Today I had an interaction with a man that really highlighted how emotionally unstable and violent men can become at the slightest provocation. I was going to my favorite restaurant to pick up some dinner after work. I live in an area with very bad roads and this meant I was going fairly slowly (15-20mph max) looking for a place to parallel park. I didn’t signal far in advance as I only saw the spot once I’d past one of those giant pickup trucks that was parked immediately before it, but given how slow I was already going to avoid damaging my car on the potholes it was still a fairly gentle stop. As I park a car pulls along side me with a pair of men in it and they begin to wave at me to roll down the window. Assuming they are trying to get my attention to likely tell me a break light is out or that a tire is flat (as has happened in the past) I roll down the window. As I do they start screaming at me that I almost caused them to wreck and stopped too quickly and I need to use my turn single sooner. Admittedly, probably with a bit of a smirk, I flip them off, roll up my window and decide to roll around the block once more so I don’t have to deal with them.

This is where things take a turn for the more ominous. I get the impression they might be following me and they honk there horns and keep shouting when we reach a red light. I continue to drive and ignore them until they get lost behind me in the rush hour traffic. I circle back to find a spot. I don’t see anyone in sight after that and go happily pick up my food — Maybe a little shaken, but mostly rolling my eyes.

Upon returning back to my car I’ve just gotten into the driver seat and who do I see across the road walking up but one of the two men! Still yelling! This unhinged scrote had parked, split up with his friend, and walked around to find me assuming I would be parking somewhere still.

Ladies, as much as this is a scary situation. I. HAD. ENOUGH. I had tried to avoid escalation by circling the road but now I was cornered and LIVID. I locked my doors, cracked the window so my voice could project through it and I just started SCREAMING at this man. I yelled as loud as I could down the road with other people on it to turn as many heads as possible. I yelled that it was his problem for tail gating so closely he nearly hit me! I screamed he was following me! And a creep! I screamed and asked him what the hell was wrong with him! And yelled and just let every bit of anger pour out of my body! Then I told him if he took a single damn step towards my car I’d take it as a threat and run over him accordingly while angling my car aggressively toward him out of my spot.

He appeared to rethink his aggression at that moment and his advance stopped. He moved out of my way like the cowardly skid mark on humanity that he is. And he is most certainly cowardly. He saw a small woman on her own and thought he could intimidate and threaten using his size. Be safe out there ladies. Use your voices as a weapon to get attention when you are in a dangerous situation. Use makeshift weapons (even your car) to level the playing field. Do whatever it takes to not make yourself an easy target. I shudder to think how this could have gone differently if he had gotten to me before I got in my car or if I hadn’t acted loudly and aggressively enough to scare him off.