I think a decent rule of thumb is not to say things to strangers that you wouldn’t want to say to their children. Wouldn’t make a weirdly sexual double entendre around a stranger’s ten year old? Then don’t say it to me, either! Wouldn’t ask what hotel the stranger’s ten year old is staying in, or pry into his thoughts…

I had a manspreader once in the center seat (I was at the window, bc I am ALWAYS at the window) and even though he was not a heavy set guy he acted like it, he kept spreading wider and wider, basically crushing me against the bulkhead. And he also couldn’t keep his hands away from his crotch. Till the attendant came…

I hope you said, “The olds of yesteryear, they used to pull themselves up by their bootstraps instead of mooching cookies from strangers.”

I’m sure you know this already, but it rarely hurts to hear it again: none of that was your fault, you didn’t invite it, and he was completely in the wrong. It’s not your responsibility to correct his behavior. You did the best you could in a stressful, potentially dangerous situation (you were worried he’d follow you…

This is instructive for dudes, as well. Four or five years ago, I was on a flight with an attractive woman my age seated next to me. I was single at the time. We made small talk (nothing suggestive, I didn’t hit on her) and she seemed apprehensive the whole time. I figured either she didn’t like me or she didn’t like…

Don’t you dare apologize or blame yourself for this anymore. (To be clear, this was well-written, thoughtful, and I thank you for sharing it!). My ‘don’t you dare’ is just the reminder that we all need and deserve in these situations.

I was on a Southwest flight (paid for my Group A boarding, picked out my perfect window seat) early in the morning the other day, and a guy sat in the middle seat. He manspreaded the entire time. Throughout the flight, every 15 minutes or so, he would reach into his basketball shorts and give himself a good thorough…

I’d say that the primary reason (besides racism obvs) a lot of white people ( especially middle and upper class white people ) don’t get this issue is that they have never personally had any sort of encounter with a police officer who has abused their authority , acted insane and/or treated them like shit. They might…

Good grief. I totally understand - I was never harassed that way, but once woke up during a red eye flight to find my neighbor masturbating under his blanket, and I pretended I was still asleep because I was so embarrassed and just didn’t know how to react. I’ve witnessed men masturbating on the train and on the…

Tell them to bring their own cookies! Good lord.

YES! I hate it when people are like “but Eric Garner was committed a crime.” Nearly everyone has committed a minor crime at some point, be it speeding or swiping a candy bar. Should everyone be killed?

I always get old ladies who scold me for not sharing my cookies with them seated next to me

Just an FYI, racist Yahoo commenters are the people who can’t figure out how to comment on YouTube.

The most virulent—and most common—echo chambers on the Internet belong to the ultraconservative, who require near constant peer confirmation to convince themselves that their status quo is not dying.

“Do I think about who he was as a person? Not really, because it doesn’t matter at this point. Do I think he had the best upbringing? No. Not at all.”

Yet, somehow Wilson feels that Brown’s alleged theft of cigarillos from a corner store (as cited in the Justice Department’s report) made Brown a “bad guy”

I am both impressed and dismayed that you waded into the yahoo comment pool.

This country is fucked. I posted a comment critical of Wilson on Yahoo’s mention of this and in less than two minutes, I was downvoted so hard that they cloaked my comment for poor reviews. 2,000+ comments on that article and most of them are racist as fuck.

Yup, this happened to me as well. It’s ridiculous. I hate being stuck on a plane with nowhere to escape to. (And of course, we always are the ones who have to move and inconvenience ourselves by moving further from our luggage and such.) Such entitled assholes.

I’ve been there. (Well, not exactly; happened in a hotel room with other people, not on a plane.) I froze. I blamed myself. But I did learn from that. I now make a fuss when men touch me inappropriately. Because fuck our upbringing. Fuck all of that. I hope you get to this place soon.