In this day and age, I feel like everyone knows that using headphones in public is proper etiquette.
That doesn’t mean, of course, that people will always comply.
OP was on a bus where some people were playing loud and (subjectively) offensive music without headphones.
This was a few years ago on a 13 hour Greyhound trip when I was in the middle of a mental breakdown.
These people were listening to music loudly, and if that wasn’t bad enough it was just awful.
When OP tried several tactics to get them to stop, someone else started doing the same thing just to add to the chaos.
It was driving me nuts, so I tried politely asking them to use headphones. They refused because they had kids based on the claim the kids needed entertained. So I told them to give the kids headphones.
This led to me getting cussed out, which led to a heated argument.
Another passenger started listening to music loudly just to troll me at this point.
I tried to get the bus driver to enforce the rule that says headphones are required to listen to music on the bus. He threatened to dump me on the side of the road instead.
So, OP figured a little taste of their own medicine would go a long way.
I kind of hit my limit at that point and decided to share my misery with the whole bus. I said,
“Ok. Since we’re not enforcing the rules about not being noisy and using headphones, I’ll just sing.”
Now, it should be noted that while I don’t have the best voice I am a trained vocalist from childhood. I can at least avoid sounding like a strangled cat… If I want to.
I didn’t want to.
I launched into a very loud, hoarse, and off key rendition of The Song That Never Ends.
It took one sing through for the troll to put headphones in.
And it worked!
It took a couple loops before the whole bus was screaming at the other passengers to either put in headphones or turn off their music so that I would shut up.
We rode the rest of the way in blissful silence.
The top comment says these people deserved what they got.
Can we also make this not be a thing?
I cannot even imagine.
You really do learn a lot hanging around in public.
This does have the potential to be entertaining.
I would never have been so bold.
It’s certainly entertaining to read about, though.
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