Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to have sat on her feet

232 replies

Toenailz · 11/09/2023 23:39

Tongue in cheek really, I feel perfectly reasonable. OH thinks I'm getting old, intolerant, and grumpy.

Got on the bus today with shopping bags in tow, they're heavy and I'm knackered (I have a disability that causes chronic exhaustion, but it's invisible). It's heaving busy in town/on bus, so I head to the back of the bus so we can fit some bags on our lap/feet out of people's way/the aisle.

One corner of the back seats is taken. The other corner has one, older teenage girl, taking up 4 seats with herself taking one seat, her handbag taking another, and her feet on the 2 seats in front of her, burying her head in her phone as if she can't see us. Didn't move her handbag or feet from the two seats, despite my obviously being right in front of her, so I just gave up and sat on her feet.

She removed them sharpish, probably because I'm quite fat.

Probably not helped by the inward trip earlier today, where having dodged one teenager's leg placed right into the aisle, I tripped over the next one's leg in aisle and went flying.

I couldn't be arsed asking her to move, because I was about 6 inches in front of her, my OH had sat in the seat next to her handbag, so there's no way she couldn't have known we were there (no headphones, either) so I thought, if you're going to pretend I'm not there, I'm going to pretend you're not. But ffs, I sat on a teenager. ON PURPOSE. Not a high point in my life.

OP posts:
Thread gallery
5
Vegemiteandhoneyontoast · 12/09/2023 11:44

There was one a while back where a heavily pregnant woman asked a man on the train if she could have his seat as she felt ill and he said no. She threw up on him.

258486h · 12/09/2023 11:44

This reply has been deleted

This user is a troll so we've removed their threads and posts.

Skogrammy · 12/09/2023 11:45

Vegemiteandhoneyontoast · 12/09/2023 11:44

There was one a while back where a heavily pregnant woman asked a man on the train if she could have his seat as she felt ill and he said no. She threw up on him.

What a vile women.

Daisymaybe60 · 12/09/2023 11:46

Oh God, I thought I was going to have to do this the last time I went on a train. Someone was in the seat I’d booked and when I politely pointed this out she said she was only there because the man busily trying to ignore us both across the aisle was in hers. I stood between them and said that one of them would have to move as I wasn’t about to stand for two hours. The man blinked first, crashed his laptop shut, gathered his many scattered belongings and shoved past me. Thank God. There wasn’t really room for me on his lap - it was a table seat.

Vegemiteandhoneyontoast · 12/09/2023 11:46

Skogrammy · 12/09/2023 11:45

What a vile women.

Show quote history

She wasn't vile, she couldn't help it.

Skogrammy · 12/09/2023 11:47

Vegemiteandhoneyontoast · 12/09/2023 11:46

She wasn't vile, she couldn't help it.

Show quote history

She was vile, she could of been sick in the opposite direction. Not over someone. Disgusting women.

Wetblanket78 · 12/09/2023 11:48

I would have given her a little tap and if she didn't move them sat on them. My daughter did this once on a bus. There was room on the other side she could have sat. But I've always told my kids not to put their feet on seats on public transport. So I suppose it was her way of telling her not to do it.🤣🤣🤣

She's severely autistic and non verbal and always wants to sit at the back. It was actually a woman who went to the same secondary school as me though she wasn't there much. She's well known in our town as a shop lifter. She never recognised me I just moved her onto the other side of the bus.

CherryMaDeara · 12/09/2023 11:48

Whilst I would ordinarily say use your words and ask her to move, feet on seat is so reprehensible that I'm glad you sat on her feet.

Given she said sorry, she knew what she was doing.

deveronvalley · 12/09/2023 11:48

Honestly, I think you were a knob. When you feel like you're about to potentially be a knob to someone, think to yourself "would I take this same action against this person if they were a 6ft5 bloke?" - if the answer is no, you're probably being a knob because you think you can get away with it against someone you perceive as weaker, either physically or in status. It's why people are rude to shop staff, why builders catcall lone women and why bullies bully. It's all the same thing.

Vegemiteandhoneyontoast · 12/09/2023 11:48

Skogrammy · 12/09/2023 11:47

She was vile, she could of been sick in the opposite direction. Not over someone. Disgusting women.

Show quote history

🙄

258486h · 12/09/2023 11:48

This reply has been deleted

This user is a troll so we've removed their threads and posts.

CClaire · 12/09/2023 11:48

I did this on the train once. The girl turned out to be drunk and we argued all the way from Paddington to Reading in a borderline farcical manner. She said she had an ankle injury, which she clearly didn’t have, but TBF it could’ve been someone with an ankle injury and I’d have felt awful.

AmIAutumnalNow · 12/09/2023 11:50

JetBlackSteed · 11/09/2023 23:47

I would be interested to know who was sat in the other corner of the back seats that you chose to leave be and pick on the teenage girl?

Hardly picking on her Hmm

Skogrammy · 12/09/2023 11:50

Comtesse · 12/09/2023 11:39

Haha “assault” yeah sure

Show quote history

Well the OP did say she was fat so a fat person sitting in someone can be classed as assault. Hardly going to be painless.

CherryMaDeara · 12/09/2023 11:52

Skogrammy · 12/09/2023 11:50

Well the OP did say she was fat so a fat person sitting in someone can be classed as assault. Hardly going to be painless.

Show quote history

It's not assault if you deliberately place yourself in danger. Feet don't belong on seats. Any feet on seats are likely to be subject to being sat on.

No jury in the land would find OP guilty.

Sparkl · 12/09/2023 11:57

Exactly.
OP is exploiting the fact that she could do this to a younger, female passenger, making herself out to be public transport etiquette warrior but as you point out, it simply continues a particular type of treatment of young women in the public realm.
They aren’t allowed to take up extra space, older men are.

Brefugee · 12/09/2023 11:58

and yet so many of the rest of us have said that we do it to men. So there is tht.

FTB2023 · 12/09/2023 12:02

It does sound like she needs to be taught some manners, I can't entirely blame you

This is the nonsensical argument that baffles me.
How does treating the teen with disrespect encourage her to show respect to others?

The fact that the teen apologised suggests that she was oblivious to OP'S non verbal attempt to get her to move rather than deliberately ignoring her.

There's nothing to suggest that if the OP had simply got her attention and spoken to her she wouldn't have moved.

ditalini · 12/09/2023 12:03

Sparkl · 12/09/2023 11:57

Exactly.
OP is exploiting the fact that she could do this to a younger, female passenger, making herself out to be public transport etiquette warrior but as you point out, it simply continues a particular type of treatment of young women in the public realm.
They aren’t allowed to take up extra space, older men are.

Or maybe you're trying to exploit:

a) women's socialised expectation to "be kind", "don't step out of line", "always put yourself last"

alongside b) "if you put yourself in danger it's your fault" re: your inane comment about behaving differently around 6'5" men

to police the completely understandable behaviour of another woman. Nice job.

NooNakedJacuzziness · 12/09/2023 12:05

Katy Perry's follow up maybe:
I sat on a teenager on purpose
She was taking up seats that were surplus

258486h · 12/09/2023 12:07

This reply has been deleted

This user is a troll so we've removed their threads and posts.

ditalini · 12/09/2023 12:08

FTB2023 · 12/09/2023 12:02

It does sound like she needs to be taught some manners, I can't entirely blame you

This is the nonsensical argument that baffles me.
How does treating the teen with disrespect encourage her to show respect to others?

The fact that the teen apologised suggests that she was oblivious to OP'S non verbal attempt to get her to move rather than deliberately ignoring her.

There's nothing to suggest that if the OP had simply got her attention and spoken to her she wouldn't have moved.

She wasn't teaching anyone anything, nor does she have to.

She was sitting down on the bloody bus. She doesn't have to be the whole bus's mum and check that everyone else is comfortable before planting her arse on a seat that is empty of arses.

Bus seats are for bottoms. If you're using it for something else then the onus is on you to be aware of someone else wanting to use it for its intended purpose.

Sparkl · 12/09/2023 12:09

I didn’t make an inane comment about about 6ft4 men, I replied to one.

I didn’t say anything about OP being kind. I think she should extend common courtesy to people equally, including younger women. There is a bravado to her posting that I think is problematic based on who she chose to confront. And I think she should consider how she goes about confronting a young woman in future and what prejudices she might be continuing if she does not.

ditalini · 12/09/2023 12:11

Sparkl · 12/09/2023 12:09

I didn’t make an inane comment about about 6ft4 men, I replied to one.

I didn’t say anything about OP being kind. I think she should extend common courtesy to people equally, including younger women. There is a bravado to her posting that I think is problematic based on who she chose to confront. And I think she should consider how she goes about confronting a young woman in future and what prejudices she might be continuing if she does not.

I completely disagree. I don't think she should pay the incident one second of mind. She took the space she was entitled to take.

PiIlock · 12/09/2023 12:13

I agree and I don't think she deserved to be assaulted by OP

An assault? So this is a police matter then?