how do you deal with the inevitable hecklings?

[Seaton Begg]

Dear dear, I just got heckled while walking the small units home from school.

Welcome to the Green and Unpleasant Land.

[Gentleman-Adventurer]

Dear dear, I just got heckled while walking the small units home from school.

Welcome to the Green and Unpleasant Land.

If only we did have a bow of burning gold.

[Ben Hudson, Esq.]

Interesting thread. Posting for updates, if I may.

[Dreadful Sydney]

As a few have said, use humor. Use hecklers as a stone upon which to sharpen your wits. Above all, be confident. They want to humiliate you...you give them wit and confidence in return and they will be disarmed.

[Klynt Mahryd]

I think one idea would be to ignore them, and fix your eyes in the distance, like you have a very important meeting to go to.

[Sir Nazin Von Drala]

I think the Stop, Smile, and Say "Good one chap!" then waving and walking off would work.

[Commander Obadiah]

Dear dear, I just got heckled while walking the small units home from school.

That really gets my goat, surely these eejits can at least leave people alone in front of their children.

I was forced to curtail my response to a very hard stare.

You could at least have told them to stop being so silly and pull up their socks!

Commander C. Obadiah

Post Script: Well done on what you actually did.

[Random]

The most clever ruse I've ever heard was developed on the spot by a close friend of mine, who was one day accosted by five large young men while walking with his girlfriend. Recognizing that the situation could not be defused verbally, nor could it be fled, nor could he risk fighting them, as he could not defend the girl from multiple assailants, he improvised a very clever bluff. He snapped out his pocket knife and cut a gash in the palm of his hand, and declared to the attackers that he had just recently found out he had HIV, and that if they attacked him he would see to it that they all left infected.

While it was an outrageous story, the men were unwilling to risk it, and my friend was able to escape with his girlfriend, and without having to risk violence.

I've heard of similar tactics being used to good effect, though I've never had the occasion to try it myself. My father told me of a time, in his long-haired biker days, when he was accosted by several men of the more-muscles-than-brains variety in a drinking establishment. They made it clear that he would not be leaving with all of the blood, teeth, etc that he brought in with him. Obviously outnhumbered and outgunned, he pleasantly agreed with them, noting only that he would likely be able to make sure that one of them was in similar condition. He asked for volunteers. In the end, they decided they liked his courage, and the group's leader actually treated him to a drink.

My aunt worked as an auxiliary police officer in a mid-sized town for a number of years. The worst of her duties consisted of helping to round up the Friday and Saturday night drunks from a notoriously rowdy nightclub. She was ill-fitted for this duty; my family is not particularly large (I, as a 5'4" male, am about average, a bit on the tall side), and my aunt in particular is extremely petite. One weekend, she went to the bar to find a pathetically stereotypical musclebound, leather-clad troublemaker, threatening violence on anyone who approached him for purposes other than giving him alcohol. When she explained she was there to remove him, he made further threats. completely nonplussed, she approached to just outside arm's reacha nd stage-whispered to him some permutation of the following (I am afraid I do not remember the exact words):

"If you hit me, I will be forced to strike back. There are two possible outcomes. First, you win. Then you become the jackass who just beat up a girl half his size in front of your friends over there, and a lot of much bigger cops take you to jail. Second, I win. Keep in mind that you're drunk, and I have a baton and the training to use it. Then you become the guy who just got beat up by a girl half his size, and you still go to jail. So how about we take option three: I'll buy you a cup of coffee, and then you'll call a cab. Sound good?"

He took option three, for what it's worth.

[Ambie]

    I just shoot those who get too big for their breeches.  But I reckon that might not be best for those not from these parts.

But then I & me crewmates look right plum crazy and pokerish so most don't bother.  And no one bothers the Doc more than once.

But more on topic: Anywhere outside Indian Territory I rag proper to blend with the locals.  That avoid most problems and, if I can, I leave if there is a problem. But then I aint gots no pride to be worried about; I know who I be.

 If I can't leave then I shoots 'em, but that causes problems with the fiddling lawmen and family and such.

'Course if you meet me in the badlands you be fixen to have other woes then wanting to pitch a fit 'cause I gots brass goggles on my Stetson..... 

[Mad Maxine]

oooh, this is an interesting thread. I'll post later after reading more. Just didn't want to lose track of it.

[Herr Döktor]

Went to the opening night of the latest Indiana Jones flick, and, as I'd left my car at a friends house to catch the fast train, I had too walk past a group of slightly drunk Chavs in Hayes (Pretty much Chav central, for the uninitiated), dressed as Indy...

... I smiled at them and said "Guess what film I'm going to see?" and got a chorus of the theme tune, told I looked great, and had a short discussion as to whether the film would be any good!

Not sure what this shows, maybe they respect cultural icons?

[Atterton]

Well did you have a gun and whip with you at the time? 

[Herr Döktor]

Strangely, I rather thought that in the current climate that going armed might be considered antisocial; so no, unarmed but for my wit.

[A.G.Morgan]

Then the climate must be changed, it seems.

I must ask, as an American far removed from the old world, what exactly is a "Chav"? I've heard of them often in an unflattering tone, but never a detailed description.

[Lady Lavinea Dreadful]

Then the climate must be changed, it seems.

I must ask, as an American far removed from the old world, what exactly is a "Chav"? I've heard of them often in an unflattering tone, but never a detailed description.

to my knowledge they are what we reffer to as "thugs" or "gangstas" i think.

[elShoggotho]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chav ...every country has a special class of people who lend themselves to being kicked down upon.

[Mad Maxine]

America consists of a whole friggin' country full of people who are completely obsessed with having status, being normal (the definition of which varies by region), turning off their brains, watching sports, playing video games, imbibing in drugs and alcohol, and watching TV. Honestly, I'm so not impressed with most people that I can't even work up more than a moment's ire when one of the proles (mundanes) says something rude to me. And I'm more than happy to let them know, in no uncertain terms, that they don't impress me in the least.

I have had the good fortune to live in several cities that are filled with open-minded people. I have also lived smack-dab in the middle of the country (Kansas) surrounded by goat-ropers, where I was privileged to be the only girl in a 300 mile radius who was sporting a mohawk.

I was pestered to no end when I lived in Kansas. I had one near-fight with one guy, and I once told off a whole table full of cowboy posers. I was fortunate to be going through a masters program in Seattle with one of the guys on the local police force, so they all knew I was cool. I was also in really good shape at the time, and confident that most of the jerks out there were only big talkers. I managed to escape that hole unscathed and tougher than ever. 

No matter where you are, if you are creative, interesting, inventive, do your own thing,and don't look like everybody else, you're going to take a little flack for it. Even in Seattle, I occasionally get a stupid comment. Mostly, I've found that the key to survival is being really disarmingly nice. I have a slight advantage in that I get a big shit-eating grin when I'm nervous, and years of consulting means I can talk to just about anyone. Plus, I'm 40, I know I rock, and I just don't give a shit any more.

[Seaton Begg]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chav ...every country has a special class of people who lend themselves to being kicked down upon.

Chavs often do the kicking (when they can gang up on some passer-by).

The anti-Chav comments are not some snobbish put down of the 'working class youth'. There is nothing noble about the Chav.

[SteamKit]

Mostly posting for updates, but I do have something to contribute. In my experience I've found it's best to consider just who's heckling you, and let that guide your response. For example, my friend's redneck brother started fussing with my ushanka and making nasty comments, one winter. Told him to back off before I pummeled him into a meaty bag full of bone chips. He backed off. Now...I wouldn't do this to say...a stranger. Try and gauge who's bothering you and decide on an appropriate response. And walk away if you can! Failing that, if it's one on one, you'd be surprised the reactions you'll get if you drive your forehead into the top of their skull.

-Kit

[Vienna Fahrmann]

     Dear Maxine,

    Three cheers for you!

     Vienna

[Silas P. Morgan]

The closest that I get to being hassled was when Don was drinking at my Bosses bar snidely asked what I was dresses up as.... I just told him that I was a piano player in a cat house.... Everyone got a laugh about it, and it quickly shut Don up....

That was when I was wearing a bowler, recently, I purchased a pith helmet that I now wear. So far, other than friendly/silly comments about Jamangi, or "Livingston I presume" most people think it's kinda cool.

Maybe it's just because I don't take what I'm wearing too seriously... Of course, it's not unknown for me to walk into a bar dressed as a Pyrate... so the locals kinda expect me to dress differently.

[Mad Maxine]

Thanks Vienna. Same to you.


PS. To all, it also helps to remember that we're descended from monkeys. When you do that, the behavior of others becomes more fun to watch--as long as no one starts flinging poo.

[Zastrozzi]

Reminds me of a joke we used to have pinned to the wall in the newsroom where I worked:

"I'm a journalist.  Don't tell my mother, she'd be so disappointed.  She still thinks I play piano in a whorehouse."

[Zorch]

Looking back on it, I think growing up in the midwest where (for the most part) anything even slightly out of the norm is mercilessly ridiculed helped me build a little character, so its easier to shrug off the occasional snide remark.

Of course now, living in San Francisco it is kind of nice to stretch your creative side a little, be different, and know for a fact you wont get that much flak because the person sitting next on the bus looks like he a liquid magnet infected into his bloodstream then walked through a scrapheap. 

[Hikaro Takayama]

Yeah, I've found humor tends to work as well.....

I just recently bought two Fezzes, and wore them to work.  When some of the more redneckish folks there (although even they have gotten used to my rather eccentric headgear by now) made some comments about "shriners" or terrorists, I just whipped up my arab accent and said, "Hello, welcome to Ali's Discount Used Camel Lot.  We have a wide selection of quality, pre-owned, low mileage camels, and  buy-here, pay-here no-credit check financing."