Annoyingness on Buy Nothing Groups

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01/27/2023 14:03

Subject: Annoyingness on Buy Nothing Groups

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Anonymous

I recently left my local BN group. New admins started in the past few months. One is really nice and the other posted a group poll to see if the members thought they should begin allowing people to post animals for free in the group. The majority was to allow it, but a few members including myself spoke up and said this is a bad idea. I foster animals looking for homes for 2 local rescue groups and we always charge an adoption fee because it weeds out people who aren't serious and committed to providing an animal with a good life. We also get a lot of animal surrenders from people who, as we talk to them and ask questions, obtained the animals for free to begin with. Animal adoption is not like giving away an old sofa. There is so much more that needs to be considered. The admin basically ignored all the well laid-out reasons why positing pets for free in a BN group isn't a good idea and said they were looking for a way to honor the majority vote plus the concerns of other people, like enforcing rules on how to go about it (but how are you really going to police that?). I said it just isn't appropriate for a BN group and it's ridiculous that it was still being debated and considered as a possibility and left. One lady also chimed in that the local humane society is a "joke" because they wouldn't adopt the dogs her family applied for because they were not appropriate for homes with young children. ::eye roll:: I'm pretty sure the humane society was just doing their job in trying to place the dog in an appropriate home and avoiding a situation where the dog or child would be at risk of being in a bad situation.

I gave away a lot of nice things in that group and also received some. Overall I liked the concept, but there are also so many rude/greedy people in it who have this expectant attitude. I have a neighbor who I gave fudge to recently (she happens to be in that group) that I bought in a holiday resort area (it's expensive fudge). She took it from my hands without so much as a thank you. The more I thought about it, I think this is a result of how she gets things for free in that group all the time (there's a woman in it who bakes things and regularly gives them away and my neighbor always raises her hand for them) so it's like nothing is special anymore. They just expect it. At first I felt good giving things away to people that I didn't know. It has never made me feel a sense of community though (a lot of people have picked things up from me more than once and the second time, they don't even remember me or coming to my house based on their messages). Then there's the people who request oddly specific and/or expensive items. Like one lady wanted a tufted head board for her 8 year old daughter but it needed to be either cream colored or grey... and she also wanted a fiddle fig leaf tree. I'm such an idiot because when I first joined that group, I gave away 3 neatly wrapped packages to people with little kids and even asked them what their kids were interested in and made up the packages to be age appropriate (coloring books, crayons, stickers, some toys etc, American girl doll journals) and set them on my porch. One was that lady. I get it if it's every day household essentials but to basically use it as your wish list is so gross. Then there's the no-shows and people who ask to reschedule and then I've got something hanging out on my porch for days. I'm over it and that group has shown me how awful and unappreciative people can be. There have been a handful of good exchanges, but mostly it's been negative.