When I was around 11 I was at the McDonald’s down the street from my house with a couple of friends. It was just three 11/12 year old girls chilling eating in the back of the restaurant. It was dark out but not late, probably 7 or 8 at night. After a bit my friend leaned over to me and said the guy at the table next to us “looks like (her abusive stepfather)”. Realistically it could not have been her abusive stepfather and she was across the other side of the country.
However, he was creepy and sitting alone and watching us VERY closely. We started getting nervous and at some point I said loudly enough for him to hear “okay, my dad is coming to get us”. He wasn’t, but I was hoping that would make the man leave us alone. He immediately got up and went to go stand just outside of the back door into the parking lot.
We panicked even more and walked to the front entrance of the McDonald’s, called my dad from a payphone. I remember how panicked we must have looked because a random person who was in line came over and asked if we were okay. Thankfully my dad was home and came to get us from the front entrance and we left together.
Another time I was on the last train home from work, I was around 18. A man had gotten on the train near my stop, first sat on a further seat and then moved closer as the trip went on. From my stop, I had to walk about 50 meters to a not-very-well lit taxi pickup area. This man got off at my stop, and as I approached the well-lit exit of the train station I could feel him following me. I almost went outside and then thought better of it. Turned back and thankfully found a transit worker on the platform. I asked him if he could walk me to the taxis and he did. As my taxi was driving away I saw the man who had been following me walk back further into the train station. As I mentioned, it was the last train of the night so he had no reason to have gotten off at the stop if it wasn’t his stop. There were no businesses or anything else around. Anyway my favourite part of this story (not favourite) is that when the transit worker was walking me over to the taxis he said something along the lines of “oh you’re just too cute thats why that man is following you”. No thank you.
Nevertheless, I want to tell a quick story of where someones gut feeling was wrong.
More than 20 years so I used to go to an evening school (don’t know the English name for, maybe college or something like that). One day I was done, it was very late and dark outside (around 10 in the evening) and I was tried and not in the best mood and I just wanted home. To get there, I had to catch the last train of the evening and the train station was a few minutes walking away.
Since I’m a pretty tall guy with long legs, I can walk pretty fast. I was walking down the narrow sidewalk towards the train station when another pedestrian appeared on front of me. This pedestrian, a young lady, was slower than me and since I was in a hurry I tried to overtake her (get in front in of her so she wouldn’t slow me down and could walk at her own pace). However, when I started my maneuver she got a little faster, but I still wanted to finish my maneuver and walked a little faster myself and she got a bit faster again… after a short while of this, it ended with her running away to a street on the other side of the road while screaming in fear.
This way quite confusing for me since I had no bad intentions at all. However, from her perspective it was probably super scary with a tall grumpy looking guy “following” her and then getting into snatching range. So I think she did the right thing and from that point I tried to avoid accidentally scaring other people.
Yeah I’ve had a similar experience, when I was in my early 20s, and have since chosen to accept missing the train or whatever is the reason I’d need to hurry, so as not to scare someone that bad. Jesus it’s awkward and it’s entirely understandable, but man does it get me questioning whether I look scary or weird or do I seem suspicious and has been a constant source of anxiety ever since. But I’ve realized it’s my job in that situation to clearly signal I’m not a threat, and I’ve chosen to do it just by slowing down myself so the distance grows and I become no threat to them (feels so bad to think of one’s self this way by the way, fuck me, but what can you do?) or alternatively if there’s a detour I could take to still catch the train as in your example, I’d rather go to another block and jog if nobody’s there and not miss the train. Either way, if I’m perceived a threat, there’s nothing in the moment that can be done about that other than no longer be perceived one, i.e stall or reroute away.
This only ever happens in dark, at night, and them likely drunk or tired, so it’s entirely understandable. I’d be fucking anxious too if someone bigger than me started speeding up on me. I have the privilege not to be scared this way due to my physique, so I also have to respect it the other way around too.
It’s so easy to go with the gut reaction of “this is disrespectful” without considering the scenario from a third person you know? I think this is where most end up in and start thinking “you can’t do or say anything anymore” and become either incels or too fucking loud magas or equivalents, because it is kind of hard on self confidence to be in that situation. But it’s always going to be worse for the other, they might fear for their life, and rightly so, so there’s no comparison there once you actually start thinking and exercising your empathy. So if you manage to get past the initial feeling of disrespect, frustration and self-doubt, then this is a real non-issue. And something very small to avoid and handle properly in the moment.
But if you don’t get past it, or lack the empathy to see it from others’ pov, well, you end up a shithead basically, coping unhealthily with that and it might even grow as large to be the whole identity ultimately.
Just rambling here I suppose, sorry to hog all the space, felt like I needed to let that out. I’ve had some friends go with the disrespect and self image and confidence shattering effect that I’ve helped get past it and see it objectively, and I just can’t help but think of everyone who doesnt have the help nor the inner capability, and stray from the sensible and humane path due to something so small as this.
I usually do my best to just take an extra wide berth to get by. It’s usually only going to happen late at night or so when it’s super quiet, so in that case I will just cross the street myself.
Kinda just signalling, don’t worry I want nothing to do with you. It helps lull them into a sense of security.
I feel like if I were ever in that situation I’d just straight-up yell something to the effect of “hey lady, I’m not trying to chase you; I’m just in a hurry” and try to get her to cross the street or something so I could get by. I have no idea if it would actually help or not, but if it’s awkward anyway I’m the kind of jerk to be willing to make it more so.
When we’re talking personal safety, you want to play it safe, surprisingly. I mean, maybe you’d rather be the one who says to themselves “ah, it’s probably nothing” and then gets murderaped, but most of us wouldn’t.
When I was around 11 I was at the McDonald’s down the street from my house with a couple of friends. It was just three 11/12 year old girls chilling eating in the back of the restaurant. It was dark out but not late, probably 7 or 8 at night. After a bit my friend leaned over to me and said the guy at the table next to us “looks like (her abusive stepfather)”. Realistically it could not have been her abusive stepfather and she was across the other side of the country.
However, he was creepy and sitting alone and watching us VERY closely. We started getting nervous and at some point I said loudly enough for him to hear “okay, my dad is coming to get us”. He wasn’t, but I was hoping that would make the man leave us alone. He immediately got up and went to go stand just outside of the back door into the parking lot.
We panicked even more and walked to the front entrance of the McDonald’s, called my dad from a payphone. I remember how panicked we must have looked because a random person who was in line came over and asked if we were okay. Thankfully my dad was home and came to get us from the front entrance and we left together.
Another time I was on the last train home from work, I was around 18. A man had gotten on the train near my stop, first sat on a further seat and then moved closer as the trip went on. From my stop, I had to walk about 50 meters to a not-very-well lit taxi pickup area. This man got off at my stop, and as I approached the well-lit exit of the train station I could feel him following me. I almost went outside and then thought better of it. Turned back and thankfully found a transit worker on the platform. I asked him if he could walk me to the taxis and he did. As my taxi was driving away I saw the man who had been following me walk back further into the train station. As I mentioned, it was the last train of the night so he had no reason to have gotten off at the stop if it wasn’t his stop. There were no businesses or anything else around. Anyway my favourite part of this story (not favourite) is that when the transit worker was walking me over to the taxis he said something along the lines of “oh you’re just too cute thats why that man is following you”. No thank you.
Always trust your gut, kids.
I absolutely agree. Better safe than sorry.
Nevertheless, I want to tell a quick story of where someones gut feeling was wrong.
More than 20 years so I used to go to an evening school (don’t know the English name for, maybe college or something like that). One day I was done, it was very late and dark outside (around 10 in the evening) and I was tried and not in the best mood and I just wanted home. To get there, I had to catch the last train of the evening and the train station was a few minutes walking away.
Since I’m a pretty tall guy with long legs, I can walk pretty fast. I was walking down the narrow sidewalk towards the train station when another pedestrian appeared on front of me. This pedestrian, a young lady, was slower than me and since I was in a hurry I tried to overtake her (get in front in of her so she wouldn’t slow me down and could walk at her own pace). However, when I started my maneuver she got a little faster, but I still wanted to finish my maneuver and walked a little faster myself and she got a bit faster again… after a short while of this, it ended with her running away to a street on the other side of the road while screaming in fear.
This way quite confusing for me since I had no bad intentions at all. However, from her perspective it was probably super scary with a tall grumpy looking guy “following” her and then getting into snatching range. So I think she did the right thing and from that point I tried to avoid accidentally scaring other people.
Yeah I’ve had a similar experience, when I was in my early 20s, and have since chosen to accept missing the train or whatever is the reason I’d need to hurry, so as not to scare someone that bad. Jesus it’s awkward and it’s entirely understandable, but man does it get me questioning whether I look scary or weird or do I seem suspicious and has been a constant source of anxiety ever since. But I’ve realized it’s my job in that situation to clearly signal I’m not a threat, and I’ve chosen to do it just by slowing down myself so the distance grows and I become no threat to them (feels so bad to think of one’s self this way by the way, fuck me, but what can you do?) or alternatively if there’s a detour I could take to still catch the train as in your example, I’d rather go to another block and jog if nobody’s there and not miss the train. Either way, if I’m perceived a threat, there’s nothing in the moment that can be done about that other than no longer be perceived one, i.e stall or reroute away.
This only ever happens in dark, at night, and them likely drunk or tired, so it’s entirely understandable. I’d be fucking anxious too if someone bigger than me started speeding up on me. I have the privilege not to be scared this way due to my physique, so I also have to respect it the other way around too.
It’s so easy to go with the gut reaction of “this is disrespectful” without considering the scenario from a third person you know? I think this is where most end up in and start thinking “you can’t do or say anything anymore” and become either incels or too fucking loud magas or equivalents, because it is kind of hard on self confidence to be in that situation. But it’s always going to be worse for the other, they might fear for their life, and rightly so, so there’s no comparison there once you actually start thinking and exercising your empathy. So if you manage to get past the initial feeling of disrespect, frustration and self-doubt, then this is a real non-issue. And something very small to avoid and handle properly in the moment.
But if you don’t get past it, or lack the empathy to see it from others’ pov, well, you end up a shithead basically, coping unhealthily with that and it might even grow as large to be the whole identity ultimately.
Just rambling here I suppose, sorry to hog all the space, felt like I needed to let that out. I’ve had some friends go with the disrespect and self image and confidence shattering effect that I’ve helped get past it and see it objectively, and I just can’t help but think of everyone who doesnt have the help nor the inner capability, and stray from the sensible and humane path due to something so small as this.
I usually do my best to just take an extra wide berth to get by. It’s usually only going to happen late at night or so when it’s super quiet, so in that case I will just cross the street myself.
Kinda just signalling, don’t worry I want nothing to do with you. It helps lull them into a sense of security.
I feel like if I were ever in that situation I’d just straight-up yell something to the effect of “hey lady, I’m not trying to chase you; I’m just in a hurry” and try to get her to cross the street or something so I could get by. I have no idea if it would actually help or not, but if it’s awkward anyway I’m the kind of jerk to be willing to make it more so.
In none of your stories anything really happened, though. Of course, it might have, but it might also just been coincidence or whatever.
When we’re talking personal safety, you want to play it safe, surprisingly. I mean, maybe you’d rather be the one who says to themselves “ah, it’s probably nothing” and then gets murderaped, but most of us wouldn’t.
The people to whom something did happen aren’t here to tell their stories.