To be shocked at this level of aggression?

[Glitterzzz]

Hi guys. I dropped my son to nursery this morning as usual and pulled out of a junction onto the road. It was raining and hard visibility but I did check each way.

I pull out to hear a few seconds later a beep sound from the driver behind. I immediately realise my mistake and think fair enough I deserve that maybe I didn’t check enough? He was not anywhere near crashing into me given the few seconds and then the beep and then I looked in my rear view mirror.

We proceed to drive along the road where I pull in on the left as was going to the post office. He gives me the finger and revs his van behind me. I come to a stop and he drives up the side car to car and opens his passenger window. I also open my window half way.

He screams at me I nearly caused an accident. I said look I made a mistake but why are you being so aggressive ? He immediately starts screaming names at me your a fucking prick , your a stupid bitch, and so on. I lost my cool and said well your a fucking dickhead then. At this point he goes to put his van in park and grapples at his seatbelt as if he was going to come out of his veichle.

I mentally noted that my doors were locked, and I don’t know if he saw I had a camera in my car but he didn’t exit the veichle. He then continues to scream abuse and ends it with telling me ‘ your a FUCKING WHORE ‘ that’s what you are a fucking whore then drives off... I checked the van for a company name but none. Didn’t get his plate number but was really shaken over this.

On reflection I shouldn’t have even put my window down. But I said straight away I made a mistake .. where do we draw the line of thinking it’s okay to be this aggressive and verbally insulting someone ? Plenty of times I’ve not been happy with another driver but don’t even beep unless it’s serious ..

I have a dash cam could probs get his reg off that. But is this even a crime ? I hate to think how he speaks to females in his own life. It was when I shot back a verbal insult ( after many from him) that I could see his shock and that’s and he was gesturing that he was going to get out the car... still a bit shaken now !

I don't even understand what you mean by "pulling out" and being in the wrong. If he was behind you, you didn't cut in front of him?

OP is on side road turning onto main road. Van driver is on main road. OP pulls out into main road in front of van driver, perhaps causing him to have to brake or slow down or I dunno, just pay attention a bit on a wet road. It's mildly annoying but at least he was in a van. When this happens when you're on a bike or a motorbike then it's dangerous. It isn't a reason to start spitting with rage and calling someone a whore.

Given there was a space of a few seconds between you pulling out and him beeping, I'd wager he was speeding.

It's funny, but all the road ragers I know are horrific speeders as well. Correlation?

I'm afraid you encountered an arsehole. I guess the best thing to do would have been to have ignored his wild gesticulating and not engaged at all.

No excuse for his behaviour. Hope you have calmed down now.

In my experience if I’m busy taking evasive action to avoid hitting someone pulling out in front of me , I tend to not beep at them - I’m normally too busy ! Some people are just aggressive , he was probably just taking this opportunity to unload stresses from other areas of his life on you ... Put it out of your mind and move on - take more time to look next time

Oh that’s horrible!

I understand that you’re shaken. I once parked in front of my house (country lane, designed parking space) to get baby out of the car. Doing to I blocked the road (narrow road) for SECONDS. A van (surprise surprise) pulled up and kept beeping. I turned and said ‘one second!’ And he called me a C-word.

Like you, I got involved due to the sheer injustice of it. I said I was parked in my bay and getting child out of the car. His response : ‘I didn’t fucking get you pregnant ffs’.

I mean ... WHAT?!

The message of both stories: some people are assholes and their behaviour makes no sense.

You could report but it would likely go nowhere and just waste your mind and mental space. Just let it go and face the fact that today you met one of the finest assholes on the planet and one day karma will meet him and treat him as poorly as he treated you.

Sorry this happened to you, OP. I can imagine you are shaken up! I've been on the receiving end of some road rage once or twice, and while I've never felt physically threatened, it's very scary.

I once came upon two cars blocking the road on the other side to me. I had to wait for a minute or two as the cars behind were overtaking them on my side, so I couldn't get through. I could see the the driver of the car in front was roaring at the driver of the one behind - she had wound her window down and was arguing back, but then he started pulling at her door handle, so she wound the window up. There were two young kids in the back, looking terrified. I pulled in a bit and shouted that I was going to call the police, and he shouted at me "mind your own fucking business, you fucking nosy cunt"! But he got back in the car and drove away anyway. I didn't have a dash-cam at the time or I would have reported him.

I do think people go a bit mental in cars, and if they are in any way prone to aggression, they can lose it. But also, commutes can just make people crazy. I know myself I can be guilty of being petty and grumpy over perceived slights in traffic - like someone skipping the queue to turn right by zooming up the left turn lane and then cutting in, or using the bus lane or whatever. So I've definitely given more than the odd extended beep! I listen to classical music or audio-books now in the car as a relaxation aid, because I didn't like that simmering resentment in myself - it was very unpleasant. But there's just no excuse for that level of aggression.

Some drivers are bonkers these days. This would shake me up, it generally does when I encounter aggressive drivers.

I live in a part of London that is de facto one way traffic as the streets are so narrow, so you wait as you enter a block for the traffic to empty and then enter the other side waits until you and the few cars behind you exit. Theoretically.

Occasionally as you enter a block having patiently waited for it to empty, someone will enter and wind their window down and explain what an absolute cunt you are for blocking the street that they're trying to drive through. It's just not worth engaging.

Also, tailgating! WTF! Just yesterday I was in the fast lane, flowing with the traffic, passing the slower traffic in the lane to the left, with nothing to gain by increasing my speed except tailgating the guy in front of me. What does the guy behind me do? Flash his brights, overtake me aggressively, and then tailgate the guy in front of me. WTF?

I was the victim of road rage once - my "crime" was sticking to the 20mph speed limit in a built-up area. I got tailgated and then blocked in so that he could get out and scream threats at me. It was an incredibly stressful experience.
Unfortunately for him, the car behind him was being driven by an off-duty police officer ...

You can actually report him to the police ... it’s road rage and illegal.

That's so scary op. Hope your you're ok

This happened to me twice, the first time, years ago I was coming out of an industrial estate after being to something like b&q. As I was on the drive out, a van over took me, pulled to a screeching emergency stop in front of me. I obviously Emergsncy stopped too.

The man got out his van and approached my car, I started to put the window down and he went absolutely nuts, shouting how fucking dare I cut him up and if I ever did it again he was going to cut me up. I genuinely hadn’t even realised I had cut him up,

I then had to sit there and take his abuse and threats, as I couldn’t get past his van and he was standing beside the car shouting in the crack of the window that was open.

I was so so shocked, eventually he lost steam and stomped back to his van and drove off.

More recently, I Pranged another driver, coming round a round about leading to a dual carriage way, we both pulled over at the side of the dual carriage way , as did a witness, I was the only female, with the two other vehicle Male drivers. In the pissing rain.

The traffic was filtering past us, there were two lanes as dual carriage way and we three were standing behind our vehicles exchanging details.

One man, instead of driving past, actually stopped his car, blocking the one open lane, and shouted “ move your cars you bunch of fucking cunts” and then proceeded to sit there and call us all fucking scumbag cunts repeatedly , we were genuinely open mouthed with shock, and there was no where for us to move to. We hadn’t even been blocking the traffic, he was.

After taking the abuse in shock for a couple of mins, one of the men stepped forward as if to deal with him, and the man then just drove off.

He literally stopped his car, blocked the traffic, and sat and shouted at us that we were dirty fucking scum bag cunts multiple times. Genuinely never seen anything like it in my life. We stood there for two or three mins, side by side with our mouths open, staring at him, we were so shocked.

It really is best to not engage with these people.

It is scary and deeply disturbing though.

Something similar happened to me a couple of weeks ago. I pulled out of a car park in my village. A van came up and didn’t like that I was going less than 30 - I was just about to go over a big speed bump in a 30 zone just after school drop off so I wasn’t wanting to speed but rather drive carefully as the car park is a main cut through to the school and maybe little kids were around having dropped off their older siblings. I picked up speed, was maybe doing 25. All of a sudden I realised he was trying to overtake me. I panicked because I didn’t want the scenario of notanotherjigsaw, where he would stop dead in front of me because there was literally nowhere for me to go. So I sped up so that he would be behind me. He did too. We were coming up to an island in the road so he had to go behind me. I knew he’d be fuming so I darted off to the left in a side road and he followed me all around that road and the next two. Then I double backed on myself and called 999, who told me to go to the nearest police station. He eventually stopped following me and I went the long way home. As I drove back, I saw him parked in a driveway just around the corner from my house. A workman. Arsehole. To outward appearances, it probably looked like I was racing him I wasn’t. I just didn’t know what to do.

Unfortunately for him, the car behind him was being driven by an off-duty police officer...

You can't just end it there what happened?

Horrified that people think it's ok to blame OP for engaging. Not to criticise an utter nob for his abusive behaviour.

Horrible experience. The misogyny is very near the surface isn’t it? I struggled to park in a tight spot and the man waiting In the car behind shouted I was a bitch cunt whore etc. I gave up,and drove on. He then couldn’t park in the space either !

Wonder if those abusing are utterly faultless drivers who never once have made a single error?

An old lady drove into the back of me a real crunch totally her fault she was almost gibbering in fear as I approached her relief when I said god it’s just a car as long as no one was hurt was obvious. The guy I described earlier would have literally killed someone for that.

Can not believe PP are shifting the blame back on to you. If not your fault. Horrible nasty man, I’d hate to be his partner if he feels it’s okay to treat other people like that!

Happened to me, a taxi driver pulled up beside me and called me a bitch before he saw my husband in the car who is over 6 foot 🤣 he hit that pedal hard & went through a red light (it had just turned red)

Also cross posted with Bluntness. My dh told me I should have let him overtake me. But these posts show that angry drivers will emergency stop. So my instinct of self preservation was probably right. I’m disabled and chronically ill so I was too afraid of being confronted as I’m very weak.

You can't just end it there grin what happened?

Well, OkMaybeNot, she had spotted what was going on (partly because he'd spent some time tailgating her first) so she pulled over behind us when he stopped me, and took his numberplate and some lovely photos of him yelling at me threateningly. These were very helpful when I reported him, especially as she was happy to provide a witness statement. I believe he got off with a caution, but hopefully it will have made him think twice in future.

Some horrible stories on here.. there's nothing I hate more than aggressive drivers

I can honestly say the difference in which I am treated whilst on the road after my other half bought a new car (one that's more typically driven by angry men) has been shocking. I love my new found power.. but it shouldn't be necessary.

A lot of men are very aggressive on the road, men in vans and trucks in particular for some reason.
Recently I was driving along a narrow road in my town, cars parked on the other side of the road so eventually someone has to stop to let them filter through or they block the roundabout behind them. I stopped to let the queue of traffic waiting come through.
First guy driving a massive lorry, drove past and gave me a thank you wave, the next guy in a smaller lorry behind him (who I couldn't even see at first) was shouting and pointing at me, making all sorts of gestures. I have no idea what the fuck his problem was as everyone else after him gave me a thank you wave, even the bus a few cars behind him. Strangest encounter I've ever had on the road. I just pulled a wtf face and gave him the finger. There was plenty of room considering a lorry at least half the size of his truck again, had just managed to get past. People are weird.

A local woman to me has just died after a van 'just' pulled out in front of a bus, in the same way people are minimising it on here. She died of a head injury.

I'm not condoning Road rage, or the use of 'whore', but I find that bad driving is too often minimised.

Not acceptable what he did, but I am not shocked. Road rage is real. People get shot in Trumpsville for less than nothing.

Also had a run in with an older man in ca car park once while I was strapping 3 children under 5 into the back seat of my car (childminder), when he started beeping the horn and shouting at me. When I pointed out that I was putting all the children into their seats and asked him what he thought I was doing, he apparently thought I was just standing with my arse hanging out the car . I would like to point out, I am not slow at putting children in a car, I have had plenty of ecper3and I'm a bloody wizz if I'm honest 🤣

Ponoka
That’s awful. I don’t think anyone is minimising the situation. To be clear about my road rage experience, I didn’t pull out in front of the van. He was some distance away and the road was clear. I just didn’t instantly zoom off. I expect he was speeding as he came from some distance behind.

I had a similar experience just after I passed my driving test. I had driven (slowly) through a busy Tesco carpark and when I parked a man came and banged on my window. He then layed into me for nearly hitting some woman's trolley. It was really upsetting and put me off driving for quite a while.