to have bollocked three strangers

[GoringBit]

I probably was, but I am so angry. Background, we were in Paris with family/friends last week, came back to London this afternoon. We were a way from the terror attacks, but not far.

In a pub, a woman near us is on a skype call with a man. Her two friends join her and she tells the other guy to repeat the joke he just told her; it was about the terrorist attacks in Paris. No fucking way am I reoedting it, but it was horrible.

I've just said - fairly forcibly - that god forbid they should have someone close to them involved in something like that. They said it wasn't funny, and they hadn't laughed and that basically I was overreacting. I said that they shouldn't have tolerated it and that they should have pulled him up on it. I was shaking, but whether with anger or some other worry for loved ones still there, I don't know, maybe both.

I hadn't realised how much last night had shaken me up, so WIBU? I'm not normally a previous snowflake, but maybe I should have accepted that people make bad jokes about horrible things and just silently judged them.

Do I just need need to have a word with myself?

In which case tassle, op was not unreasonable to speak freely about how their chat made her feel.

Wow, what's happened to freedom of speech??! Yes it was in bad taste but they weren't actually saying it to you, so I think YABU to have taken them to task. It's a shame that you overheard it and it upset you, but surely they still have a right to say what they want amongst themselves.

Did government officials arrest them? No? Then they had free speech.

Are you saying OP should not have free speech to say what she wants?

Freedom of speech means you have the freedom to speak or write what you wish without fear of being arrested. It does not mean you are free of the consequences of that speech.

You can't just walk into a room and shout NIGGER and expect everyone to be ok with that.

You don't tell offensive jokes in mixed company either. OP had every right to call them on it, just like they had every right to say it.

Sorry - weird bolding.

This is harsh, but
OP Ask yourself:
Are you the joke police?
Where do you draw a line on acceptability?
Are you prepared to be similarly berated in a public place for something that you deem to be acceptable, but someone else does not?

There were people joking on the train today, nobody said anything though.Most just pretended not to hear them.
I'm sure somebody would have spoken up if they had family and friends there, or if they were affected.
I hope you are ok now OP, some thoughtless people about.

It was a sick joke but you don't have a right not to be offended and if something bothers you, you are free to sit somewhere else

They would be within their rights to turn round and tell you to F off if you started insisting they "pull him up on it" (hate that phrase). Then what would you do? Waste of time getting involved imo

Eleanor I take your point, and I'm not trying to be the joke police, but they were loud enough for me to clearly hear at a neighbouring table and in a public place. I get that they were exercising their free speech; so was I.

If I say something that's offensive, I'll have no complaints if I'm pulled up on it. I remember many years ago using, in all innocence, the expression 'half-caste' at work as a descriptor. A colleague explained that it was not an acceptable expression, and I've never used it from that day to this. She made me think about what I was saying, and maybe I did the same for those people today. But if not, so be it.

And yes, I accept that they might have told me to fuck off, and if they had, well, their prerogative, I suppose.

It's been interesting to read all the comments.

Got splinters on this one tbh. I understand the anger and the frustration, but I also understand the power of humour in these situations, even (especially?) pitch black humour...

Je suis Charlie

Itgibk you were totally unreasonable. Yes, it might have been distasteful but that doesn't give you the right to do what you did. They weren't spreading the joke, you overheard a private conversation and then proceeded to berate someone for it. You also told them the appropriate way to act in future. Totally unreasonable. Seriously.

We all have a right to freedom of speech and just as they had a right to make the joke, OP had a right to say how she felt hearing it.

I'm from a military background and have lots of friends and family in the emergency services,black humour is very much part of who I am as I heard so much of it growing up. However you don't say those kinds of things in public where people can overhear and you don't say them unless you are completely sure the people you are with have the same sense of humour.

If the people in question instead of making sick jokes had been making racist comments, disabled jokes or swearing would the OP have been right to say something then? It's not about what they said it is the fact they said it in public, loud enough to be over heard.

I can understand why it felt raw. But it wasn't your conversation.

As a matter of law, obviously OP had a right to say whatever she wants. But it's also a matter of social practice and manners. I would never butt in in on the conversation of total strangers, let alone tell them off for it. If I didn't like it, I would simply move away.

Oh dratsea don't be absurd.

What everyone else said about free speech. It goes both ways.

Gruntled I mostly agree about not butting in, but when people are so loud that it is clear everyone around them can hear them whether they want to or not I think it is a bit different.

Obviously only OP knows how it was, but it doesn't sound like she was leaning over their table trying to eavesdrop.

Their loudness wasn't anything to do with her. If they were sharing a loud joke which the OP found funny, it would still be socially odd to fall about laughing with the group of strangers that told the joke to each other. And if it was a conversation she could hear about the price of food in marks and spencer and the OP had an opinion to share, it would also be socially odd to interrupt and share with them her thoughts and experiences.

She chose to "bollock" a group of strangers about a joke she found offensive. She can do that if she wants: I think it's pretty odd behaviour but I can understand why she lost control of herself with the rawness of the emotion she had been feeling.

this kind of scenario is the whole reason for that phrase "too soon". It's too soon after the incident to expect everyone in a public place, where they can overhear you, to not react emotionally to a joke about it. I generally don't like those kind of jokes being told in public as you never know who it might affect.

To be honest I don't think you had the right to 'bollock' them, you're not the conversation police. But if someone says something that you find offensive or distressing I think it's ok to tell them so, but obviously you don't have any authority to insist they don't say it!

I think free speech goes both ways.

If you use your right to free speech to talk loud enough for other people to hear you then they have the right to use theirs to point out you are being offensive.

People can make horrid jokes if they want, but if they want to do that in public then they carry the risk that they'll offend someone.

Agree with lalyra and Senpai. If you exercise your right of "free speech" in a way that would be offensive to a reasonable bystander you need to accept that their right of free speech is likely to come right back at you and rightly so.

I hope you're feeling better OP.
I was in Belfast in uni when there were bombs and bomb scares all the time. It is frightening, and I hope you're ok this evening. Don't underestimate how exhausting this kind of stress is.

Some people deal with stress by using humour, and that's ok too. I've been at funerals when the humour is extremely black, and everyone's laughing even though they're upset.

I wouldn't butt into others convos if I felt differently to them. I don't think there is a right and a wrong reaction to violence. Giving them a piece of your mind is a reaction to stress IMO. and not helpful to the situation.

Kneeing someone in the face in asda or stoning them in a dusty marketplace isn't the answer to a difference of opinion, is it really?

We need to be kind to ourselves and each other.
Mutual respect and understanding is a better solution.

Be kind to yourself op and seek out help if you're still raw in a week. You sound very shocked.

Only on MN do I hear about people going round 'bollocking' or 'berating' or 'having an encounter' or 'words' with people who are going about their business in public. No, I do not think the world would be a better place if every time someone tells a slightly off joke, someone else starts berating them. On the train you hear all types of conversations, I have heard people talking about having affairs, or politics, for example. Should I interrupt them and give them a piece of my mind?

There is no tolerance at all, here in this behaviour. I really don't want to live somewhere people are constantly pulling up and giving their opinions to other who dare to speak in public in a way they don't agree with. People can be righteous without being right.

People have their own way of dealing with things. What other people say in public baring the usual disclaimers is absolutely none of your business and they would have been well within their rights to tell you to do one.