To think this was disgusting behaviour

[rudeteenager]

Driving down a residential road, 2 lads about 16/17 stroll out in front of me, headphones in, clearly not paying attention to the road. I obviously slow right down and beep loudly to alert them, they barely respond or look up but I see them smirk at each other. Next thing, I hear an incredibly loud shout of, "fuck off!!", look briefly to my left to see a teenage girl of about the same age gesturing at me and shouting profanities. I mean, was that hugely necessary? Absolutely disgusting behaviour. I have a 17 year old daughter and if she behaved that way I'd disown her! What is wrong with some young people today?!

Yep. I agree with this.
Slow down to avoid hitting them. Beeping sounds aggressive. If they walk out in front of someone else it's not your problem.
I also agree with the 'cool girl' comment earlier.

I think that this is part of the issue though. People seem to ready to accept this kind of overly aggressive response. Maybe they are scared to challenge it (I know I would be), but it seems that aggression is the go-to reaction these days.

I recently had a car crash. It was the other person's fault entirely. I could have been really lairy about it - it would have been justified to do so, but instead I chose to take a rational approach. The other person and the person who witnessed it both remarked that they thought I'd have a far more hostile approach. It's a shame that this is now what seems to be expected. Sad times.

Figure of speech. I don't mean I'd dump her in the nearest bin. But I do mean, I'd be fucking mortified and embarrassed.

Coming back to this, i don't understand how the OP was wrong? Beeping is literally there to alert people (often pedestrians with headphones in who cross without looking) that you are there. The amount of people who walk with their headphones in these days and are completely oblivious to their surroundings is scary.

I'm aware that pedestrians have the right of way but that doesn't mean they should be careless ffs if they started crossing a motorway would that be OK by everyone?

Fwiw I've been in the car with an aggressive group of teens pissing about in the road the driver laid on the horn other drivers did the same it was a noisy mess teenagers need to learn the world isn't theirs

Nope it's for imminent danger which none was in

There is plenty of people who seem to use them, when they are waiting for someone, or the totally moronic one where they beep driving past the person they have just dropped off.

@Theunamedcat
Exactly that. I don't think anyone on this thread would be remotely OK with the situation of someone apparently obliviously, whilst wearing headphones, just strolling right in front of their moving car. It would jolt anyone to react, I feel. And being met with an aggressive fuck off would also no doubt not be acceptable to many. But of course: because it happened to a stranger on the internet, and people enjoy an argument with an OP, obviously everyone would be perfectly unaffected in the same situation 😂

I've never had profanities shouted at me by a teen.
What I have seen while picking up my kids at school, is teens, singularly or in a gaggle, walking straight in front of my car as I pull up to the entrance.
Entitled kids that know you're not going to run into them, at your expense, as well as their own. In a year or so, they'll be driving and then in a hurry they acquire the sense not to ignore other drivers.
Kids....most of them grow up.

Also, I think people are missing the fact that these lads were neither hurrying across the road, nor seemingly aware of my presence (ie not looking in my direction). Had they been doing either or both of these things, I perhaps wouldn't have felt it necessary to alert them to my presence. On top of that, they had earphones in. So it was a fair assumption on my part, given they were not looking in my direction, hurrying, or seemingly able to hear anything, that they didn't realise my car was there.

How do people know there wasn't danger? We weren't there. Almost every driver I know has had to beep at an oblivious pedestrian at some point or another.

Lots of misinterpretations of the highway code going on here.

The changes back in 2022 didn't give pedestrians the right to randomly walk out in front of moving traffic (otherwise zebra crossings would no longer need to exist....).

The changes referred to traffic giving way to pedestrians at junctions (e.g. a driver wanting to turn into (or out of) a side street should give way to pedestrians waiting to cross the road at that junction).

People already on the road are also at the top of the hierarchy. So someone jogging down the road doesn't have to jump into a hedge to give way to a car, for example.

That would have been me at 16

These teens were wearing headphones and not paying attention, so you had no guarantee that they were fully aware that you were there. I think your horn use was entirely appropriate, assuming you didn't go for full-on blaring for ages type usage. I also think it might have had more of an impact on those boys due to the horn use, so perhaps they might be more mindful whe crossing the road in future.
Some of the reponses on here are mind boggling. The fact that anyone here think an expletive laden outburst at the OP for driving carefully and alerting these boys to her imminent presence was an appropriate reponse needs to give their heads a wobble. The girl's reponse was totally out of order

i agree. And it sounds as though the girl wasn’t even involved, just a bystander.

Right, so in the heat of the moment, you used a figure of speech (a creative use of language to generate an effect) which resulted in quite a few posters being shocked at your reaction.

It's not that much different from the situation you describe.

I'm not condoning what they did.

Op, AIBU is not a good place to vent. Every word you say is taken literally (or in the worst possible way) and picked on.

I wonder, could the girl have been filming? It sounds like a prank for effect.

I was in the supermarket a few weeks ago when a young man had a very dramatic fall and sent packets flying and bottles rolling around. He was politely helped up. I noticed his friend filming and smirking.
So stupid, but it is apparently a thing these days.

Perhaps she can look toward her male friends as examples as how to behave in public.

What's the AIBU?

But you stopped so they didn't need to know about your presence by you beeping at them. It's enough that you stopped and there was no danger. They were in the road, you saw them, your slowed down and stopped. You started with the aggressive behaviour by loudly beeping and the girl was aggressive back because she was standing near your car and had to listen to it.

Aye. Sure that was it.

To think this was disgusting behaviour. Which it was. YANBU.

Rubbish (your last sentence). You don't need to go round beeping at pedestrians.
I had to slow right down almost to a stop in the same situation as the OP. The kid was right by my driver's open window as I pulled away. I could have beeped but what's the point? I was extremely tempted to shout he was an idiot but didn't because his mate was waiting for him and therefore he would've looked stupid and given me a mouthful. I let it go.

She beeped because they had headphones in and weren't looking in her direction.

Just be grateful your dd isn't like this OP. I don't get all of the pent up rage so many people have ready to direct at random strangers.

If I get the arse end of road rage I tend to laugh to myself and wonder if they have have blood pressure related health incident in the near future. If you go around shouting and screaming at randoms all day I don't think that's not compatible with a long and happy life. I witnessed someone having what looked like a medical fit when i let a bus out. We was then next to each at the traffic lights. I just laughed at her. What a bunch of sad angry people. I bet they also raised their blood pressure at every red light. Possibly has a episode at every red light, every pedestrian, every zebra crossing, every day of their life. Its a bit sad really.

Yes, and MN being a large and diverse site it'll include parents who've raised kids like this and often think it's smart - so as happens every time OP will naturally get grief from these

'Twas ever thus ...

But she knows its was so she wasn't really asking was she, she was just ranting in the AIBU section instead of the chat section in the hope of more views.

So YABU @rudeteenager for doing that.