What to call someone that verbally attacks you in public

[Jennifer]

I would probably smile, blow them a kiss and flip my hair and walk away.  Girls HATE that...it's like the ultimate diss from a ->-bleeped-<-.

This is such a perfect reaction to any small minded person who verbally attacks you!

Jenny

[Keaira]

What did the girl on the NYC subway do?

She kicked a guy's butt for calling her a guy.

[King Malachite]

I usually take the first option, but it does depend on where it is and how strong I'm feeling.

This happened to me once in a semi-public place, a community center where I'd been hanging out, getting counseling and free coffee, doing volunteer work, and going to various gatherings for years. I was still selectively closeted. One guy's kindergarten-aged son came running into the room wearing a fancy gown and plastic high heels from the dress up bin. This kid did stuff like this all the time, no matter how much his father got onto him. He came running in this one evening, so proud and pretty, and almost every single one of the 15 or so adults started making fun of him and saying nasty things and making bigoted jokes. I stood up and told them to stop it, that it was not okay to talk like that in that space.

They all turned on me. I'm not used to getting bullied as an adult, or at least not by so many people. It frankly scared the hell out of me, but I held my ground. The first comment/accusation was "Why do you care, are you one of them?"

I said yes of course are you blind. Is it not obvious. They said you still aren't gay or anything, gay people are gross, and you're just a girl. They said I was just a girl and there's nothing wrong with girls liking girls. I was shaking and told them they didn't know what they were talking about. Several people launched into mean-spirited and ignorant arguments about how messed up gay people are. I tried to explain that every vicious thing they said kept someone they loved in the closet. I tried to point out how happy that little boy was in his dress and that it didn't seem to matter to him whether he was a "->-bleeped-<-" or not. I tried to be honest and calm. I tried.

After that there was a period where whenever I'd walk in, everybody would stop talking. There was a lot of whispering about me. But no less than three people came to me in private and thanked me, and said they'd been too scared to say anything.

I don't hang out there anymore. It's obviously not a place for people like me, but when I do visit, I get hugs and I'm treated like one of the old guard. It's okay.

So yeah. But usually I just ignore it. Not worth bothering with.

Wow some of those adults are just so ill-informed.  That is excellent what you did and even better that a few of those adults were thankful and I'm sure the boy was too.  We need more people like you in the world.   


My ideal response is to not say anything or just to say "ok" with little to no eye contact and get away from the situation especially if it's in the public.    If thing's started to get rough and violent and I couldn't leave I would just back myself into a corner and when they try to attack beat them down so at least I can call it self defense.

[V M]

She kicked a guy's butt for calling her a guy.

LOL... I remember that one now!!!    She through him around like a rag doll!!!

[GinaDouglas]

"Your actions are a felony hate-crime.  Say it louder so more witnesses can hear you.  Go ahead, scream it at the top of your lungs."

That's what I say now.

I used to say, "You know what's worse than going to prison for beating up a ->-bleeped-<-?  Messing with the wrong ->-bleeped-<-, getting your ass kicked, and going to prison anyway."