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Vice Blog

PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION IS FULL OF DICKS

Yesterday a 36-year-old disabled lady in London spoke out about getting the

shit kicked out of her

by another parent whose stroller bumped into hers on the bus. I can't figure out what's more depressing--the act itself, or the fact that no one on the bus intervened or has even come forward with a witness statement for police yet. This is how societies are supposed to work, you pussies. If

this guy

had been there, you know he wouldn't have stood for that shit. Anyway, London's one of the busiest hubs in this sad, sick world and, as anyone who lives here knows, its buses and tubes are regular arenas for all the sadness and the sickness that pour out of it. They can be great when it's 11pm and you're high and need someone to talk to, but if you're anything other than an emotionally invincible psychopath, more often than not journeys on public transport are hellish ordeals that corral you into spending time with idiots like these.

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THE SLEEPY DRUNK

We'll start with a guy everyone knows. He's fighting pretty hard to throw off all the old cliches in that video up there, but that doesn't change the fact that his DNA is smeared across every shoulder in London.

How to deal with it:

Tougher than it sounds. If you wake him up, he might do that thing where he starts shaking and screaming because he doesn't know where he is, or he thinks you've woken him because a bomb warning's just come over the tannoy. Probably better than leaving him and getting a lap full of face, though.

THE MAN WHO REFUSES TO PAY HIS BUS FARE AND WHOSE ARGUMENT WITH THE DRIVER MAKES EVERYONE ELSE FIVE MINUTES LATE

This guy usually gets on wearing a hood and trainers in an attempt to qualify for TfL's "Under 16s Ride For Free" scheme, but doesn't tend to persist with this ruse for very long: flying into a wild, indignant rage once questions are raised about his facial hair, heavily bloodshot eyes, and poorly concealed can of Special Brew. There is no emotional or logical universe in which he should be able to win this battle, but this does not matter to The Man Who Refuses To Pay His Fare And Whose Argument With The Driver Makes Everyone Else Five Minutes Late, because he knows the driver will usually relent after those five minutes for fear of hemorrhaging the service and getting shit from his boss. It seems this problem is not restricted to London:

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Or to men:

Though maybe she does have a point.

How to deal with it:

Tell him to ride the bendy (free) bus with all the other sad-eyed homeless alcoholics and upper middle class hipsters.

THE MAN WHO HASN'T FIGURED OUT HOW TO EAT YET

I didn't pay my fare just to hear the saliva sloshing around in your mouth, you fucking neanderthal. Apparently I'm not alone on this one--

this man

was considering dumping his girlfriend because of it, and the guy below got so mad he marched straight home and forced his five-year-old son to star in an instructional short just to demonstrate how retarded you have to be to have reached adulthood without figuring out how to get food into your body: The kid himself is quite annoying, actually. I'm not sure if that invalidates my point or not. I don't think it does, because smacking your mouth when you eat is the worst thing in the entire world.

How to deal with it:

Termination of life. An eye for an eye.

THE MOTHER WHO WON'T STOP HER CHILD CEASELESSLY RINGING THE BUS BELL

It's not the kid's fault. If you've spent as much time hanging around parks watching them play as I have you know by now that children aren't real people yet, and that they have tiny brains. It's the parent's job to ensure that the pink mush slopping up against the insides of their soft skulls reaches full size without straying too far from the uniform shape, and endlessly ringing a bell within earshot of 100 or so other people is a telltale sign of more socially destructive behaviors to come (stage school, fake rape claims, etc). As such, it must be nipped in the bud, but kids' parents are the only people who are allowed to hit them.

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How to deal with it:

I don't know, I haven't got a child.

THE TOUGH GUYS

Tube violence is rare because there are so many exits. Never start a fight on a bus, because the only way you can back down is if you lose. If you don't lose, the police will get there eventually and find dozens of ready made witnesses, all of whom are pissed off because even if you're not the one who "started it," in their minds you're a worse version of The Man Who Refuses To Pay His Fare And Whose Argument With The Driver Makes Everyone Else Five Minutes Late. If it's gone too far and you've already put up your dukes, the best thing you can hope for is that the bus will drive off and the both of you will back down at the same time and laugh about it together. Though there could be more than one of them and they could all have knives.

How to deal with it:

Ignore it and hope it goes away.

THE SINGERS AND THE SODCASTERS

Singing on public transport is obviously massively gay, as illustrated by the bell-end in the stripey jumper up there who thinks his life is a Richard Curtis film. But why does everyone act like

sodcasting

is cool now? Just because I'm riding with you doesn't mean I want to know you're there.

How to deal with it:

Ring the bell ceaselessly, demand a refund, spit food in their face, start a fight, fall asleep. KEV KHARAS