I was just sitting at the mall taking a break from mall walking. A man walked over to me when I wasn’t even looking up. He said "I haven’t seen you here before. " I said I wasn’t really here to talk to people and got up and walked away. He said he would leave, he may even have said sorry. I said I was ready to leave anyway. In retrospect I think he may have just been slightly mentally challenged so I wish I had been a little softer, he did not turn out to be aggressive. Looking for suggestions on something still clear and firm but more polite? This scared me for some reason, I think how fast he walked up and sat down near me.
Editing to add a key detail, he sat down close to me which is probably what made me more nervous than I would have otherwise been. I appreciate all the thoughtful feedback I’ve gotten and interesting discussion.
Fair enough. But some of the attitude here seems to be “ewww creepy guy talked to you, you narrowly avoided rape” when in all likelyhood the dude was probably just awkward… We need more empathy in general, not just towards girls and women.
It’s not that she definitely avoided rape by doing so, it’s an explanation why women don’t have to give men the benefit of doubt. That man’s feelings aren’t more important than her safety.
There’s also the attitude here that she was being super rude and mean to this man even though he was rude for insisting on a conversation first.
Women do not have to be polite to men just because men want them to be.
He didn’t insist, per OP he backed off immediately when the attempt to initiate a conversation was rejected. And IMO attempting to start a conversation in public is not clearly rude.