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Outrageous harasser on the morning commute

March 24, 2010 By Contributor

Photo by contributor

I board the bus heading to work this morning. The driver wishes me “good morning,” I return the favor, tap my SmartTrip card and head to the back of the bus where I find an available seat. I get lost in space as I read my book.

At Rosslyn, a man comes on the bus, looking mad as I don’t know what. He’s rambling, cursing about this or that, and just gives me this bad vibe. He sits two seats down from me, clumping his backpack down between us really hard. He pulls out his paper, cursing while he reads.

He says something to me, but I ignore it, thinking he’s saying something ignorant. Then I chose to move away from him, and he gets pissed.

“Fuck you,” he says. “When a black man tries to talk to you, you run away, but when a white man talks to you you smile and get all happy. Stuck up black bitch! You love the white man’s dick. You’ll suck a white man’s dick! You ain’t shit anyway. You ain’t got no ring on your finger. Ain’t no one want you. And you got knotty dreads – nasty. You probably ain’t wash yo’ dreads ‘cuz you afraid…”

All this nonsense when I was trying to read a damn book!

I pull out my phone…

“Go ahead, call someone! You ain’t got no one to talk to,” he says.

…and take his photo in the rare moment he wasn’t looking. Then I head to the front of the bus, away from this fool, and ask the driver to call the police.

“This guy is on the back of the bus cursing at me for no reason at all,” I said. “Telling me I suck white man’s dick and other nonsense.”

The guy walked up front from the back of the bus and starts saying more crap! He’s directly behind me at this point.

“I opened a window and she got all scared and moved away!” the crazy man yelled. “I tried to ask her about the window and she ignored me and moved away.”

“I didn’t realize you opened a window!” I said. “You were sitting at the back of the bus, cursing and ranting, talking about me sucking white man’s dick—“

“Watch your mouth!” the driver snapped. “You two need to stop.”

Why was I getting blamed? I didn’t raise my voice or curse, and I was only repeating what the guy had been saying to me.

“Go ahead, cry and whine to the driver,” the crazy guy continues. “You all fine until someone insults you, then you want to cry like a baby.”

“I am not crying,” I said, calmly. “You don’t see me crying.” This was so frustrating.

The crazy guy goes to the back of the bus, still ranting and cursing, and a nice gentleman gave up his seat in the front of the bus so I could get away from this guy. I had the foresight to have Metro Police’s number on my phone, so I called them, described the guy, told them the bus route and bus number, and where we were located at. Sure, the driver can tell me “good morning” but he’s pretty much useless for anything else.

The crazy guy got off a few stops before I did, so I called Metro Police back to let them know that.

“You’ve just gotta stay humble,” the guy at the front of the bus said. “Guys like him are everywhere. All you can do is keep your cool, don’t let it get to you…” and stuff I was just too distracted to take in at the moment.

When I got off the bus I thanked the guy and told him to have a good day. Yet I feel numb. I’m just so used to being sexually harassed that I’m surprised I didn’t start getting angry, or cursing, or crying or showing some kind of emotion. All those people on that bus just sat there and watched me get cursed out and called names because I chose to ignore a crazy lunatic on the bus. Is this like Pay-Per-View or morning entertainment to them?

Things need to change. Not only do harassers need to be held accountable for what they do, the people who sit idly by and watch this stuff happen need to do so as well.

– anonymous

Location: 38B towards Farragut Square (Bus #2600), Washington DC

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Filed Under: Stories, street harassment Tagged With: bus harasser, racial harassment, sexual harassment, street harasser, street harassment, Washington DC

Comments

  1. northporter says

    March 24, 2010 at 1:45 pm

    Horrible… They teach the drivers not to do anything… I wish they would at least make a call to the HQ to let them know… even if cops don’t come out they need to know what is going on. I love riding the bus.. but I hate crazy people. Even if he was mad about you not talking to him why the heck did he bring the race card into it? Dude was nuts. I hope you feel better. I’m sorry this happened to you.

  2. b says

    March 24, 2010 at 1:49 pm

    That sounds so scary. I’m really sorry that happened to you.

  3. Golden Silence says

    March 24, 2010 at 2:04 pm

    They teach the drivers not to do anything… I wish they would at least make a call to the HQ to let them know…

    Exactly! He should’ve done something. Instead he jumped in and blamed her for what was going on. At least she called the transit police on that loser, so they’ll have a record of it.

  4. Ericka says

    March 26, 2010 at 11:55 am

    FYI, I saw this link on MetroMan’s website.
    WOW, sorry you had to go through this but I’m glad you had the abilities to call Metro Police. You should also report this to Metro b/c that driver should be re-trained in what he is supposed to do in situations like this. If one of his passengers is being threatened by another, he should radio it in and alert Metro Police….not just keep driving.
    Me on the other hand…..dude would have been on the first thing smoking headed to the nearest hospital with stab wounds.

  5. Golden Silence says

    March 26, 2010 at 4:33 pm

    …b/c that driver should be re-trained in what he is supposed to do in situations like this.

    A lot of drivers, not just him and not just in DC, need to be retrained in how to handle emergency situations. Just driving the bus is not enough.

    I’m still shaking my head at how people just sat and watched a woman be belittled and demeaned like that. Have people just lost their humanity? This is not the only story I’ve read on here or on other sites involving bystander syndrome. Something needs to change.

  6. dre says

    September 9, 2010 at 12:20 pm

    LOL!!!!

  7. Golden Silence says

    September 9, 2010 at 12:46 pm

    dre, I fail to see the humor in this story.

  8. Frank Talk says

    December 19, 2010 at 2:30 pm

    While what this guy did was crazy, he was just reacting to centuries and centuries of racial oppression of black men.

  9. Golden Silence says

    December 20, 2010 at 2:10 pm

    While what this guy did was crazy, he was just reacting to centuries and centuries of racial oppression of black men.

    So taking out his issue on a black woman he didn’t know was okay? I don’t think so! That’s the lamest excuse I’ve heard.

  10. Kami says

    July 6, 2011 at 2:21 pm

    Wow! I’m fortunate enough not to have to encounter people like this in my commute, but unfortunately, I encounter these types of sick Black men at my job. They feel they need to put down Black women so they can feel better about themselves. I call it “kick the dog” syndrome. I can generally only shake my head and wonder why… Why do you think that black women (or women in generally) need to put up with your crap? Get therapy if your life sucks! I swear, the picture of that sick guy looks just like the “nasty” men at my job and it makes me feel physically ill.

    I’m sorry for your bad experience. Try to hold you head high, ignore the equally sick people that “sin in silence” by ignoring your plight and just try to imagine how much better of a person you are when compared to the disturbed people you are surrounded by.

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SSH will not publish any comment that is offensive or hateful and does not add to a thoughtful discussion of street harassment. Racism, homophobia, transphobia, disabalism, classism, and sexism will not be tolerated. Disclaimer: SSH may use any stories submitted to the blog in future scholarly publications on street harassment.
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