It has come to our attention that some forum members are swapping their email addresses through third party suppliers.
We would strongly advice all members not to do this as it could compromise your safety. Do remember that people posting on this, as on any other forum may not be all they seem and you may be exposing yourself to unwanted contact.
Breast Cancer Care can take no responsibility for your safety should you contact other forum members in this way.
Jane
Moderator
Breast Cancer Care
Hi Jane
I understand why this has been posted and that Breast Cancer Care don’t want to be held responsible if something were to happen to a forum member when they met up with someone they’d been talking to on this site.
However I think Breast Cancer Care need to accept that people will want to meet with others going through the same thing and if you prevent members exchanging contact details on this forum they will find another way to do so.
Surely it would be more helpful to allow email exchange and provide sensible advice about what to do if you plan to meet with someone? For example don’t give out your home address, always meet in a public place, make sure a family member or friend knows where you’re going… etc etc.
As far as unwanted contact goes, many web email accounts allow you to block certain senders or set up rules to automatically delete unwanted mail anyway.
I don’t mean to be argumentative. I think this is a great website but that it would be much improved if email addresses could be exchanged. Or… if the private message facility was changed so it was unmoderated and you could send messages to more than one person at a time.
Apologies if I should have posted this under forum feedback.
Jo
Hi Jane,
Have to respond in support of Jo. I love this site, find it really informative and supportive, but use the ‘other’ site much more because it allows me to interact with others on a much more personal basis.
I do understand your concerns, but, just as an example there is a thread at the moment where a group of women, living close to each other would love to meet for a coffee and a chat, but cannot because they can’t exchange the information necessary. Yes, we can communicate with each other on the forum, but for some of us, this is the only contact we have with women going through the same tribulations.
Now, through the other site, I have met up with several women in the local area, travelled for a wonderful get together between a few of us who have formed close bonds, and had the opportunity to privately mail, both giving and receiving invaluable personal support. I cannot stress enough how much this has meant to me.
Obviously, we must keep ourselves safe. But we are grown women and can surely make the decision ourselves whether to communicate directly.
Along with Jo, I don’t want to be argumentative either - just wanted to show the other side of the picture 
I had a lovely day at the seaside yesterday with 2 ladies I’ve met several times.
We first got to know each other here via the (old) contact buttons.
A very large group of us meet at least twice a year, we travel from all over the UK and spend a weekend together. Meeting up with my friends has helped me beyond measure.
I wouldn’t expect BCC to take any responsibility for my safety that’s something I can do for myself.
Belinda.
Dear Jane,
I am curious to know why you have highlighted this issue now? Everyone knows bcpals was set up in part because of the lack of means of contact on this site. There have been countless threads regarding this issue and it looks as though you have just begun another debate. How do you suggest we get in touch with each other? I was at the seaside yesterday with Belinda, and I have to say that, meeting others in the same position as oneself is some of the best medicine you can get. It is so terribly important to be in touch with one another and you still don’t seem to realize this.
Jenny.
Reading through the forums it is possible to read who is meeting who and where and when. Surely this leaves members wide open to any crank browsing the www to turn up uninvited! Shouldn’t bcc be more concerned about the safety of those members . It has to be safer to allow them email contact rather than post such meetings publicly.
Jenny, you are right when you say that bcpals was set up to enable women to contact others. It has been running for almost 2 years, and during that time we have only had complaints about 2 people making inappropriate contact. Far more women have had the opportunity to make contact with others, and there are many “meets” arranged. BCPals is a private forum, and can only be read by members. If we find we have members not prepared to be supportive and join in the posts on a regular basis we make them inactive (i.e. we don’t want voyeurs!) We believe this makes for a safer environment for people to post in where members communicate and get to know who they are talking to. Although we are proud of our pm system we do not encourage people to join purely to use that facility. Whilst we do not pretend to offer the wonderful wide range of information on bc that bcc do, we think we have something special.
Hi Girls,
I agree totally with all of you ladies here.
I am one of the ladies who would like to meet the ladies in my area for coffee but cant arrange anything as apprently your not allowed to share information.
Surely, as one Jossie says, we are grown women going through a traumatic time, surely we can look after ourselves.
Lynne.
You cannot control everyone and their activities. So long as people are aware of the dangers, it is their decision whether to do this or not. Far better to provide a secure method by which people can contact one another - as is done on breastcancer.org
Those who are undergoing stressful treatments can really benefit from personal contacts.
BCC - time to grow up.
Lynne007…Hi Lynne, the site Phoebe has mentioned www.breastcancer.org is a site where you can send private messages to each other and you can swap addresses…their forums are worth a visit too.
Hope you all manage to meet up soon.
Belinda.
x
Adding my own voice to this thread.
As much as the public forums are lovely, there are times where private discussion is invaluable - and here private messaging is uncomfortable, because there isn’t a personal mailbox, in the essence, all personal contacts are strongly discouraged. I feel that is truly a pity, because many of us could find even better support and help.
While the dangers of identity theft and unwanted contacts is very real on internet, I believe that free-mails are in use very widely to prevent at least some of such abuses. Personally, I have several emails - some used exclusively for sharing on different boards where I participate regularly. I had never had to suffer any intrusions on my “real name” personal or professional emails. Perhaps not everybody is aware of those risks, but I for one feel it would be relevant to inform rather than forbid?
It should be remembered that we are grown-ups, fully functional adults, able to take important decisions in critical areas of our lives. Surely, we don’t need parental controls?
In fact, in the area of privacy, it is much worse that the nicknames can be googled and traced to this board… I feel that at the moment of choosing a nickname, users should be informed… so that they can choose something that can protect their privacy.
Hi All
I completely agree that we should somehow be able to swap email addresses, as we are all grown ups and can monitor our own emails to see whether we believe people to be true. There are plenty of people on here that would like to email and swap stories and pictures with, but can’t, although have managed a couple. And also to be able to maybe meet up as well.
As someone said, surely posting meeting details on this open forum is more of a danger than people being able to swap email addresses and making plans private without joe bloggs being able to see what is going on.
I also think that people will start to move away from this site in favour of others where we can be treated like adults. Which would be a shame, as I have made many friends on here and actually like all the postings I find.
Can something not be done to help us with this?
Dawn