lately for all the above reasons. And fed up with people whose reaction to being told the truth is to call people names. Some people don't want advice, they only want to hear what they want to hear. They want their immature, PSF, oh poor me opinions validated and when someone points out how they contributed to their own misfortune and try to give advice for avoiding such situations in the future, they throw a snit fit.
Maybe we should all drink more wine and mellow out. I'm willing to give that a try.....
Time to build a bigger bridge.