The Verbal Abuser

One day I was shopping with my boyfriend's daughter, "Bugs", at the Burlington Factory Store. We 'needed' shoes, and she is always begging for matching mother-daughter outfits, so we figured we'd shop around a little. As we were browsing in the shoe department, we heard a man yelling.

We peered around the edge of one of the aisles, and saw a family with a shopping cart. The baby was sitting in the actual cart itself, and a little girl (no more than 3 years old) was standing in the cart with tears in her eyes, while the man yelled at her at the top of his lungs.

He was showing extreme aggression: his body tensed, hands clenched, and he was only a couple inches from her face. Her mother stood behind the cart, showing from her body language that she was both terrified and embarrassed. She glanced about nervously at the people who were leaning into the aisle, watching the scene.

"How would you like it?" he screamed. "What if I yanked you right out of the cart by your arm? I might rip your shoulder out of its socket! You should never do that to your baby brother! I should f*cking teach you a lesson! I should do it!!!" I need to add that the baby was laying there peacefully, watching the whole proceedings with wide-open eyes, so apparently whatever she did was hardly traumatic to him.

The little girl stood there, trembling with tears coursing down her cheeks. I sighed. Another *sshole. I almost said "C'mon, let's go back," to Bugs until I saw her face. She was stricken. She had never seen such verbal abuse. He kept ranting and raving.

That's when I made my decision. "Come with me," I told her. I marched up to the man, and said loudly "Take it outside. You're being verbally abusive to your daughter, and I don't need my child subjected to this!"

He turned in wonder and stared at me. His wife also stared, her eyes growing even larger. The entire department store was silent except for their little girl, who was breathing in deep, jerky sobs.

"What did you f*cking say to me?!" he snarled.

"I said take it outside!" I said even louder. "I'll give you a head start before I call the cops! This is unacceptable behavior!" I turned to his wife. "And if he treats his daughter like that, he probably treats you like garbage too," I told her. "You need to stick up for your kids!"

He clenched his fist and bowed his chest out at me. "Why I outta..." he began.

"Go ahead!" I yelled. "Hit me instead and see how fast I'll have you thrown in jail. Go on! I dare you! Do it! Otherwise, get your sorry *ss out of here. We don't need to hear your mouth!"

Bugs watched with her mouth hanging open. Oh yes, I have a temper, but I use it judiciously. Hey, I was a tomboy who grew up with brothers. There is little that I fear. And I know this: when you confront a bully, he dries up and slinks on to the next person who won't call his bluff. Usually.

"You b*tch," he growled.

"Yup," I agreed, "that's me! Now get out of here! I'm calling the cops in 5 minutes, and there are plenty of witnesses in here. I'm betting you don't want that kind of trouble, right?"

Muttering under his breath, he said roughly "C'mon!" to his wife, and they started away. He cast a glance over his shoulder at me. I stood there, staring right back at him. He turned, and they left.

I turned to Bugs. "Never let a man treat you or your children that way," I said. "Never."

"Wow!" was all she could say. She'd never seen me do anything like that. She got a quirky grin on her face.

Other people who had witnessed the exchange snuck into the aisle. "Are you OK?" asked a man.

"I'm fine, actually," I said, which was partially true. I was shaking a bit from the adrenaline rush. But I wondered why, out of all of these people, I was the only one who had been courageous enough to say that enough was enough. Why is it that there are so many sheep, and not enough shephards?

I walked up the aisle a couple minutes later to make sure the family had left, and the store personnel assured me that they'd gone immediately. I hope that I made that mother think for once, but I doubt it. In fact, I was lucky she didn't turn on me, too. That is typical in situations of domestic abuse.