Bizarre incident on train...

[Redqueenheart]

I had a rather unpleasant experience on my way home today on the London tube and I wonder how other people would have reacted.

I was sitting in a tube carriage and looking at images and videos I had taken from an art exhibition I visited earlier. Was really tired and just wanted to mine my own business.

A man comes in and seats next to me, fidgeting and getting a bit too close for comfort. I ignore him.

He then asks me ''What is that?''. I realise he is now looking at my phone and expects me to tell him what the picture I am looking at is.

I snap back ''That is my phone and there is something called privacy''.

To my surprise two young women who were sitting on the other said of me get involved and say ''that was rude, he was only asking you a question''.

At that point I had enough and said something in the line of ''My pictures are private and none of your business'' and moved to a different seat on the other side of the train. Heard the girls snigger but there was no more interaction after that.

I really don't get why on earth the guy thought it was OK to barge into my space and then start staring at my phone and demand my attention and why these two women actually thought it appropriate to defend him...

Afterwards I did ask myself if this was an attempt to distract me while one them would try to get something from my bag but even as it stands I was absolutely furious about these people's behaviour.

I am quite curious to hear how other people would have reacted.

What u said was fine

^ I agree. We can set clear and strong boundaries in a polite manner.

The situation was clearly uncomfortable, the man's actions (starting from sitting directly next to you where there was a choice) were directly causing it.

Your first priority was to react/change the situation to not feel bad. You did just that.
It doesn't really matter whether someone perceived is as rude or not.

Quote from today’s newspaper (Scottish):
”Transport chief Jenny Gilruth will toughen up security on late-night buses and trains after raising concerns of men targeting women on public transport. ..previously said she was intimidated by drunk men squeezing in beside her on carriages even when she was surrounded by empty seats. She also said she was victimised whenever she tried to swap seats.”
Transport Scotland is carrying out a review and speaking to women and girls across the country. Will report later this year.

This happens. It’s always men targeting women.

With the most politeness I can muster, are you ok hun?

Not your finest point there was it.

This. It would be useful for women to download the railway guardian app on their phones for themselves and their daughters, which provides advice and actual assistance for women who are feeling threatened or harassed. Invaluable when some men don't have any boundaries and think they can behave however the hell they want towards lone women.

Thank you, I had no idea there was such a thing!

apps.apple.com/gb/app/railway-guardian/id1608231573

What to do if you see someone being harassed:

www.btp.police.uk/police-forces/british-transport-police/areas/campaigns/Railway-Guardian/

Funnily enough, saying 'that was a bit rude' isn't listed as a suggested action.

That you do you says precisely nothing about whether OP has an obligation to be polite to people creeping her out and invading her (limited) privacy in multiple ways?

I think that being rude is an option that we all have all of the time, and whilst it's best if we restrain ourselves most of the time, because most people don;t deserve strangers being rude to them, it is really not wrong to be rude to people who you feel are doing things you believe are wrong.

How often are men told to 'be nice'?

'On the train, we might hear someone persistently making sexual comments to another passenger or see them following them through the carriage when they’ve made it clear they don’t want to talk.

We might see someone standing too close on purpose,'

So, the BTP recognise that the behaviour the OP describes is harrassment.

How sweetly naive you are.

Well done OP for listening to your gut.

HE was rude and you did exactly the right thing by quickly extracting yourself from the situation.

Being "polite" in these situations rarely works.

Well done you. I’d have cussed the two women out too.

Quite often tbf....

"Be a gentleman"

"Ladies first"

"Boys don't hit girls" (although it's socially acceptable for women to wallop men around the face, especially in romcoms which have a primarily female audience. Nobody ever complains about that).

Just sayin.

It’s nice to be nice.

Fuck that noise. And that's not nearly as impolite as what I could have said.

I'm not sure who really has a vested interest in women ignoring their instincts, or devoting their time and attention to unwanted, intrusive male strangers. Oh, wait ...
If I'd felt that uncomfortable, I would have moved seats before he said anything.

(If a woman had asked about the photos, would she have reacted as she did? Nope.)

Well no, because if a woman did that (and I have never had such an encounter with a woman in public, but have had dozens with men... funny that...), the motivation is probably not sexual, whereas with a man it probably is. That's just the facts.

I can't quite understand why people think the OP was in the right to be so rude.
Even if this man was being nosey, or trying to chat her up, it didn't warrant such a rude reply. Just so unnecessary. She could easily have just said Oh, pics of an exhibition' or even 'Oh, that's private'.

Because every woman who has ample experience of these types of encounters (and you are lucky not to be among their number) knows that if you're courteous or show the merest hint of friendliness, or not even friendliness but simply a lack of open hostility, many men will take that as encouragement to carry on or escalate the conversation. There have even been studies showing that men often think women are flirting when they're just being coolly polite. This man had already shown he had a disregard for social norms by sitting too close and commenting on the content of a stranger's phone, so there's good reason to believe that at the very least he would fail to understand less direct cues (if simply neurodivergent yet harmless). Or worse - if he was a predator he would take OP's failure to assert that first boundary as a sign that she will be unable to assert further boundaries should he wish to test them. Because that's how predatory men work.

It clearly wasn't a threatening situation (and yes, I've used the tube for decades, including daily when I worked in the City.)

What a naïve thing to say. Plenty of sexual harassment and assault incidents start with the premise of a "polite" (yet intrusive and disrespectful of social norms) conversation.

Tbh i rarely hear those phrases these days, in the 60's and 70's yes but i think they've fallen out of usage rather a lot.

NC as this story would be outing and my partner is on MNbut:
I met my partner in an airport lounge. I am glad they didn’t think I was trying to sexually assault them when I brought up something on the tele. We’ve had a lovely marriage. When I see a couple that look like they are just getting to know each other, in an airport , or tbf in any situation, it makes me really happy cause of how things ended up with us.
i think it’s definately good to be cautious, but this thread is painting every single man who approaches a woman in a public place to be some kind of sex crazied lunatic warewolf who, once they pick the scent of a fertile female will stop at nothing till they have either murdered or raped?
That is the bizarre thing!
this guy on the tube clearly was lacking social skills, maybe he had LD? But they don’t sound like a terror? And the others around also clearly thought she was rude too.
Safety is important but it would make me really sad if young people weren’t able to meet each other in public places anymore due to the ‘social interaction police’ on MN where only ‘hunky guys from Colgate commercials’ were allowed to approach women.

*’It clearly wasn't a threatening situation (and yes, I've used the tube for decades, including daily when I worked in the City.)

What a naïve thing to say. Plenty of sexual harassment and assault incidents start with the premise of a "polite" (yet intrusive and disrespectful of social norms) conversation.’*

^ this

Also with the tube (outside of busy times) one stop can change it from being 10 people and you in a carriage to just 1 person and you in a few seconds.

But if you say you don't want to talk to someone, that is deemed as being rude.

Apparently it's not rude to demand engagement from strangers but it is rude to refuse it.

You were 100% correct OP, the man and the women opposite were wrong.

You have more patience than me OP, I would have said "do you mind" in a very loud voice the second he fidgeted closer to me! 🤣🤣 but then I'm "rude" like that 🤣🤣

THAT is what's rude - looking at someone else's phone without their express permission. You would be absolutely bloody rude to look, let alone accost a stranger.

@Redqueenheart did nothing that was rude. The main who intruded on her, looked over her shoulder at her phone, and then expected her to engage with him, was the rude person.

Women owe random men ABSO-fucking-LUTELY NOTHING.