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jraphyesterday at 11:05 PM1 replyview on HN

I'm all for asking nicely in general but it doesn't work well with entitled people who don't give a shit about the people around them.

The chances, regardless how nice you try to ask, that the person who elected to broadcast their tiktoks or calls to the whole wagon at full volume goes "oh, sorry, I'm so embarrassed, I'll turn this off", are very low.

Last time I tried to ask "can you use headphones?", the guy answered "I don't have headphones" and put the volume even louder.

A person who cared even a tiny bit would not have started to begin with. Asking is almost futile. These people simply seem to be used to get away with inflicting themselves to people around without consequences. The worse part is that if you do nothing, you participate in this.

What can you do.

I think it can only work if it becomes very socially unbearable, or if they got fined for this. Or, indeed, if it brought them nuisance. In that regard, this HN post's solution is interesting (not sure it's good though).


Replies

pvtmerttoday at 12:01 AM

i agree with this one, in this particular order, how things be in large cities & crowded areas:

- loud person does not care in the first place, that's why they do the loud act

- usually they are more than 1 person, outnumbering me

- although some places have public disturbance prohibited laws, unless there is a law enforcement/security around, chances of me being ending up in a hospital is higher than chances of stumbling on a decent person

- it is easier to act or play stupid

---

on a similar note, last time when i asked someone to lower their volume while having headphones on me, they demanded my headphones because they claimed they were too poor to buy one. -- i am talking about 20$ type-c earbuds vs 16" macbook size marshall speaker. -- as a result, i did not give my headphones and they continued to play music.