Thus far this year I’ve been doing a lot more walking and a lot more catching public transport. I’m very tired of how stressful driving in Sydney is, and wondering if I’ll get to and from work alive far more often than anyone should, and I’m trying to get more exercise.

A couple of days ago I left work, walked down to Parramatta Road, hopped on the bus. Bus was pretty full, though there were a couple of open seat spots. I went for one next to some guy and, lo and behold, he was taking up most of the seat by spreading his legs. Plopped right down next to him, or rather, right up against him because I was not able to sit properly on the seat.

My sweaty right arm against his left, and my right leg against his left. He would not budge, so I started pressing my right leg into his left, and he started forcibly pushing back. I chose not to relent.

I don’t know if it was my sweating or my being against the guy because there was not space to sit properly on the seat, but he was getting pretty uncomfortable from it and forcibly asked me to stop pushing against his leg. Something along the lines of “Can you stop pressing against my leg?” but really, really firm and annoyed. I said something along the lines of “I’m trying to sit on the seat properly, you could just close your legs” and of course he fought against this. Told me a few times I could go sit elsewhere, with me responding a few times saying it’s public transport, I’m trying to sit on the seat properly and he could just close his legs and I wouldn’t be against him if he did; you know, that sort of stuff.

He tried to justify it by saying he’d had a long day, kept refusing to close his legs, claimed he was taking only half the seat (it was quite apparent that he wasn’t, and even more so when he got up to get off the bus). I told him he wasn’t the only one who had a long day, and all he had to do was close his legs and it’d be fine. It was just a lot of back and forth that was going nowhere because this guy didn’t want to be considerate in the slightest, and I can be quite obstinate when it comes to public resources and people being assholes.

So eventually I said something along the lines of “I doubt your dick’s so big you need to spread your legs”, followed by “You’re not the only one who’s had a long day. You’re just the only one using it as an excuse” and he stopped talking after that, and relented a little. Closed his legs a little. It doesn’t really matter much, but small victories and all that.

Yeah, telling someone their genitals are small isn’t tactful, and maybe I could’ve found another spot to sit if I stood for a while (the other spot was taken soon after I sat down), but public transport is a public resource and maybe, just maybe, people should be a bit more courteous. Maybe we shouldn’t be shitty and selfish.

This isn’t a recent thing. This had been happening well before Covid-19 lockdowns, and well before anyone cares to remember. People just tend to think it was after that as they started taking more notice when they had more space to move around. Plenty of people can actually be aware that they’re not the only person in the world; that other people around them are indeed alive and might actually like to use public resources too. They choose not to, however, and maybe we need to be willing to make them deal with the fact that, no, they aren’t more important than anyone else.