Public confrontation - loss mentioned

Maebb

We were just at dinner, and the woman at the table behind us was talking way too loudly, first of all. She said that women in Muslim countries must not be oppressed and actually probably have it better than women here because at least they have had female heads of state. She said she would vote for Sarah Palin for president. She said that the chance of miscarriage goes way up after hearing the heartbeat. She told this awful story about how a woman's fetus died inside her around third trimester, and she didn't know it or didn't get medical treatment for it, and it became toxic and poisoned her and she died. Then someone else at the table told a story about someone who got IVF and couldn't get pregnant, but then a year later she got pregnant while on the pill and while her H was using a condom, but the condom broke. She was like, "No, that's impossible, they must be not telling the whole story. If the IVF didn't work, there's no way she would get pregnant that way."

I'm fine with political opinions that are different from mine, but the miscarriage "fact" was absolutely false (coming from someone who has had two m/c's in the first 6 weeks and who has done extensive research on it), and the toxic pregnancy story was just not really appropriate to be talking about at such a loud volume in a crowded restaurant.

I tried hard not to listen, but her voice was piercing. DH said it would be better not to say anything to her, so I just ordered another drink. Have you ever confronted a stranger when they were saying false or offensive things?

klondikebar

I try to ignore people. I agree with Spooko about it not being a good scenario for correcting someone. I will definitely give a dirty look if someone is being offensive.

LaurelBee

I would've asked (loudly) to be reseated. I'm sure loudy louderson would've gotten the cue.

persephonerose

I haven't but we were at a family dinner last year for MIL's birthday and these people at the table near us were very drunk and loud. We asked the wait staff several times if they could ask the people to keep it down. We were in a very small house that was converted to a restaurant so it was tight quarters.

Eventually BIL lost it and slammed his hand down on our table, turned around and told them to shut up that no one cared about their trip to Italy or the crappy wine they had there.  Needless to say they left very quickly afterwards. It was awful.

littlestjerry

Holy shit, @fredalina!!! I would die! 

lifesaverz

peanutrach1 said:

Unless they are trying to talk to me directly, I do not get involved. Even if someone does try to draw me in I try to say as little as possible. There are a lot of crazy ppl out there and I don't want to get involved in that. I prefer to ignore them and talk about them later.

This is pretty much my feeling. With all the crazy shit that happens & stories I've seen on the news about people getting beaten to death by strangers & whatnot due to some dumb altercation, I just feel like it's not worth it. DH & I have discussed this too, you just never know what people are capable of. The most I usually do is maybe an eye roll & then we sit & talk about them to ourselves.

lifesaverz

@fredalina‌ , holy moly!! Wow I would just die in that situation!

Maebb

@fredalina‌, wow that ex-mil sounds truly awful. Your response seemed pretty tame. It's so hard for me to hold my tongue in situations like that even though I know it's pointless to argue because people like that are generally not really interested in talking rationally about their views or hearing alternate opinions.