To ask what's the rudest thing a stranger has done to you?

[YoungScrappyHungry]

Inspired by the lovely thread about kindest thing strangers have done for you, and also a chance for me to share this horror.

When I was 19, I worked on the tills at a supermarket in my holidays from university.

A woman I was serving was staring at me, trying to get my attention as I scanned her stuff. I looked up at her and smiled. She said, in still the most condescending tone I've ever heard:

'Don't you wish you'd studied now?'

I was so floored and ashamed, I didn't say a thing back and just carried on scanning her things. Fact was I was actually at university, but even if I hadn't been....aghh!....still gets me.

What are yours?

When I went to a work appointment at 8 months pregnant (huge) I parked on the road outside someone's house. I wasn't blocking anyone's drive, it was a wide road, no issues.

Got back to my car couple of hours later and a man came running out of the garden where he'd been raking leaves and gave me a massive bollocking for parking there. If that happened now I'd tell him to shove his rake up his arse, but I was young and hormonal and just burst into tears.

I was having a bad day, feeling pretty grumpy, stressed and and generally out of sorts with the world. My "friend" chose that day to tell that "what you need is a bloody good shag!!" ....

Well, thanks friend, but my husband was undergoing treatment for prostate cancer at the time, so a shag of any quality was out of the question. (She knew that, of course!).

When I was in Perth, Australia in 2000, a complete stranger (male) said to me "oy rotten skin". At first I didn't realise he was talking to me, but he then went on to give me a lecture about skin cancer. Unfortunately I'm fair and dont tan.

Another time when I was at college doing a course, one of the other women on the course (she must have been in her 40s at the time, should have really known better), said what is wrong with your eyes, we were all wondering whats wrong with your eyes. Unfortunately I've got a noticeable squint in my left eye (worse after failed operations). I went bright red and got tears in my eyes cause I was so embarrassed (I was only 21), I then said sorry you've just really made me cringe. Anyone else would have apologised, she just said o yes I am cringy. The scary thing was in general she wasn't an out and out bitch.

When I was about 6 weeks post partum after a horrific emergency c section we had gone into the local shopping area. I walked out of Fat face (the shop) and a grown women who was with her family said loud enough for me to hear "look a fat person in fat face how appropriate" still stings to this day.

Showgirl you just reminded me of a similar experience. It.is actually the only time another female was cruel to me (well to my face).
I was walking out of New Look with my mum when this girl (probably a size 26 herself) says to the person with her (her mum probably)"Please tell me I'm not that big, please!" To be fair her mum said that she had no room to talk.
One thing I've realised at every size I've been is that there is always someone who wants to bring you down and kick you while you're there. I used to weigh 24 stone and now I'm 14 stone. I'm from a family of fellow fat people. My cousin thinks I'm now too thin. I'm still a size 18-20 which is far from thin but I was always the biggest. She is probably around 20 stone but wasn't a fat teen like me. I remember her coming shopping with me and when I went into Evans she loudly declared that she would rather die than shop there.

DH is not white, in his 40s, and has a very well paid, professional job. On a recent family holiday to a southern seaside resort he had sat down at a table in a cafe while me and two DC waited in the queue to order. A very posh old lady told him 'I want to sit here, go and get me a menu'. A very confused DH told her that he didn't work in the cafe. She wasn't remotely embarrassed or outfaced but told him that she had thought he was on his break.

@itsmehere1

Phew I have had a few, but the one that always gets me down is this one.

Weekday morning I boarded my south eastern train to Blackfriars. I was standing as there were no empty seats. Suddenly a man stood up to perhaps get down the next station, I was close so I moved and sat. Suddenly from behind there was this lady (mid-30s) who seemed to be looking angrily at me and was huffing and puffing as if I took her seat. I kept sitting and she kept on staring at me the entire way, I even looked at her to ask what's wrong. After few stops, she had to get down, which she did not before knowingly stamping on my feet and saying "Oops Sorry" in a fake manner. Till date I can't forget the cf, couple of people around me also showed their annoyance towards her. I on the other hand was just too stunned, but thinking back I felt I should have said/done something!

I've had this before, where someone thinks you stole 'their' seat. Surely if they were closer they would have got there first? Is it not literally that simple?

My only stories are vile sexual comments from men when I was young.

My husband left me for a woman he’d been having an affair with for some months. I knew she had had several other short relationships before him so, as this was at the height of the AIDS crisis, I went to be tested. I explained when I booked in that though I’d had only one sexual partner in the last twelve years, I had recently learnt that partner had been unfaithful. When I got my negative results, the doctor (who obviously hadn’t read my notes) looked at me and said ‘ I imagine this has taught you the lesson not to have unsafe sex again’ I was so poleaxed by her judgy tone I just quietly agreed.

I don't really know if this qualifies as rude or something else but, one day on the bus into work I saw 3 people who i assumed got on together. One of the men was chatting away to the other woman and man. Bus was crowed and the couple managed to sit together. I had an empty seat behind me so the first man sat there. He proceded then to lean forward and blow on my hair, and said am I making you uncomfortable? Also "I'm gonna make you feel uncomfortable the whole way here".
The couple I saw him with turned out not to be with him at all and got off the bus before us without even looking in his direction.
At the time I didn't know what to do so just leaned way forward and ignored him as best I could and luckily he got off the bus before me! Strange and rude!

Walking down the road in my uni town with my first girlfriend (now wife) and a group of young lads drove past. The youngest honestly probably about 13 shouted “Dyke” out the window. My wife just shouted back Yes! Honestly he was so shocked he actually shouted back alright then!

@DuesToTheDirt

We should all have comebacks at the ready. My favourite (only used it once I think, but it was satisfying), is "Were you born stupid or do you work at it?"

Good one.

Mine is always the same - "Sorry, I think you've mistaken me for someone who gives a shit about what you think"

@Coldilox

Walking along the street holding hands with my then girlfriend (now wife), man walking in other direction spits in my face as he passes me.

Have had worse at work (police, wasn’t at the time) but that is the worst I’ve had completely apropos of nothing.

Was shocked and upset at the time. Would react very differently now. Bigoted twat.

Jesus that is just awful. This just made me so sad :(

Oh, too many to mention.

But the spitting stories remind me of a gem when I was 17, many years ago and living in another country.

A man spat at me. And then told me why in the most unpleasant terms.

Because I was a girl, doing A levels.
And my mother had the temerity to work and boss men around.

I think of him whenever I get a salary increase and add a little extra to my Plan International donation.

I was going into a Flunch (supermarket café) in Brive la Gaillarde in the summer and there were 2 blokes on the terrace drinking - good God-fearing muslims during Ramadan, one of whom owns a Halal butcher nearby.
They both said to me that I deserve to be strangled, raped and killed so that a man can have my intelligence as I don't have any right to it.
No doubt, exh would agree with them.

The worst one for me was when I was 17, I have naturally black hair that was very long and I was walking home from the funeral/wake of my best friend who had died in a car accident a few weeks before, so dressed in a knee length black dress from M&S that my Gran had taken me to buy.

It was also my first ever funeral, and watching his parents bury their child was traumatic.

Bunch of teenagers I didn’t recognise (from the other secondary in my area), started shouting abuse at me - goth, weirdo, go kill yourself you miserable bitch, and so on.

I was rather drunk and instead of ignoring them, I gave them some shit back and ended up in a fight with 3 of the girls jumping me

Upstairs on a bus once when I was 15, a man sat on the opposite row, one seat in front and had a wank! I was too nervous and scared to move, or get off early so I just sat there until my stop. I should have told the driver but I didn't, just got off the bus and never even told anyone, felt too embarrassed.

@FluffyPJs

I was recovering in hospital after a miscarriage. My cystic acne had flared up due to the pregnancy hormones and my face was quite bad. When offered a cup of tea, which I don't drink, I accepted so I could give it to my husband. He always had 3 sugars so I asked for 3. The nurse snapped at me, very nastily, no wonder your skin is so bad with all that sugar. I was devastated. We did put in a complaint but the damage was already done.

Oh that's so mean.. people just don't think do they. Although I don't know how your husband tolerates 3 sugars.. wow! i'd be hyper!!

A nicer one to balance the horror stories: I was dropping youngest at the park on a Sunday. Bloke very aggressively toots, agitates etc for the few seconds my car is stationary. I start backing up so there’s room to pass. He doesn’t even wait for that and tries to swerve around me. Wallop! He hits the bollards. The watching children find this hilarious and give him the raspberry. Woman further down the road had seen him being aggro and came to ask if I was ok. I gestured towards him checking out the damage on his car and said “I am now”.

Not the rudest. Not a stranger either. Just something I still remember nearly two decades later.
My first year of uni. I had long hair (down to thighs) not having been to a hairdressers for years.
We had a mature student on the course (engineering) called Dave, who spent much of his time ranting about students (not 'mature' ones - just the 'scrounging' kind - the kind that he had to sit in classes with every single day but he still felt it necessary to constantly criticise)
I came in one day with a different hairdo - I'd just had it in plaits overnight so it was wavy. I could see Dave getting revved up with a new reason to have a go, and true to form, he then embarked on a mammoth rant about scrounging students wasting taxpayers money on pointless things like hairdressers.
I didn't say anything. We just let him go for it, and I came in next day with my standard straight hair. He did mention it - I just said don't you hate it when people make assumptions about things that don't concern them? He did look sheepish
It didn't stop his rants though. Knobber.

Probs not the worst but the most recent! During the March 2020 lockdown my 2 year old DD and I (visibly pregnant) were out for our daily walk and as part of this we had to cross a footbridge in the park. Everyone in the park was very good at social distancing and as the bridge is very narrow there'd be a little queue at each end so that people could cross safely without getting too close to eachother.

When it was our turn to cross, DD started to dawdle and ignored me when I tried to chivvy her along (loudly so that the people waiting to cross could hear). Before I could pick her up, a lovely lady who was out for a walk with another adult decided to pipe up with "SOME people need to learn how to discipline their children". I was shocked to start with but then I got the rage and said "SOME people need to remember their manners. Would you like to be in lockdown with a 2 year old? No? I didn't think so. Have a lovely day" and then flounced off. It's the only time I have ever clapped back and I was well proud of myself ;) Bitch.

3 hours after having my 1st DD following a traumatic birth, midwife came in as my DH had shut my curtains so I could try and rest , She flung them open and said what’s wrong with you you have only had a baby. !! 2 hours after this I hemorrhage and was in theatre. An hour after being back in my room she came in again and said “you need to get up and go and shower you can’t stay all day in bed “! Never cried like it as felt like a total failure.

We were sat in sainsburys cafe when my son was about 8 months old. The cafe was deserted.
A lady in a wheelchair chose to sit right behind my son (there were spaces literally everywhere in the cafe) and the shouted at me to control him when he was turning round to look at her. I explained that as he was 8 months old, and she'd chosen to sit behind him, of course he was going to turn round to try and see her.

I then had the delight of meeting her again in the town centre about a year later. My son was running about in a pedestrianised area, but I was watching him carefully and was very close to him and he was causing no bother to anybody.

She went out of her way to drive her electric wheelchair over to shout at me that he should be under control because she could have run him over in her wheelchair.

I told her to fuck of and mind her own business!

I left the hospital after having my 6th MC wearing makeup and fairly normal clothes. A nurse who had been lovely to me while I was there walked past me as I was leaving and doubled back to tell me "You don't look like you've just had a miscarriage, most mothers don't care about their appearance after all of that" In front of a busy waiting area full of babies.

@foxyknoxy30

Threw a crab claw at me

There's a very slight chance that was me. If so I promise it was a total accident. The little blighter was proving much more resistant to the cracker than it had any right to be.

Carnforth Inn?