My Question of the Day: You’re on public transportation during heavy rush-hour traffic. When you got on the bus/train, you were thankful there was one, empty seat left. You’ve got a long ride ahead of you, and you’re glad you don’t have to stand the entire way.

After sitting there for a few minutes, you realize why the seat was vacant. The person in the seat next to you is listening to his/her mp3 player at maximum volume, and you can hear every lyric, even though he/she has on headphones.

You find the lyrics highly offensive, and after a few stops you look around to see if there’s somewhere else to stand or sit.

There isn’t.

Everyone is packed into the bus/train, and you can’t even stand up where you are without bumping into the person who’s standing directly in front of you.

What do you do?

My 2 Cents: I’m quick to ask someone to turn his/her music down on public transportation. Usually, people are not offended or upset. They don’t necessarily realize how loud their music is, so I nicely and politely ask him/her to turn it down.

Only once did I have a young man try to get belligerent with me. When I asked him to turn his music down, he said, “You ain’t my momma.” I smiled at him and said very sweetly, “You’re right, but I know you probably have an amazing mother, and she wouldn’t appreciate you making her look badly out in public,” and I turned back around in my seat. About two seconds later, the volume went down.

I’m not going to sit anywhere and be annoyed and say nothing, and this is something that annoys me. I can’t do anything if they don’t comply, but I at least ask.

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Take a few moments to check out the tweets from Twitter on this subject:

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TankaBar_JasonD not much bothers me If like a grandma was getting offended I would ask them respectfully to turn it down.

tclarkusa What’s the saying ‘grin & bear it’ well, I would just do just that and sprint to the 1st avail seat.

JoshDamage I allow that person to enjoy their music. They do have headphones. I wud also put my headphones on and rock out.

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The commentary doesn’t have to end!

Please feel free to continue to add your comments below.

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