Hehe yeah. In my city there's an ordinance against smoking at a bus stop. It's a 300 ticket if a cop happens to pull up while you're having a smoke (which I used to call 'bus-callers' because it always seemed like as soon as I lit up, the bus would suddenly appear). I had a pack of smokes on me but I knew about this new ordinance so I wasn't smoking. A woman walked into the bus stop shelter and was waving her smoke around. I lifted my pack out of my shirt pocket to identify myself as a fellow smoker and said 'Not trying to make a fuss, but I just wanted you to be aware it's a 300 dollar ticket if you get caught smoking in the bus stop'. She went BALLISTIC. "I don't need to hear anything more from YOU!"she yelled, and and started stomping around, just furious with me. So many anti smokers had given her a hard time that she wouldn't even listen to a friendly word of advice from a fellow smoker. She was livid, and I didn't respond well for trying to do a good deed getting yelled at for it. Point being that the ANTZ and their ilk have just terrorized people into being wholly irrational and defensive. It's no wonder cloud chasers are blowing vapor in people's faces and saying 'NYAH!' I feel like doing that too, sometimes. Regarding the OP, though, I can see his point and part of me agrees with what he did. Another part of me hears and accepts the contrary arguement of 'it won't do any good, so mind your own business'. Perfectly valid. Even the more extreme version of that 'I'd make you wear it home if you said that to me'. Yep, I can see that too. It all comes down to getting other people to behave the way we want them to behave, because that's the way we want them to behave. Why? Because we all feel the need to do that on some level, at some time, to greater and lesser degrees. It's a universal human response.
I've said it before- it's all about a certain amount of tact in situations where you confront others in public, especially with the intent of telling them they are doing something they shouldn't be even though they are well within legal bounds.
If I put myself in the "punk's" shoes, what happened here?
I'm at Wally World today picking up some things for my sick grandmother who has just been given a few days left to live. I normally don't vape in the store but I have been stressing out lately and it was just out of habit that I pulled out my eGo and started to puff away in the checkout line. Nobody said a thing about it (even the cashier) so it didn't dawn on me that I should probably not be doing this here.
As I'm walking out of the store, a guy walks up to me out of nowhere with something in his hand. He introduces himself as a fellow vaper and i think "cool, I haven't met many, maybe he wants to talk about gear or something?"
Well, he most certainly did not. Before I could get the words out, he started telling me how disrespectful I was, how I give all vapers a bad name, and even topped it off by calling me a hipster! I wanted to explain the situation and even apologize but I was so taken aback that all I could think to say was "it's not illegal". What a stupid line.
After he shared some more of his thoughts, I couldn't even speak. All I could do was stare straight ahead. He stormed off, leaving me in disbelief and feeling really guilty. I went to my car but I kept thinking about what he said to me. I went back into the store and apologized for my behavior. Luckily, they were forgiving and I even converted a couple of employees who were curious when they saw me vaping! I hope they use the info I gave them and I really hope the story I told about my grandmother (who is the reason I quit after she was diagnosed with lung cancer) helps them to get off the cigs!
I hope that guy doesn't think I'm some punk or something- it was an honest mistake and I think he might have been having a bad day or something.
Thanks for listening everyone- just been a tough day.
My favorite saying:
"Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind."
so-n-so wasn't an old. grandma tried that very same stunt when we were grocery shopping for her weekly supply of baby food (it's all she can gum these days). while the cashier was ringing us up grandma whipped out a huge provari from the cavity of her leg stump and blew a cloud so thick that the poor checkout girl thought grandma's head exploded or sumpthin. after the cloud dissipated i apologized profusely to the the checkout girl and blamed grandma's actions on senior dementia. then i promptly wheeled her to the front door of the nearest nursing home for two weeks so she could think about her actions a little. and told her that maybe, just maybe, i'll give her her leg and teeth back if she behaves herself.
