Yesterday afternoon I made my usual commute home, but it was not the pleasant ride I've come to expect. I walk from my office through downtown to the underground, where I hop on the light rail that runs from the University of Washington through downtown, then up the Martin Luther King corridor to the airport. It's usually a very pleasant ride, 35 minutes. Sometimes its crowded, and rarely crowded enough I have to stand.
There has been an effort by the local press, egged on by the always anti-transit conservative press, to document a spate of assaults on public transit in the past year. So that's also very much on my mind.
As the train exited the underground and started through the light industrial zone, a man got on with a bicycle. He was white, scruffy and dirty, dressed in overalls and carrying a bucket and squeegee. I was sitting on the bench next to the doors, and an attractive young woman in her mid-20s was sitting next to me.
He started talking at her. He got louder and louder. She started to look away uncomfortably, and other people on the train were getting equally uncomfortable. I decided to try something: I very deliberately pulled out my cell phone and took his photograph.
"Hey, you! You think you can just take my picture like that?" He turned his attention to me. He didn't move any closer, fortunately. But he then went on a rant. "You. I never forget a face. I will never forget you. If I see you twenty years from now, if some fool like you even lives that long, I will deliver my punishment on you. I will. I never forget. Never. You can't just take someone's picture like that without permission." On and on like that for the entire rest of the ride. I managed to deflect his attention from the woman, but that didn't make the rest of the ride at all pleasant. He went from demanding attention to making vague but abusive threats.
When I reached the commuter station, I was able to get off. He stayed on, with the woman. There was only one more stop left.
This is the United States. Where the fucking homeless are armed. In fucking Seattle. Where anyone and everyone could be a target because of our gun culture. And where anyone can become a poorly trained, adrenaline-activated "good guy with a gun" and actually create more injury. "Terrified" doesn't begin to cover what situations like this begin to be with that kind of awareness floating around just days after the Orlando massacre. Where I end up on a train looking at some scruffy lowlife who could end me and everyone else on this train if he got pissed off enough.
America is a horror show. So many things, enforced by guns at the low level, and by courts controlled by the powerful at the high, work to keep us cowed.
There has been an effort by the local press, egged on by the always anti-transit conservative press, to document a spate of assaults on public transit in the past year. So that's also very much on my mind.
As the train exited the underground and started through the light industrial zone, a man got on with a bicycle. He was white, scruffy and dirty, dressed in overalls and carrying a bucket and squeegee. I was sitting on the bench next to the doors, and an attractive young woman in her mid-20s was sitting next to me.
He started talking at her. He got louder and louder. She started to look away uncomfortably, and other people on the train were getting equally uncomfortable. I decided to try something: I very deliberately pulled out my cell phone and took his photograph.
"Hey, you! You think you can just take my picture like that?" He turned his attention to me. He didn't move any closer, fortunately. But he then went on a rant. "You. I never forget a face. I will never forget you. If I see you twenty years from now, if some fool like you even lives that long, I will deliver my punishment on you. I will. I never forget. Never. You can't just take someone's picture like that without permission." On and on like that for the entire rest of the ride. I managed to deflect his attention from the woman, but that didn't make the rest of the ride at all pleasant. He went from demanding attention to making vague but abusive threats.
When I reached the commuter station, I was able to get off. He stayed on, with the woman. There was only one more stop left.
This is the United States. Where the fucking homeless are armed. In fucking Seattle. Where anyone and everyone could be a target because of our gun culture. And where anyone can become a poorly trained, adrenaline-activated "good guy with a gun" and actually create more injury. "Terrified" doesn't begin to cover what situations like this begin to be with that kind of awareness floating around just days after the Orlando massacre. Where I end up on a train looking at some scruffy lowlife who could end me and everyone else on this train if he got pissed off enough.
America is a horror show. So many things, enforced by guns at the low level, and by courts controlled by the powerful at the high, work to keep us cowed.
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