Man Ruins Karen’s Day Without Saying A Word After She Tries To Push Past Him To Skip The Line
Interview With Author
Few things make people as unattractive as entitlement. Recently, a person who goes online by the nickname NotASmurf submitted a story on the subreddit ‘Boomers Being Fools‘ about a lady in a grocery store who behaved in such an appalling way that she quickly became enemies with everyone there.
While the other customers patiently waited in lines, she decided that her time was more valuable than theirs and made an attempt to cut in front. However, her plan failed when one guy refused to let her pass.
Entitled people run amok if nobody puts them in their place
Image credits: ThamKC (not the actual image)
Which is exactly what happened to this selfish lady
Image credits: Kampus Production (not the actual image)
Image credits: cottonbro studio (not the actual image)
Image credits: NotASmurf
The lady demonstrated textbook exaggerated entitlement behavior
We got in touch with NotASmurf and the Redditor said that they weren’t concerned that the altercation between the man and the lady might escalate beyond verbal confrontation. “The woman just kind of seemed like she wanted to whine about it and the guy was clearly just going to ignore her. She didn’t touch his cart again or make any move to touch him,” they told Bored Panda.
Other customers also weren’t in the mood for drama. “I think once the woman started getting louder, pretty much everyone decided to ignore her too. No one else said anything. I don’t know what the reaction of anyone behind me was and I didn’t look around to see what everyone else thought.”
With are these examples of entitlement and impatience becoming more common in society, or are they simply more visible due to social media and instant communication?
With such stories going viral, one might think that entitlement and impatience are becoming more common in society. But NotASmurf doesn’t believe so. “They’re probably just talked about more because there’s more interaction on social media now compared to the past, and people are sharing their stories more often.”
“It does seem like a lot of the time when these kinds of stories pop up it’s almost always someone who is older, such as a retiree. That’s not to say that younger people don’t act loud and entitled in public, but I think it says a lot that there’s a massive subreddit called r/BoomersBeingFools, but r/ZoomersBeingFools only has two posts on it.”
Image credits: Karolina Grabowska (not the actual image)
According to therapist Dr. Steven Stosny, who has treated over 6,000 clients for various forms of anger, abuse, and violence, when people feel entitled, they are not merely disappointed when others fail to accommodate their presumed rights. They feel cheated and wronged. Just like this lady, they get angry, exude hostility, and assume a stronger sense of entitlement as compensation.
“Of course, once we’re older than five and not cute anymore, the world is not likely to meet our entitlement needs,” Stosny wrote. “It gets to be a downward spiral—the more they don’t get what they’re sure they deserve, the more justified they feel in demanding compensation. The person who cuts in front of you in line is often saying: ‘With the way I’ve been treated, I shouldn’t have to wait in line, too!'”
Exaggerated entitlement isn’t exclusive to violent criminals. “Caught up in the talk-show, self-help, personal-growth mania that dominates popular culture, many feel entitled not just to the pursuit of happiness, not even just to happiness, but to feeling good most of the time,” Stosny said. “This level of entitlement, this ‘cult of feeling good,’ is partly responsible for the sharp increase in anger and stress. When the entitled don’t feel good, which is much of the time, they feel victimized.”
There are a few ways you can respond to these people in everyday life, but psychology researcher Stefan Falk suggests the following three:
1. Avoid them, if and when possible. Sometimes, you have to speak up for your own peace of mind. But engaging with selfish people often leads to negative results. Unfortunately, they’re widespread, so learning to deal with them is important to your own well-being and success.
2. Set clear boundaries. Call them out when their behavior becomes too much. Consider questions like: “Could you clarify how this behavior benefits the company?” or “Do you genuinely believe this behavior serves your own best interests?” At the very least, you can make clear that their actions are unacceptable to you.
3. Educate them on the risks they face. Selfishness has many negative impacts. For instance, you could say, “If you only focus on what fits your needs, you’ll get tunnel vision. This affects everything from tasks to interactions to learning, and it won’t serve you in the long run.” Or, “If you see everything as a personal offense, you will be constantly frustrated, unfulfilled, and burdened by negative thoughts about others.” In many cases, know that you may not get the response you had hoped, though.
However, it sounds like the guy in line handled everything pretty well, doesn’t it?
People were glad to hear how the whole ordeal ended
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We are agreed that racism and sexism are wrong, so how is that Bored Panda is okay with blatant ageism? I bitterly resent your assumption that because I'm over sixty five I must be rude selfish entitled clueless etc. I'm appalled to see that it is just fine to use boomer as a verb in such a way as to assert that everyone of tens of millions of people in a particular generation are a******s. Your censorship looks pretty clownish when you let such hatefulness slide right on through. Shame on you and all such bigots. Read some history for God's sake.
Yes, as a 57 with a hip problem I can attest there have been many many times when younger folk with full trolleys have come barrelling along at warp speed to score a spot before I reach a register with my 12 or so items. Rude people exist in every age bracket. I never say anything, just sigh. I love it when staff notice and open up a register inviting me to follow them to the front of the line though, that happens a few times. Some people watch out for others, other people try and run right over others. It happens right across the age spectrum imo.
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Boomers are not the problem here. It is a person being a jerk. Doesn't matter what generation they belong to. Plenty of jerks in all of them.
Absolutely. I'm in my early 40s I let younger and older go in front of me in the supermarket when they've got less shopping then me. Age or gender doesn't matter. But in OPs post it was a woman of a certain age I guess.
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Oh yes, go right ahead. Just lump all the over-sixty people together under one word, 'boomer', characterize this particular animal with all kinds of negative traits and then make fun of them, belittle them and humiliate them. If you did that with people who have a pigmented skin, you would be hung, drawn and quartered so to speak and that wouldn't be wrong. Do you know that, at least where I live, we wouldn't be able to care for our elderly, sick and disabled if there were no over-sixty volunteers? That many families rely on the grandparents to look after children, dogs, cats, gardens and even finances? Bored Panda has reams of stories of young adults feeling just as entitled as this person, but somehow the fact that they are young makes the difference? Boomer is as Boomer does.
Not saying it's right, but feels about the same as when everyone was dumping on "millennials" (who were frequently gen z actually). Like, where do you think our generations learned this behavior? We got hit with the same kind of stuff, but we were young and our brains were still cooking. We're using the bad habits we learned from y'all.
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We are agreed that racism and sexism are wrong, so how is that Bored Panda is okay with blatant ageism? I bitterly resent your assumption that because I'm over sixty five I must be rude selfish entitled clueless etc. I'm appalled to see that it is just fine to use boomer as a verb in such a way as to assert that everyone of tens of millions of people in a particular generation are a******s. Your censorship looks pretty clownish when you let such hatefulness slide right on through. Shame on you and all such bigots. Read some history for God's sake.
Yes, as a 57 with a hip problem I can attest there have been many many times when younger folk with full trolleys have come barrelling along at warp speed to score a spot before I reach a register with my 12 or so items. Rude people exist in every age bracket. I never say anything, just sigh. I love it when staff notice and open up a register inviting me to follow them to the front of the line though, that happens a few times. Some people watch out for others, other people try and run right over others. It happens right across the age spectrum imo.
Load More Replies... Boomers are not the problem here. It is a person being a jerk. Doesn't matter what generation they belong to. Plenty of jerks in all of them.
Absolutely. I'm in my early 40s I let younger and older go in front of me in the supermarket when they've got less shopping then me. Age or gender doesn't matter. But in OPs post it was a woman of a certain age I guess.
Load More Replies... Oh yes, go right ahead. Just lump all the over-sixty people together under one word, 'boomer', characterize this particular animal with all kinds of negative traits and then make fun of them, belittle them and humiliate them. If you did that with people who have a pigmented skin, you would be hung, drawn and quartered so to speak and that wouldn't be wrong. Do you know that, at least where I live, we wouldn't be able to care for our elderly, sick and disabled if there were no over-sixty volunteers? That many families rely on the grandparents to look after children, dogs, cats, gardens and even finances? Bored Panda has reams of stories of young adults feeling just as entitled as this person, but somehow the fact that they are young makes the difference? Boomer is as Boomer does.
Not saying it's right, but feels about the same as when everyone was dumping on "millennials" (who were frequently gen z actually). Like, where do you think our generations learned this behavior? We got hit with the same kind of stuff, but we were young and our brains were still cooking. We're using the bad habits we learned from y'all.
Load More Replies...
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