DH has been sprayed with red dye!

[Mojit0]

This morning DH was running along the Thames towpath as he often does. He was running quite fast as he's training. There is an area where the path narrows a bit and he had caught up and was running behind a woman. He thought she moved to one side to let him pass, so he ran up behind her, at which point she screamed and suddenly sprayed him with a spray! Most of it got on his t-shirt but some of it also also got on his neck and lower face, though he didn't realise at the time. She screamed at him to get away from her and then ran back the other way. He was saying to her, "It's ok" etc, but he said she was so freaked out and looked so terrified he didn't try and follow her.
Now he has a zig-zag pattern of red up his neck and on the left side if his face and it really won't come off. He went into work and someone told him its probably a dye that the police use to mark criminals! I looked on google and it looks as if you can buy a red spray dye that won't wash off for 7 days! If it's this, it's a nightmare as he has to go to China on business tomorrow.
DH feels bad that she was so scared and her reaction actually scared him. He thinks maybe he should have held back, but he thought she was letting him overtake her. I think her reaction was a bit extreme though -AIBU? I run down that path frequently (although not at 6.30am) and I have never heard of anything like this.

Blistory

I'll bite
the woman who was raped couldn't have done anything differently, she was raped it wasn't her fault.

The woman it the OP shouldn't have sprayed an innocent man with dye that lasts for 7 days.

And how do you know that she does this? How are you so certain this wasn't the first and only time she's ever used it?

Even if it is the only time she has done this, she has done it on zero legitimate provocation and could only have done it is she had the spray primed and waiting to be used.
That's not normal behaviour nor is it justified behaviour

No, I posted a link to a BBC news article about a woman who was brutally attacked. Out jogging alone on a footpath at 9.00pm on Tuesday night. She very much exists. She very much matters.

The reason that women are scared is because some men are rapists and women have no way of knowing who those men are. We do them an injustice by refusing to expect men to take responsibility for the role they can play in ridding us of a rape culture.

Thankyou for the support. DH has never been in any kind of situation like this before, but of course he's aware of how he could be perceived as he's over 6 ft and a broad build and might look a bit more rough before he's shaved I suppose, if you don't know him. If he'd called out she might have panicked as well. I can totally sympathise with how the woman might have felt, but it knocks you off guard when someone reacts like that and he wanted to check she was ok but couldn't exactly go after her. There was nobody around which makes it worse. I wouldn't run at that time if I was that on edge and it doesn't make much sense.

The OP husband did not rape that woman.

he bears no responsibility for her rape.

He is the victim.

He was assaulted.

The now OPs DH and his male acquaintances know that trigger happy women with irremovable red paint are out there ready to spray them for just running past, are they able to act against women in case they're going to attack them with red paint

Try acetone nail polish remover

The spray isn't necessarily legal. It claims to be, but (if this link is up to date) that seems to be undermined as of yet.

www.askthe.police.uk/content/Q589.htm

Sherbrookefosterer's suggestion of a bodycam is excellent, OP.

Mitigating circumstances/past experience or not, legally the only victim in this case is the OP's DH. He's been assaulted. Simple as. Whether the spray itself is legal is neither here nor there. Saying the OP's husband is "offended" because he's got a "bit of paint on him" is minimising an assault.

I really hope the dye comes off, OP. I'm glad you phoned the Police.

We do them an injustice by refusing to expect men to take responsibility for the role they can play in ridding us of a rape culture.

And surely that role is not raping anyone rather than not going jogging.

You can't assault people on the off chance that they are about to assault you, purely based on their sex.

Some of these comments really seem to verge on 'he was asking for it'. The language is straight out of the rapists' lexicon. He wasn't 'too traumatised', he should have changed his behaviour to avoid giving the wrong impression.

Bizarre.

We do them an injustice by refusing to expect men to take responsibility for the role they can play in ridding us of a rape culture.

But what on earth has that got to do with this thread?
It's apples and pears
You don't get rid of a rape culture by assaulting anyone who gets near you.
It isn't even clear the runner knew it was a man behind her before she sprayed, FFS

Thank god it wasn't acid

Bodycam an excellent idea. I imagine it would actually make both parties feel safer if they were routinely worn? A lot of cyclists wear them these days.

FFS, the OPs husband appears to be very much alone in his awareness of how the situation presented itself to the woman in question. But even when a man wants to take responsibility for or to at least understand his role in how events took place, some posters just need to insist that the woman is entirely to blame.

And at no point have I suggested that the OP's husband was a rapist. I believe him. I doubt very much whether I'd want to take the time to think about that however if he or any other man ran up behind me when on a relatively quiet towpath.

But Blistory, you are doing the same by insisting that the woman bears zero responsibility for assualting the OP's husband. Only difference is, you're victim blaming the man.

Victims of assault will usually question what they should have done differently.

It doesn't make any of it their fault.

Blistory you seem to be ignoring my earlier post - are you really saying then that any man who dares to run close to a woman deserves to be attacked? Do you not realise how much that is showing double standards?

If a man sees a woman fall when out running should he just run past and leave her or stop and help?

Blistory, no-one said that woman didn't matter, so leave off with your emotional blackmail. The two situations are completely different. The fact that rape exists does not give anyone the right to assault innocent people.

Exactly meg

Take it back to basics. Only one person has broken the law in this case - the woman.

It is totally the woman's fault. She assaulted him.

It is not his fault.

But even when a man wants to take responsibility for or to at least understand his role in how events took place

Straight victim blaming ffs

Your poor DH. Why would she do that

To all the people defending this woman's behaviour as totally justified... (I think it's understandable but it's still not justified!)

I want to make slightly different example.

I've seen a loved one be violently attacked by a strange dog. Seeing one of your baby cousins be a bloody mess because of a strange dog is pretty traumatic.

Yes, I have the strong urge to keep any strange dog away from me and certainly DD. I hate how dog owners are sometimes certainly less sympathetic than the OP's DH of somebody being very afraid of their beloved animal.

Does that mean I can spray strange dogs that come up to me? Am I allowed to spray them if they're owners don't call them back?

What if I'm jogging and a dog (often unaccompanied) runs up to me? Am I allowed to defend myself against somebody's pooch if it hasn't attacked me? No. of course not.

And even if it was just paint, it still wouldn't be ok...

Just like it isn't "ok" hat the OP's husband has to go on a business trip with a red face...