Stranger writes a note re loud chat in café, who is BU?

[FrodoBiggins]

Just read this online and it sounded like a classic AIBU so thought the good citizens of Mumsnet democracy should be allowed to consider.

'A stranger handed me a note saying I was speaking too loud in a cafe - it was mortifying' Metro | News story

YABU - Team green pen - talking lady is BU and should shh
YANBU - Team cat owner - note leaver was nosey and pass agg

Good on you. More people should do this.

no, why? She is the victim here, if she is too uncomfortable to speak directly, so be it. Not everyone is confident enough to tell rude people to shut the fuck up , even if they would love to, and most people actually try to avoid unnecessary confrontation anyway. It's not worth it.

When people are that rude and speak so loudly willingly, it's unlikely they will apologise if someone talks to them

They're really not. Most of the cafes I go into are relatively small and quiet. If they were really noisy/rowdy, people wouldn't go in to read a book, read a paper or do work/research etc. There's generally just low level background "hum" of conversations and sometimes low level background music. Most people have the self awareness and self control to adjust their speaking volume to their surroundings and would only talk very loudly if there was a lot of background noise meaning they had to talk loudly in order to be heard.

My DC have no volume control, I am always having to remind them they don’t need to shout. I have to do it very performatively in public spaces so that other people know I am at least trying to get them to shut up.

I have a family member like this. It’s like their not talking to you as a person more like at you. They don’t get that they are loud. I once recorded her speaking to DN and sent her it as a voice message. He hadn’t even done anything that drastic. But the way she reacts to a child just for something like dropping a sock on the floor was much worse behaviour than what that child was told off for. So embarrassing and 1 of many reasons why most have cut off contact with her.

I am deaf and was told off for being too loud, so I don't go to cafes any more, ever. I can go to restaurants and bars as they have better acoustics generally but cafes are very noisy with steam blowing, chairs on hard floors, clattering cups and I struggle with volume due to my deafness. Nice to see so many on this thread are glad folk like me are socially excluded by our "betters" who are so proper and correct and utterly perfect 🙄

Team green pen lady, deliberately loud people are a pet peeve, so obnoxious.

This guy sounds awful so I am not trying to defend him but: I do find that when doing a train booking that it often randomly assigns me a seat in the quiet carriage without me asking for it, which I do think is crap design.

Interestingly the lad that was chatting at normal volume was very apologetic. ( I said actually it’s not you it’s your mate there). The v loud one less so. There is (sometimes) a level of entitlement in thinking the content of your loud conversation is to be imposed on others when it comes to thd noisy. Other times it’s genuine oblivion I’d say.

If said nicely people are normally ok with the direct approach.

I took a v brief call on a train and didn’t realise I was in the quiet carriage. Someone indicated the sign to me I was mortified - and glad to be told! Came off the phone immediately.

asked if II had given him a note and handed me one! I just said, ‘oh that’s fine, no need to seize the last word, we’ve no more to say to each other’ and flickr it on the floor.
I absolutely love this @BigSkies2022 I bet he was outraged 🤣

https://www.reddit.com/r/london/comments/1qb707h/handwritten_note_cafe_confrontation/

This is the original Reddit thread, just out of interest. I'm on team green pen lady, too - I used to have a colleague whose volume control was permanently up at 11, and he was utterly exhausting.

I hate loud people. We were on holiday over Xmas and new year and everyone was lovely and discreet, mainly Americans, Canadians, with some Europeans and a smattering of brits at the resort, then this very very loud couple came, everyone could hear their conversation, it was literally shouted at each other, including peformative I love you’s, after about two hours I wanted to throttle them. They also were fully aware everyone could hear, it was obvious, but the chat was pure shite, from how they met, which was recently, their plans had they not met, to if they liked their drinks and each others clothes, “no I hate that top but I love you!!” “ I love you too, why do you hate my top! I will change it for you!”

sitting trying to quietly read on a sunbed as they loudly engaged in this inane shite had most people round the pool rolling their eyes, then sideyeing, then openly glaring at them.

so I’m team green pen, shut rhe fuck up and use your inside voice.

My teen dd can talk in a very loud voice and she doesn't realise she's doing it. When I point it out to her she talks in a normal voice.

She says she's trying to be more aware she's doing it now and that she'd rather me or her friends politely pointed it out than let her carry on shouting and being annoying.

I sometimes have to endure this on the bus. I’ve never confronted anyone because due to past experience, I expect particularly loud people to be aggressive in response. I find it obnoxious, personally.

But sometimes the person they are talking to can't hear them if they don't speak fairly loudly. Eer heard of deafness??

It's not loud talking that bothers me my the screechy high pitched wonen

Team note writer here, I hate the attention seeking loud people 😫

I was once asked to be quiet on a train by a man, I’d just been speaking to my friend in person there. I don’t think I’m loud either.

She's partially responsible for making herself the victim here by doing nothing to address it - if she didn't want to speak to them directly she could have either passed a polite note earlier or had a quiet word with a member of staff and asked them to intervene.

If it were a big gang of young men taking over a bus with loud banter then yes of course Green Pen would be forgiven for staying out of it...but it's one woman in a cafe talking about her cats. Given Green Pen had enough confidence to deliver a pass agg note she was clearly not that timid, so why do nothing earlier? Either it bothered them enough to ask if Loud Cat Owner could turn the volume down, or it they should have left it.

Taboo & lemonade! I loved that in my late teens.
There was a perfume called Tabu as well.
So 80s!
I'm Team Green Pen, Miu Miu & Prada sound a bit much😄

I get NX regulary to visit home from Liverpool (I'm from the NE, so long journey...). There's always, without exception, at least one arsehole who has to have a convo on loudspeaker, even despite the driver clearly telling them NOT to 🙄 Thank god for airpods!

Shame green pen doesn t write nice messages too

I think you can typically tell if someone is speaking to someone who has hearing loss vs. someone who is just loud. It's not just volume, it's about speaking more slowly, enunciating clearly and directly addressing the listener.

Agree
There's an option on reddit for "everyone's an asshole"

I think a lot of people haven't bothered to read the original article which specifies

• it was a very small "living-room-sized cafe" -i.e. therefore perfectly plausible someone speaking at a very normal volume could still be overheard

• the owner who was also in the room working on a laptop said he couldn't hear them talking

• none of the 3 friends with her said "yeah actually you are a bit loud!" - I know I would have if asked!

So basically it's equally likely she was being loud and annoying or the woman was grumpy and ott. Either way I'm not a fan of passive aggression - giving her a note as she left wouldn't have achieved anything for green pen lady whereas politely asking her "sorry do you mind speaking a bit quieter" might have.

The problem is that once one group is loud, everyone else has to turn the volume up to be heard and on It goes…it’s the same in my local. One loud group and the Volume of the whole place rises.

My mother had a cousin who was almost totally deaf and could therefore speak extremely loudly in just normal conversation.

I remember not understanding why and being quite scared of her loudness when I was a small child. I just didn't understand it at the time, though I did later realise that she just couldn't easily control her volume.

I think that Paulina perhaps needs to be more aware of people around her but note writer was rude still.

I do find people having loud phone conversations quite jarring and ignorant but I'd never have written the note. You just don't know for sure what is making them the way they are.