Nannies Gone Wild

Starting a couple of weeks ago, I began receiving complaints from parents who had posted nanny search advertisements in the DCUM nanny search forums. The posters were upset about the responses they had received to their messages. In almost every case, the response in question amounted to little more than an attack on the prospective employer. In the following days, it became clear that these parents were the target of a semi-organized effort to combat what some posters saw as unfair treatment of nannies.

When the phenomenon of attacking nanny search posters first came to my attention, the posts were somewhat on the primitive side and didn't suggest much of a political agenda. Here is one example:

"I am not interested in this position,because mom home does not ned a nanny. Take care of your children ,why do you have children? if you do not have time to take care of them. That's too bad"

It was only in hindsight that this message made any sense at all. Apparently, the ideology of this movement includes parameters on who is entitled to hire nannies (and that is a relatively select group).

Common themes of the attacks included claims that the prospective employer was looking for "a slave" and complaints about the pay level. More examples:

"Hi,How're you doing? i think nobody will acept this deal,take care of your children for about 10 hours a day,( a 2.5 and a infant) and be willing to do light housework? are you looking for a SLAVE? how can somenone will be able to take a good care of your children and have a time to do housework?when the children sleeping? nanny is for take care a child,NOT for house cleaning?????????If you find someone.............. the person is desperate or an illegal!"

and:

"Are you looking for a slave? or an illegal nanny?Take care of your child and cleaning too,perhaps you will pay $20,00 an hour????i dont thing so"

and:

"I will work for you if you pay me 25.00 an hour,the economy is getting better,just forget about having a nanny,because nanny is for RICH people! NOT for People does not have money! Got it"

Subsequently, additional posts that were considerably more lucid and explanations by the posters themselves suggested that a small group of nannies had decided to stand up for nanny rights. Legitimately, they sought to inform nannies of their rights under the Fair Labor Standards Act. I have no dispute with their goals, which are laudable. However, I do object to their methods.

It is really hard to see how the posters of these messages thought they would achieve anything positive. The primary effect of their messages was to upset almost everyone. The parents were mad because they didn't appreciate the responses. I was upset because I had to suddenly start monitoring nanny ads -- something I have little interest in doing. Almost all of these threads had responses from nannies hopeful for a job opportunity and the attacks certainly didn't help their chances (the posts had the potential to turn parents off from the whole idea of a nanny, or at least one from DCUM).

This came to head over the weekend when I decided to act against one specific poster who had replied to over 30 nanny search posts. As a first step, I began deleting her posts. Coincidentally, at about that time, a nanny posted an appeal in the Nanny Discussion forum asking for nannies to stop the practice of attacking nanny search posters (or, as she put it, "Keep the Crazy Here"). Members of the nanny rights movement joined that thread to defend their actions with one posting:

"Jeff how stupid can you be thinking that you can shut up the nannies against abusive employers that pay less than a minimum wage, under tha table and asking the nannies to work 50 and 55 hours a week without paying OT. If you, Jeff, let the abusive mothers post abusive jobs we have the right to post that we don't like. I'm going to report this kind a thing to the Department of Labor, emigration and IRS than we see if the door hits my ass or lots of people's asses...... erase this post we coming back and cheque the jobs any way."

I support informing nannies of their legal rights and protecting them from abusive employment situations. However, I do not support and will not allow our forums to be used for the kinds of attacks that we've seen over the past few weeks.