AIBU to object when a bus driver repeatedly called me darling?

[DontDareCallMeDarling]

I caught a bus today to a National Trust property I'm very unfamiliar with. The bus driver told me the bus back to town was across the road from where he dropped me off so of course I waited there.

When a bus turned up the driver said I was at the wrong bus stop and need to be across the road. I was puzzled because that would take me away from where I needed to go. I told him that I'd come from the other direction "No you didn't darling" ... I was adamant that I did, because I know I did. "Sorry darling you didn't"

I replied that I was not his darling. Clearly the original bus driver gave me the wrong information, though I was worried about not getting back, missing the right bus, and having what people often think of as a term of endearment (a matter of opinion) used to try to correct me.

I crossed the road and caught the bus but only just made it. All very confusing.

His use of “ darling” was deliberately patronising, he was saying silly female you couldn’t possibly know where you had just come from, and not to question his authority.
I think you should complain, it’s not great customer service and we are in the 21st century, public service employees should be trained on appropriate behaviour if they can’t get their dominant male brains around it.

Does saying something twice really count as repeatedly?

However I don’t understand how the bus back would come from the same direction as the original bus. Were they two different bus routes? In which case it is possible both drivers were right?

Where were you, in many many places this is just how we speak. I do miss being called hinny though, that seems to have disappeared and I liked it

Complain because the driver used a perfectly normal term that many use day to day and gave clear accurate advice.

I mean women are equally guity of using terms of endearments to all and sundry
Should we be complaining about them too or is it only patronising when its a man?

We call everyone love , lovely , darling , sweetheart, butt here .Men, women children , pets . It's not meant to be patronising,it's just our culture.

You really think I caught a bus from home to get to a National Trust house 250 miles away? Think that one through.

It didn’t sound like an endearment tbh

You're the one who mentioned 250 miles. I've no idea why you'd say that if the national trust property wasn't that far away?

You clearly don't think you're unreasonable though despite other comments explaining you were so not sure why you posted?

The use of "darling" in this context is patronising. I use "love" myself but he is using it and then also trying to tell you the direction you were coming from. He's trying to get the upperhand, not being helpful. I have had (more often) older men making unecessary comments to me, especially when I have my kids with me for some reason. Think they enjoy embarassing a woman. That's how it seems anyway.

How would you know
You werent there ?
Do you want an over all ban on people using these terms

Oh do get a grip.

So its ok for you to use it but not a man?

The darling driver gave you the correct advice and by following his advice you got home? And yet you are not happy?

Where to stand for the bus does sound like a misunderstanding though, he obviously knows where to stand, being the bus driver. But he doesn't know where you came from and he was usind the terms in a patronising way here.

Yes this bus driver gave me the correct bus stop. The one on the outward journey didn't. The second one did it with an insistence that I was muddled about which direction I'd come from and needed to correct a ditzy female.

No. He corrected somebody who was in the wrong 🙄

How do you ever leave the house if you get offended by this surely you hear it in your everyday life. Everyone is duck or mate where im from

Because you was muddled in what direction you where going

He didn't. He tried to tell me I couldn't possibly have come from the direction I had done so I was not in the wrong. I know the direction I'd travelled in.

I was in the wrong place, because the first bus driver had told me to wait there. Maybe that guy was new and didn't know the route, I don't know.

Or maybe you spoke to him like he was beneath you and thats why the original bus driver sent you in the wrong direction

Would he have said, "No you didn't, darling" to a man? I very much doubt it.
Also, I don't believe that men (except some really confidently flamboyantly gay ones) anywhere in the UK habitually call other men including complete strangers darling, pet, my lover and so on.

A lot of posters assuming that the woman in this story is
a) an uppity bitch; and
b) wrong

No its usually mate or pal or cock where im from
Where as women will call all and sundry the same generic term of enderament.

Big reach isn't it? And a ridiculous conclusion to arrive at.

I'm less annoyed at the darling shtick than his insistence I was lying. And no he would not have said it to a man.