So last night I pull into a gas station at about 12:30 A.M. to grab a bottle of Red Bull® energy drink. I pull into a parking space where there are two college-age boys in the car next to it.
What do these little punks do? They start throwing something at my car (walnuts? gumballs?) and laughing hysterically, like it’s the funniest thing ever.
I wanted to get out of my car and learn the little punks a lesson in manners, but Misdemeanor Assault would get me a one-way ticket to the Sangamon County lockup. Talking to them was out of the question, as 19-year-olds who think throwing walnuts at a car is funny are obviously beyond reasoning with. Calling the cops would have been pointless; as if cops in this community don’t have bigger fish to fry than little punks throwing walnuts at parked cars.
So, my only option is to drive away or just stay there and take it.
GGRRRRR!!!
If this was the schoolyard and I was 8, this matter could have been settled Old School (with fists). But now that I’m an adult…
…and thus you demonstrate, by example, another glaring problem with our society. Punks like those are able to run wild and do things that are assholic, and not only do they feel no remorse, it is actually fun to them! And the law is either too busy, or doesn’t give a shit.
And what can you do to stop it? Nothing, like you said. Welcome to the New America - where all innocent law abiding citizens are the victims.
It will only get worse. Call me a pessimist, but I see in 30-40 years a society of completely disarmed and helpless individuals, “protected” by a corrupt and uncaring police force controlled by a union that uses extortionist tactics to get a 10% raise each year (“sick out’s”, anyone?). The result being that the strong rule the weak by force in day-to-day society, and the petty criminals run wild.
And anyone that thinks sitting there and letting punk criminals pelt your car with walnuts is “not so bad”…well, look at what it really means. It means:
These people are out looking for trouble.
They have no problem with offending and tormenting a random stranger who has done them no harm.
They have no problem with causing physical damage to another person’s property (yeah, big deal, a paint chip or door ding. Well, it’s a big deal if it’s your car, and you take care of it!).
They could very quickly (IMO) escalate to anything else, if it was also “fun” for them. Like gang rape. (ok, that may be hyperbole…or may not be)
About the only thing you can do is complain to the owner of the store, take down the license of the car, and call the police anyway. You may find a cop that is bored enough that they may decide to pull them over and harass them. Maybe.
Or maybe this is an example of what a wonderful society we have where the worst you have to worry about is kids throwing walnut shells at your car. You’re making a huge leap based on a tiny assumption, which is that there was nothing Rastahomie could have done in this situation. Which is not true. He (not the police) made the evaluation that the offense was too trivial to make it worth calling in. You are the one leaping to the assumption that the law “doesn’t give a shit”. Frankly, I bet if you called the cops and said that there were some kids acting up and that maybe they should check and make sure that they weren’t driving while drunk or high, the kids probably would have been rousted and spent an uncomfortable few minutes at least.
Now I’m not sure what you’re suggesting as an alternative, but your reference to “unarmed” later in your rant suggests that you feel that Rastahomie should have been able to enforce politeness by waving a sidearm around. I can’t think of anything more likely to escalate the situation from petty annoyance to life-changing tragedy.
Is that really the worst that he has to worry about in our society today? Can you back that up with anything?
I did say that he should call the police anyways. Reading is fundamental.
:rolleyes: That’s some assumption you jumped to there. Besides, I was referring to the future in my “rant”, and said nothing about guns whatsoever. Please show where I suggested or hinted that he “wave a sidearm around”. I said he should complain to the owner of the store, take the license down, and call the police.
Show where I suggested he do otherwise. Or retract it. Two choices, pick one.
I have no desire to get in a pissing contest with you. I am merely irritated that you took an instance of some college-age kids acting like assholes to go off on a rant about modern society in general.
Guess what? College age kids have been acting like assholes for 1000’s of years. Long before colleges were invented. This isn’t a sign of society’s disintegration.
You can’t extrapolate one from the other.
You may have valid reasons to think that society is going to hell in a handbasket, but this isn’t one of them.
Well, the way things go lately in Amurrika, it was not totally unlikely that if Rasta had done or said anything at all to those guys, even something as simple as “Hey”, one or both of them coulda produced a weapon and decided to exercise his Second Amendment rights.
And experience dictates that if he had actually called the police, as soon as he’d established to the dispatcher’s satisfaction that it was a non-emergency situation, a “unit” would have been dispatched, oh, maybe sometime in the next hour. Or maybe not. The 911 people have more important things to do than chase around after “possibly drunk” college kids, especially in Springfield.
I’m such a cynic.
And I dunno what good complaining to the owner of the store is gonna do. What’s he supposed to do–take down their license plate and physical descriptions and refuse to serve them the next time they come in? Fat chance. Nope, I think dealing with jerks has just always been a part of human existence, and sometimes there’s just nothin’ you can do about them except wait for Mother Nature to weed them out of the gene pool.
Well, in some jurisdictions the police give much more attention to “repeat problems”. For example, in a city next to mine there is a “policy” that if a store owner complains three times about the same teenager parking their same car in their lot and drinking (something they do Fridays and Saturdays here) then the car is towed and impounded, no further warnings given. And after $500 to $1000 in impound fees, they get it back.
Had you simply acted like you were about to beat the hell out of them they probably would have left fairly quickly. Because while you know that would happen. They being college age kids don’t.
Whatever happened to telling someone to fuck off in very colourful, creative ways? If nothing else, it’ll give you a chance to escape while they wonder what you said.
So whats wrong with throwing some red bull energy drink at their lame asses? if they where throwing stuff at you i assume their window was open, try to aim for the stereo
The thing that keeps petty, mean, rude behavior in check is not and never has been any sort of formal, legal response. It is social censure, pure and simple, that keeps us all from letting our inner child out to play. The way to respond to situations like this is to convey, through actions more than words, that the incredible childishness of the people being asses just blows you away. Now, one guy doing this is just a person to be laughed at–and there is no helping that–but those of us who managed to learn empathy and manners didn’t do it because of some innate goodness in our soul. We learned it because we didn’t like it when the people around us thought we were spoiled brats. All you can do is pass this along.
As an aside, this is why I really loathe the way our society seems to clump people up so strictly by age–one is a pre-schoolerer, middle-schooler, teenager, college kid, twenty-something and so on and so forth, and many kids grow up to be totally socialized by other kids, not by people that are older and younger than them. This sort of incestous grouping keeps people from being exposed to other points of view, and protects them from social censure at an age when it makes a big impression.
I deal with this kinda stuff every once in a while at the Amusement park I work at. These guys were most likely trying to provoke a fight. Many people would come charging over and take a poke at the walnut tosser and would then propmtly be trounced by all three of them. Then they trot away a giggly that they got to kick your ass.
Contact the store owner/manager/PIC. They can tell them to leave, if the “guest” refuses to leave they can call in PD and ask to press charges for Tresspassing. At most they will be cited and released but if they develop a habit of collecting little citations they will eventually do something warranting an arrest and when they end up in court they will be less likely to be lenient due to their history. If nobody complains, the history never develops, and they go on freely causing problems because nobody dares to oppose them.
If the business refuse to address the issue:
A: call PD and tell them if somebody doesnt come down you are going to confront them yourself. They would much rather deal with the little vandalism and attitude pitching than multiple assaults and or maybe a murder :eek:
B: dont ever shop there again and write a letter explaining why, if its a chain store, write it to regional and or corporate management, attitudes will be adjusted.
C: IANAL but threaten to sue the store for damages caused by their customers. If it costs you money to fix a bunch of dings and paint chips after you asked the business to intervene, they probably can and should be held responsible if they refuse to act.
A few years back, in a town nearby, something similar happened to an unlucky guy and his girfriend. This poor soul was being harassed by three young punks (one was the son of a policeman) in the parking lot of a 7-11 store. The guy got a baseball bat out of the trunk, and went after the punks. Unfortunately, they got it away from him, and he wound up with a fractured skull-so severe that he died! The girlfriend called the police, but they got there too late. At any rate, the three were convicted of manslaughter, but this doesn’t bring back the dead.
The moral of the story…DO NOT (UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES) pick a fight with these maggots, just get the hell away from them! Even if you “teach them a lesson”, you might very well GO TO JAIL for assaulting a minor! I shudder to think if the policeman’s son had been injured-you would have a damage suit on your hands! That is the paradox of the law today-it protects the guilty, and injures the innocent! You can always have your car repainted-it is NOT WORTH risking your life to get into a fight!
Not that I’d do anything to stoop to their level, but armed with a cell phone and a shiteating grin, I think I could probably make their evening a little less pleasant.
My boyfriend called me a punk like two days ago. I was shocked. I never considered myself a punk. I asked one of my friends if he considered me a punk and he said, “yeah, you’re pretty much a punk.” What exactly defines a person as a punk? I certainly do not throw things at other people’s cars.
Thanks Cykrider, you’ve always known the sweetest things to say to me.
The answer is simple…you need a posse. Imagine their surprise when they throw a walnut at your car and you get out followed by three hulking mobsters in Armani suits and well-calloused knuckles. One stern look from Rocco, Vince, and Ice Pick, and those punks will find another hobby.
Oh no, you need a French posse. Imagine the fear someone like Jacques “Ice Pick” LaBottomy (graduate and professor, Medical School of Hard Knocks and Really Dangerous Metal Things, College of Neurosurgery) could strike into a moronic college-age kid. Maybe a few ‘Teenage Lobotmies’ are in order, to teach those idiots what real punks, such as the Ramones, are made of.
If that doesn’t work, you can get Jean-Luc “Cattle Prod” Boviere to adminster some ‘Shock Treatment’.
