Anyone been a victim of road rage?

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rayne89

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So today I did a little shopping and then was heading home. I was trying to move from the left lane to the right lane because my turn was coming up, I put my turn signal on hoping someone would let me over. The guy in the right lane decided to play some juvenile game where everytime I sped up to get in front of him he sped up and everytime I tried to slow down to get behind him he slowed down. This went on for more than a block.

Finally I resolved that his car was nicer than mine and he wasn’t actually going to hit me and I stepped on the gas and very gradually began moving into the right lane. I could see his car in my side view and I would have just to enough room to make it over if he didn’t speed up. Well he tried to speed up for the umpteenth time and I just gradually kept moving over until he had to break and let me in. This probably wasn’t my best choice but I was getting really sick of this game and was going to miss my turn if I didn’t get over soon.

Unfortunately right after I got into the right lane we hit a red light and I see the guy behind get out of his car. For a split second I thought God please don’t let this guy have a gun - I mean you never know these days. He comes storming up to my driverside window and bangs really hard on it with it with his fist. For second I thought he might break it, he screams some expletives and gives me the middle finger -the guys was in some kind of serious rage. I just looked at him rather dumbfounded because here is this forty something year old guy acting like a child having a temper tantrum with the vocabulary of a sailor. The light changed and he got back in his car and I ended up driving until he turned off because I didn’t know if this nut job was going to follow me home. I thank God my daughter was not with me to witness this lovely display.

As I made my way home my mind kept going back to the image of this guy in my window and the lovely things he called me -and utterly stupid and childish his behavior was. I mean this wasn’t some teenager, this guy was at least forty. I did pray for him and I hope if he has a wife and children he treats them better than he treated me. I do have prolife bumper stickers on my car. I thought maybe that is what set him off, I really don’t know. I just can’t imagine any adult men that I personally know behaving in such a way. I shutter to think how frightening this would have been for my daughter if she had been in the car. I guess next time I’ll just miss my turn.🤷
 
Oh my :eek:

Good thing you didn’t open the window or scream anything back at him. It could have really gotten ugly. This kind of thing happens more often than you think. It’s happened to me before and almost everyone else I know. I’ve gotten the finger, and unfortunately a couple bad words, one beginning with F. The thing that made it worse was that my 4 children were in the car with me, and they were all under 8 years old. You know how children that age like to repeat things! I was fuming!!:mad:
 
I had a guy cut me off one time on a highway…I blew my horn and he dropped back, giving me this “What’s your problem?” look, sending me some obscene gestures and yelling at me inside his car. I just glared at him and went back to driving. I had no idea what he was about to do.

He was in the lane on my right, and I had slowed down for this little interaction, and so I hit the gas to get back up to highway speed-----and I shot forward just as he decided to swing into my lane. Whether he was trying to sideswipe me or what, I’ll never know; but just as he swerved to connect with me, I wasn’t there. I saw him shoot behind me in my rear-view, and he went off the road and over a five-foot embankment.

God forgive me, because I did not stop and see if he was all right or not…I just kept right on going. Under the circumstances, I didn’t think it was wise to stop and get out of my car to check.

That was twenty years ago. I’ve never told that story to anyone before. Up until now, the only person who knew about it was my sister, because she was with me in my car at the time.
 
I see it some times, because usually I’m on a bicycle more than I’m in a car. A coupla weeks ago someone tried to pass me in the face of oncoming traffic, had to lock up his brakes, and then stopped his car, got out, and accused me of almost causing a wreck.

Stupid four-wheelers 😃
 
shortly after moving here I did something I have sinced learned is unacceptable in this state: at a busy interesection of two 5-lane highways I stopped when the light turned yellow. In this state, yellow means gun it because at least 6 more cars can make it thru the light if you really floor it. the car behind me screeched to a halt, the driver got out screeching (it was a middle-aged woman), banged on my window, and reached out, broke off my wiper blade and threw it in the road, then went back to her car.
 
I used to live near a very busy intersection. It was one of those with a green light to try to make it with oncoming traffic. I learned to wait a half minute to turn left into the intersection because too many people were broadsided there by red-light runners.

So one New Year’s Eve Day with three babies in the car (all under age 5, one a newborn), I was waiting for the oncoming lead cars to indicate they were slowing down so I could go through the intersection on a left turn. This woman in a van behind me with kids in her car starts honking her horn and waving her arms and fingers at me. Then she swerves to my right and goes around me crossing ahead of me to make the left turn and speeds down the road to my subdivision area.

I catch up with her and she is pulling into her driveway. I pull the car over and roll down the passenger window and say “Excuse me…” she charges over. I say “I see you have kids in your car. I just thought you might want to know that there are a lot of red-light runners at that light and I was going slow through it not to upset you but…” And she starts ranting at me, showing me the finger, sticking her head in my car and calling me a stupid f-ing b---- in front of my kids! (She looked like a soccer mom. Go figure.)

I was stunned. I rolled up my window and went home where I told xh and he announced to me every time we argued after that that I was crazy and confrontational and even got into fights in traffic with strangers. (This from a man who once got out of a car at a stoplight to lecture a man on his driving who was at the intersection behind us.)

Fast forward several years. Now we’re in a state where people regularly carry weapons. He is in a car with my three kids. A man behind him is trying to get by him. He deliberately drives 10 miles below the speed limit to try to anger this guy. Laughing and being confrontational. At a stoplight, this man gets out and storms up to the car with MY KIDS in it! And xh rolls down his window and the man yells at him and spits at his car. Glad he didn’t have a gun.

Now I just smile and let them ALL go by. Not worth it. Not one little bit. There’s some crazy people out there.
 
In Florida, if you are in fear for your life in a road rage incident, the law states you can shoot first and ask questions later. Scary stuff. It hasn’t ended the road rage stuff, but you don’t hear about as many incidents involving people getting out of their vehicles to assault someone else. I guess even the angry people are afraid of being shot.
 
While I have never been personally victimized, the favorite road rage activity in Houston is to get in front of the person you are mad at and slam on the brakes. I have seen that happen quite a few times, but fortunately no accidents because of it.
 
puzzleannie said:
shortly after moving here I did something I have sinced learned is unacceptable in this state: at a busy interesection of two 5-lane highways I stopped when the light turned yellow. In this state, yellow means gun it because at least 6 more cars can make it thru the light if you really floor it. the car behind me screeched to a halt, the driver got out screeching (it was a middle-aged woman), banged on my window, and reached out, broke off my wiper blade and threw it in the road, then went back to her car.
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You know, when I see people act that way, it gives me hope for America’s future. We’re such mature people who have such a well-developed sense of consideration for others.

:rolleyes:
 
Nechasin said:
While I have never been personally victimized, the favorite road rage activity in Houston is to get in front of the person you are mad at and slam on the brakes. I have seen that happen quite a few times, but fortunately no accidents because of it.
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As a native houstian this is a fun game 😦 that people play along with TxDots idea of “which interchange are we going to shut down this weekend?”
 
puzzleannie said:
shortly after moving here I did something I have sinced learned is unacceptable in this state: at a busy interesection of two 5-lane highways I stopped when the light turned yellow. In this state, yellow means gun it because at least 6 more cars can make it thru the light if you really floor it. the car behind me screeched to a halt, the driver got out screeching (it was a middle-aged woman), banged on my window, and reached out, broke off my wiper blade and threw it in the road, then went back to her car.
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Annie:

I am sorry the woman was so horrible to you, and I apologize for her indefensible behavior, but I am a native Texan and what you desribed was not common here twenty to twenty-five years ago. I am 53. I stop for yellow lights, unless it changes after I’ve already reached the intersection. I was taught to do this in driver’s ed many years ago. I don’t think the behavior you described is peculiar to Texas–I think it’s more of an indication of the shocking lack of civility on most of the nation’s roads. Fortunately, I don’t see much of this in the small town where I live. 🤷
 
After just three years of driving in Boston, I have a lot of stories to tell.
  1. Recently, I was parallel parking and had put on my turn signal, pulled up to alongside the parked car and was waiting for traffic to clear behind me so that I could back into the space. The guy behind me pulled up on my left side (it was two-lanes in our direction) and started cussing me out, flipped me off, hit the gas and sped away.
  2. I like to pull through at parking lot spaces when I can since it makes it easier and safer to get out of the space. Well, I did that one day and a man in his car had apparently wanted the space I had pulled through into. I didn’t even see him until I was out of my car, had it locked, etc. He starts cussing, calling me every name in the book and demanding that I move my car. There were plenty of other spaces in the lot, including the one behind me!
  3. There are some difficult intersections near my home where there are no left-turn arrows. It can really make a nightmare of turning left! So I was at one of those intersections, turning left and waiting for traffic to clear. The guy behind me freaks out, starts honking his horn over and over again until he pulls up on my left side, in front of other traffic, flips me off and then makes the turn before me. I guess he wanted me to risk a head-on collision? I’m not what one would call a “cautious” driver. I’m just safe, which actually can mean not being cautious in some situations. Anyway, there was a number on his van with one of those “how am I driving?” signs. So I called the number with his license plate and reported him.
  4. My favorite is still the day that I was driving along toward a green light and a man just stepped off the sidewalk in front of me. I was startled, braked quickly and gave him a little warning honk. Really, I was just freaked that he had done such a dangerous thing, not just for me but for him! And he stood in front of me, started yelling and grabbed himself, er, I’ll let you guess where…
  5. Another incident involving parallel parking and a huge U-Haul happened a couple of years ago.
It was 2 days before my wedding, and I had a 104 degree temperature just a few days before because I had gotten sick during my trip to World Youth Day in Germany. Anyway, the moving day was very, very stressful. I lost my keys on the way to get the U-Haul in the morning, and I didn’t have any spares. I had to call my roommate to come open the door to my apartment, and I couldn’t get into my car. We got the first load in and arrived at our new apartment. We couldn’t get in there because the lock was broken and had to call our landlord who called a locksmith to come fix it. In the meantime, my friend’s breaks failed on his car, and he had to stop helping us move and get his car towed home.

The locksmith did great work, and we did a couple of loads, moving all of my things. Then, we had to move my then-fiance’s things. On our way to get the first load, the traffic in our neighborhood just hit all-time crazy. A city transportation bus was burning on the turnpike, and traffic was diverted right through our neighborhood during rushhour on Sept. 1, which is student move-in day! I waited through six lights trying to make a left turn at one of our intersections. Seriously, that’s 6. It was insane!

So I finally, safely, get the giant moving van to my fiance’s street, which is this little, one-way street with parking on both sides. There was a spot right outside his apartment! But parking a moving van is pretty difficult, so I didn’t get it the first time. A taxi driver was behind me, cutting through that street because it runs through two more major streets (taxi drivers were forever cutting through that street, speeding, at all hours of the day and night, making crossing the street a bit difficult).

He gets out of his car and starts yelling at me and tries to make me get out of the U-Haul, telling me that he’ll park the U-Haul himself. For goodness sake, I had only tried once! I calmly told him, I’m the only person authorized to drive this vehicle, I can do it, it will only take me a moment, and then I will be out of your way.
 
rayne89…this guy was acting very threatening to you. Why didn’t you call 911 on your cellphone and give them his license plate number? Or write it down and call later? Depending on what he said to you, he could be charged with making terrorist threats, or at the very least assault for making you fear he might hurt you (not battery, he would have to touch you for that). I mean, this person literally put you in fear of your life. Why did you just sit there and take it?

I was a college student in Chicago in the mid-90s. One day my fiance (now DH) and a couple of friends jumped into my car with me to go check out one of the suburban malls. Well, we’re driving along, and all of a sudden this car pulls out of a parking lot and nearly hits us and cuts us off. Well, being stupid teenagers, we pull up next to the guy and tell him to watch where the “hades” he’s driving! Next thing I know, this psycho is chasing us through traffic, I am driving scared out of my wits trying to avoid him and not hit anything. Next light, he gets out and tries to grab my fiance through the window, which is being rapidly rolled up. But not fast enough. He beats on the window, then grabs the top of it and pulls on it until it shatters all over everyone in the car. I guess he realized at that point he had gone too far, cuz he started to run to his car. I screamed at my passengers to write down his license plate. This was before everyone had cellphones, so when we got to the mall we had been heading to, a minute later, there just happened to be a cop there. We flagged him down, told him some psycho had just gone nuts and busted the window out of the car, and gave him the license plate number. The cops eventually told the guy either to pay for a new window for my car or to face going to court on charges. He paid, and I let it go after that, but God, I was scared to death that day. All four of us were. I had three guys with me, and he probably outweighed all of them put together by 50 pounds. If he had had a gun, we probably would all be dead. If had gotten a good hold on my fiance, he might have been seriously injured.

BUT scared as I was, I didn’t just lay back and take it. This was before there were road rage laws too, but I still made that guy pay for terrorizing us that day. We have got to stand up against these people and make them pay a price for this behavior. Maybe if they are penalized enough times, they will finally learn. Or, they will get a long and egregious enough record that some judge will really throw the book at them, and they won’t have access to innocent people for a long while.

I’m glad you came out of it okay. I know just how terrified you feel in a situation like that. Had I known the town I was in at all, I would have driven toward the police station. If he wanted to chase us and hurt someone, let him do it in their parking lot! That is another safety tactic to remember in situations like those. I think your decision not to drive home was a very smart one. And I too am thankful your daughter was not with you. That would have been much more scary.
 
duskyjewel said:
rayne89…this guy was acting very threatening to you. Why didn’t you call 911 on your cellphone and give them his license plate number? Or write it down and call later?
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After this happened the guy was never in front of me for me to see his plate and I wasn’t about to try and follow him to get it. In the state I live in we only have plates on the back of our vehicles.

Umm…sit there and take it :confused: . This guy was looking for a fight and I wasn’t about to give him one. My personal safety was more important to me. I gave him a blank emotionless stare and said absolutely nothing(while he called me a stupid f-ing c**t and shook his middle finger in my face.) I was a woman alone and this guy was twice my size and could have easily busted out my window. I’m completely certain if my window was rolled down he would have hit me. If a semi-truck wasn’t in front of me I would have tried to enter the intersection to get away from him if at all possible. If he would have followed me I had every intention of driving to the police station.

A couple of months ago a woman shot and killed someone for cutting her off in traffic.
 
I was trying to move from the left lane to the right lane because my turn was coming up, I put my turn signal on hoping someone would let me over.
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Here is the primary problem - and you caused it yourself… turn signals are an announcement, not a request!!

Turn SIGNAL… a device that signals you are turning! NOT “let me in, (edging over) let me in, oh come on let me in pleeeezzeee” request device.

Why were you in the left lane (in traffic) when you knew your turn to the right was coming up in a few blocks?

It’s called defensive driving. There’s a gap, you signal, and MOVE! You don’t edge over, slow wayyyy down, and “hope” someone will “let you in/over”.

I’m not advocating unsafe driving. But toddling along with your signal on for 1-1/2 blocks, undecisively edging over, and slowing down is more of a hazard than just signaling, taking the opportunity (not chance), and MOVING!

My area is fraught with with WORST drivers in history. NOBODY around here knows how to merge properly, or change lanes. They’ll race down an “on-ramp”, then STOP at the bottom! Waiting for a 1/4 mile gap in traffic to then accelerate & merge in… (the whole time with the blinker on and the “let me in, let me in, let me in pleeezzzeee” mentality)

Definition of confusion? Four Minnesotans at a 4-way stopsign.
 
rayne89 said:
So today I did a little shopping and then was heading home. I was trying to move from the left lane to the right lane because my turn was coming up, I put my turn signal on hoping someone would let me over. The guy in the right lane decided to play some juvenile game where everytime I sped up to get in front of him he sped up and everytime I tried to slow down to get behind him he slowed down. This went on for more than a block.

Finally I resolved that his car was nicer than mine and he wasn’t actually going to hit me and I stepped on the gas and very gradually began moving into the right lane. I could see his car in my side view and I would have just to enough room to make it over if he didn’t speed up. Well he tried to speed up for the umpteenth time and I just gradually kept moving over until he had to break and let me in. This probably wasn’t my best choice but I was getting really sick of this game and was going to miss my turn if I didn’t get over soon.

Unfortunately right after I got into the right lane we hit a red light and I see the guy behind get out of his car. For a split second I thought God please don’t let this guy have a gun - I mean you never know these days. He comes storming up to my driverside window and bangs really hard on it with it with his fist. For second I thought he might break it, he screams some expletives and gives me the middle finger -the guys was in some kind of serious rage. I just looked at him rather dumbfounded because here is this forty something year old guy acting like a child having a temper tantrum with the vocabulary of a sailor. The light changed and he got back in his car and I ended up driving until he turned off because I didn’t know if this nut job was going to follow me home. I thank God my daughter was not with me to witness this lovely display.

As I made my way home my mind kept going back to the image of this guy in my window and the lovely things he called me -and utterly stupid and childish his behavior was. I mean this wasn’t some teenager, this guy was at least forty. I did pray for him and I hope if he has a wife and children he treats them better than he treated me. I do have prolife bumper stickers on my car. I thought maybe that is what set him off, I really don’t know. I just can’t imagine any adult men that I personally know behaving in such a way. I shutter to think how frightening this would have been for my daughter if she had been in the car. I guess next time I’ll just miss my turn.🤷
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Have I ever been the victim of road rage? Absolutely…nearly daily. I’m a terribly slow driver, and in Florida…it drives everyone around me nuts. I have learned to get a bit quicker…but, I have been screamed at more than I ever was screamed at in PA.

May God give you a more peaceful rest of your weekend…I think that most people who exhibit road rage, have something far wrose going on in their lives, so we just don’t know. I ask Mary to pray for those who have anger problems.:o
 
kettle said:
In Florida, if you are in fear for your life in a road rage incident, the law states you can shoot first and ask questions later. Scary stuff. It hasn’t ended the road rage stuff, but you don’t hear about as many incidents involving people getting out of their vehicles to assault someone else. I guess even the angry people are afraid of being shot.
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Wow, I did not know of this law. I have seen so many cases of road rage here in Florida and some have gotten out of their cars. No one angry at me, but seen others get angry at others. It is so sad that so many people have so much anger inside of them. I use to attend, with my husband, an anger management group at the local veteran’s administration clinic and the stories these guys tell is scary. They don’t see that they are in the wrong with their excessive anger. One guy said he doesn’t have a problem just getting out of the car and telling someone off. There was a wife in the group, who I didn’t know was a devote Catholic, who told these men that they should be ashamed of themselves scaring people with their anger and cussing at them. She told them all that she would pray for them. I was so proud of her and wanted to say the same, but she was brave enough to say something. I thought she was a protestant for Jesus was in almost all her words, but one day about a year later I ran into her at a Catholic Bookstore and we talked. Her husband, like mine, have improved with Jesus helping them to get rid of most of their excessive anger problem. Yes, some in this anger management group were in their late 40’s and some in their 60’s and they still saw no wrong in yelling and cussing at others for they call the other drivers “stupid” and causing them anger. They saw no blame in themselves. I guess that is why they were all in this group.
 
udoc89 said:
Annie:o. I don’t think the behavior you described is peculiar to Texas–I think it’s more of an indication of the shocking lack of civility on most of the nation’s roads. Fortunately, I don’t see much of this in the small town where I live. 🤷
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I served on a jury in Texas last year where stopping on the yellow was an issue and I was the only one of the jurors who was taught in drivers ed (Michigan, 1960s) that yellow means caution, slow down and prepare to stop unless you are already in the intersection. All 11 jurors sided with the guy who rear-ended a woman with 3 kids in a van. She had stopped on yellow because there were several cars ahead of her turning left and she did not think she could make it over 7 lanes of traffic.
 
Jay2 said:
Here is the primary problem - and you caused it yourself… turn signals are an announcement, not a request!!

Turn SIGNAL… a device that signals you are turning! NOT “let me in, (edging over) let me in, oh come on let me in pleeeezzeee” request device.

Why were you in the left lane (in traffic) when you knew your turn to the right was coming up in a few blocks?

It’s called defensive driving. There’s a gap, you signal, and MOVE! You don’t edge over, slow wayyyy down, and “hope” someone will “let you in/over”.

I’m not advocating unsafe driving. But toddling along with your signal on for 1-1/2 blocks, undecisively edging over, and slowing down is more of a hazard than just signaling, taking the opportunity (not chance), and MOVING!

My area is fraught with with WORST drivers in history. NOBODY around here knows how to merge properly, or change lanes. They’ll race down an “on-ramp”, then STOP at the bottom! Waiting for a 1/4 mile gap in traffic to then accelerate & merge in… (the whole time with the blinker on and the “let me in, let me in, let me in pleeezzzeee” mentality)

Definition of confusion? Four Minnesotans at a 4-way stopsign.
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Ok enough with !!! marks.:rolleyes: I was in the left lane because I had just pulled out of a shopping plaza -it’s just a couple blocks from my house. I didn’t slow way down. When I sped up to get over the guy gunned it. When I took my foot of the gas to get behind him he slowed down. The primary problem was not my driving -even if I’m the crappiest driver in the world (which I’m not) this guy does not have the right to bang his fist on my window and call me nasty names. Anyway, I wasn’t undecisive and I wasn’t toddling. This idiot was intentionally trying to prevent me from getting over, for whatever reason, I don’t know -I saw him pull out of a industrial park right before I pulled out of the shopping plaza maybe he had a bad day at work 🤷 . I know how to drive Jay.😉
 
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