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Source: (consider it) Thread: Preaching on the bus - OK or not?
Stetson
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quote:
Perhaps to be fair to all, there need to be special 'preaching buses' where the people getting on know that they might be hailed by a speaker; they then have the right to choose that form or transport or wait for another bus. It would be very interesting to see if those buses became popular (perhaps with hecklers?) or whether they remained empty! Of course, to be fair to all - again - these preachers should not be specifically Christian but open to others with something to say, as well.


And then, countdown to some bus-preacher complaining that the admittance of hecklers to the bus constitutes "persecution of Christians".
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Ariel
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quote:
But then I wondered whether it's fair for people to be banned from preaching on public transport.
Totally. Who wants to be told on the way to work, first thing in the morning, that you're going to Hell?

I met one of these once on the Tube (Afro-Caribbean lady, 50+). She got into our carriage and harangued the lot of us. People buried themselves in books, plugged their headphones in and studiously avoided eye contact. She knew it and berated us for it, but none of us had asked her to start up on our moral failings and lack of spirituality. Luckily, she moved into the next carriage at the next stop.

Shouting at strangers on their way to work that if you don't stop what you're doing RIGHT NOW and START LOVING JESUS or BURN IN HELL and boy, will it be HORRIBLE, is a pretty good way to get anyone's back up, especially first thing in the morning when you're on your way to work.

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Bullfrog.

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Preaching, like most forms of communication, depends somewhat on the consent of the audience. Preaching to a captive audience, to me, breaks this implicit covenant between speaker and audience.

--------------------
Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg

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no prophet's flag is set so...

Proceed to see sea
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I recall, not on a bus, someone doing this at a bus stop while probably 100 or so people waited for several different busses sometime in the early 1980s. My response - the woman was right beside me - was "yes I do know Jesus, he's in my chem class". This was during a time where spotting Elvis was all the rage, and someone had just mentioned that Elvis was in his chemistry class. Several other people said things and the person desisted, but I thought I was pretty funny, though the humour was not original.

--------------------
Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/

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Palimpsest
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quote:
Originally posted by Chorister:
Perhaps to be fair to all, there need to be special 'preaching buses' where the people getting on know that they might be hailed by a speaker; they then have the right to choose that form or transport or wait for another bus. It would be very interesting to see if those buses became popular (perhaps with hecklers?) or whether they remained empty! Of course, to be fair to all - again - these preachers should not be specifically Christian but open to others with something to say, as well.

Must be nice to live somewhere where there's excess municipal bus service that can be given to preachers. In the U.S. service tends to range from barely adequate to theoretical. Now if the preachers wanted to hire their own bus and provide a service, that would be a fine alternative. I suspect it would not be popular except among the desperate.
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The5thMary
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This discussion is interesting and all but what do you do when you're a captive of an obnoxious bus DRIVER?! When I lived in Seattle, there was this one bus driver who obviously wanted to be a comedian or an actor... one of my friends went to high school with him and said he had been that way in school, too. Anyway, he would get on the microphone and do this long ramble, making extremely stupid jokes and then laughing at them and getting annoyed when most people ignored him. He just got louder and kept asking why people weren't charmed by his routine. Most people in Seattle don't like to make waves so I'd say nearly all of them would just sit in their seats, looking anxious. Not me! I yelled, "Shut up! You're not funny!" and everyone looked at me in horror. The bus driver didn't see who had called him out but he did, eventually subside into a sulking silence. At least for that one ride. Every time I got him as a driver, I tried to get to my destination on his bus but usually had to pull the cord and escape to wait for another bus. THAT was obnoxious.

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God gave me my face but She let me pick my nose.

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LutheranChik
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The5thMary: I once rode a city bus whose driver, in the middle of the route, suddenly asked the riders if they minded taking about a brief detour. Now, this was a very friendly, funny guy, and people were enjoying his commentary along the way -- and it wssn't the rush hour -- so people kind of smiled and shrugged and said, "Why not?" The driver went about four blocks off-route through a residential section, stopped along the street and noted, "That's my house. I just wanted to make sure that my neighbor didn't throw his trash over on my side of the fence today. Because he always tries to do that when he misses trash day and I'm not at home." As it turned out, his neighbor had done precisely that, so we then had to wait while the driver left the bus, trotted down his driveway and tossed his neighbor's trash bag back over the fence. When he returned he said, "There -- I feel better now," and we proceeded back to where he'd left off on the route.

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Mockingale
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quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:
I was riding the bus this morning and as usual it was fairly silent, being mostly tired office workers.

A middle aged woman stood up and said "Excuse me everyone" and began to do some kind of preaching. She mentioned that she had a prophecy that someone on the bus's destiny had been blocked, and that there was an international fasting movement to combat this. I have no idea if it was Christian or what religion it was. We all ignored her of course.

But at the next stop, the bus driver got out of his vestibule, marched towards her, and said "I've told you before, you can't get on this bus and start with this nonsense." She kept preaching, he continued to shout in her face. It was uncomfortable and I got off and walked to my final destination as that bus wasn't going anywhere soon.

I found this woman quite annoying. But then I wondered whether it's fair for people to be banned from preaching on public transport. Certainly people have loud obnoxious conversations or play music out of speakers which are as bothersome, but I've never seen a bus driver stop and approach someone for those things. It struck me additionally, that a middle aged woman preaching religion is less of a scary target than a group of hooded teenagers, and perhaps that's why she was singled out. The bus driver was needlessly aggressive, in my view.

So the questions are:

- is it currently banned/illegal to preach on public transportation (this was London BTW), and if so is that fair?

- why are we less willing to tolerate other types of noisy behaviour or disruption but not religious proselytizing or preaching? Is it because we think the religious are "easier targets" for taking out frustration than others? Or is it something to do with the view that religion should be private?

I question what good it can possibly do to use such an opportunity with a captive, nonvoluntary audience. I'm not aware of anyone who came to faith because they were cornered by a zealot and forced to listen to unbidden preachifying for a half hour. I know that in the days when I didn't believe I would have simply resented the hell out of it and written the woman off as a loony tune.

/I'd still write her off as a loony tune, though perhaps well meaning.

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PaulBC
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This is something I would not want happening on the bus I ride . It is impolite and a waste of evryones time .

--------------------
"He has told you O mortal,what is good;and what does the Lord require of youbut to do justice and to love kindness ,and to walk humbly with your God."Micah 6:8

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Martin60
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Health and safety, she's distracting the driver, stop the bus, eject her. In that order of course.

--------------------
Love wins

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Ethne Alba
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Whilst I have a bit of a reputation for either chatting with or actually ejecting foul passengers from peaceful buses [sadly, very true. I am a nightmare to travel with ], before this thread goes the way of all flesh I do want to add something and please excuse the repetition if you've heard this before:

At one desperately difficult time in my own life a guy got on the bus and pronounced the Book of Common Prayer's confession and absolution over my head, with one hand on my shoulders, whilst dressed akin to a pirate.

He kinda knew me, but had no idea at all of the situation that I found myself in and not a clue about where I had come from and what I was going back home to.

Without a single shadow of a doubt, on that day (with all of his own very public and obvious problems), that man spoke the word of God into my life and I will be eternally grateful.

RIP Micky, I never got to say thank you either.

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seekingsister
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quote:
Originally posted by PaulBC:
This is something I would not want happening on the bus I ride . It is impolite and a waste of evryones time .

It was definitely weird, but the only time wasted was by the bus driver stopping the bus and shouting at her for 10 minutes. We all mostly had headphones in anyway - and yes I hit "pause" when I heard her start talking because I suspected it would be something...umm...different. However I'm still not convinced that a woman trying to unblock someone's destiny is more of a disruption than the bus driver's outburst.

My view may of course be skewed by my time spent in New York City where people preaching on the subway is a 1-2x weekly occurrence.

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Gwai
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I definitely see the downside to the bus being stopped! However, I'm also kind of glad the bus driver protects those of us who don't wear headphones. I prefer to read, and it's really hard to focus when someone's talking at you. (Never heard a preacher, but people come sometimes to tell exaggerated stories of misery to con the vulnerable into money.)

--------------------
A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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no prophet's flag is set so...

Proceed to see sea
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quote:
Originally posted by Ethne Alba:
whilst dressed akin to a pirate.

This is the only redeeming part to this story.

--------------------
Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/

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Justinian
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quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:
quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:

Maybe this woman has been prophesying on this chap's bus before?

Oh certainly, he said as much. I don't normally take that bus, my normal route has been choked up with road works so it's entirely possible that she does this 3 times a week.

However on my normal bus, there is a large group of children on their way to school, who are loud and rude and blasting music, and I have not once seen any effort by a bus driver to control their behavior.

Of the many anti-social activities I've seen on London transport this lady was easily the least threatening. Last Friday there was a man on the train with his feet on a seat drinking a beer aggressively staring at everyone. I'd trade him with destiny woman any day.

One huge difference is that the kids do not intentionally set out to disrupt others. The starer, from your account just wanted to be left alone. Your witness-for-Dawkins in the OP on the other hand was knowingly and deliberately being rude and quite intentionally actively rather than passively disrupting the peace of everyone else on that bus. The purpose of kids with loud music is because they like loud music and just don't care. The purpose of bus preaching is to deliberately break into everyone else's life and prevent them having the peace of urban solitude.

It's the difference between someone brushing past a table and knocking a beer over them, and someone quite deliberately picking up a glass of water and throwing it into someone else's face. Yes, the beer will be worse at a many levels as it's harder to get out. But the person who'll be banned from the pub is the one who deliberately throws water in someone else's face - and for very good reason.

Or to put things another way, the way to deal with things on public transport is live and let live. Even the kids with loud music are just about inside the rules. Your evangelist point blank refuses to let live.

--------------------
My real name consists of just four letters, but in billions of combinations.

Eudaimonaic Laughter - my blog.

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Gwai
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Very well said, Justinian. I realized today that I spent my whole bus ride to work today standing within a foot or two of one of my coworkers who I quite like. Neither of us want to chat much that early in the morning, so we probably wouldn't have said much if I had seen him. (He said hello to me as we were getting off.) However, I was reminded of how very much I ignore everything on the bus so that I can be alone despite the number of people standing and sitting within a couple feet of me. The kids are accepting the code that we are all alone together. The music is probably how they act when they are alone, and it is certainly how they ignore everyone else. The preacher is, as you say violating that code, by NOT acting as if she is alone.

--------------------
A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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seekingsister
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quote:
Originally posted by Justinian:
One huge difference is that the kids do not intentionally set out to disrupt others.

Have you ridden a bus lately?

Absolutely many of them are setting out to be disruptive, often even hurling insults at other riders who glance at them.

I'm not advocating bus preaching. I just got the feeling that the preacher is a soft target and that's why action was taken against her.

Someone did ask how I'd react if it was a jihadist - well I wonder how the bus driver would have reacted to a jihadist as well. Rather differently I would guess.

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Gwai
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Fair enough then re the kids. The ones on busses I ride do ignore everyone else. You may be right that she was a soft target. She may also though offend the bus driver more than the children do. (Not sure if that's a better reason or a worse reason for the driver to focus mainly on her.)

--------------------
A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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SvitlanaV2
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In a huge multicultural metropolis don't you just have to put up with this sort of thing? People doing the occasional strange thing in public is part of the scenery there.

The only solution if you live and/or work in such places is to save up hard and then take your money away to some small, charming place where people are all of one mind when it comes to behaving themselves in public!

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Gwai
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Chicago counts as a huge multicultural metropolis, but we don't have to put up with that particular thing. Our rapid transit organization is very serious about people creating noise on the train or on most busses. In general people just don't. (Certain routes that are considered lower class have more noise. I think it is considered the will of those who live there though I don't know if that is actually true.) The only disruption I hear is once a month maybe I see a sob story busker on the train. They're annoying, and almost always lying* so I hate to see them get people's charity, but hard to stop as they're homeless and probably have little to lose.

*My "favorite" is the guy who I saw telling a story about how he's just got out of prison and was trying to turn his life around, but only had 5 more copies of his resume. If we would just give money, he'd get a job. Of course weeks later when I saw him again, he had still just gotten out of prison last week, and still had only a couple more copies of his resume.

[ 18. February 2014, 15:08: Message edited by: Gwai ]

--------------------
A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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ChaliceGirl
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Haven't been subjected to loud preaching on the bus, but I've been talked to by Jehovah's Witness on the bus and at bus stops. They'll start out making small talk, then say something like, "It's a crazy world, but there's hope..." and out comes the literature.

Oh well, I just grin and bear it. Rather deal with that than the loud cell phone talkers, or people who suddenly don't know what "Excuse me" means and don't move aside.

But in the case in the OP, it sounds like she's been a problem for awhile, and if she is distracting the driver from doing his job, it is an issue.

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ToujoursDan

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This is par for the course on the New York Subway. I have to encounter this kind of preaching at least once a month, at least. I just put my headphones on and read. We don't have much in the way of noise rules (and those that exist are rarely enforced.)

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"Many people say I embarrass them with my humility" - Archbishop Peter Akinola
Facebook link: http://www.facebook.com/toujoursdan

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Enoch
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quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:
... I don't want this to be a discussion about mental illness - because a lot of people think I'm mentally ill for believing that a guy rose from the dead and is in heaven with his father now. I want to talk about why preaching in public is almost universally seen as very terrible, but we are willing to suck it up for a whole other host of anti-social behavior when using public transport.

I'd like to come back on a slightly different issue here.

Someone preaching is pretty harmless. Nobody is being threatened. It's not a serious abuse. It's less of a nuisance than music or the beat of someone else's over-loud iPod. Furthermore it can be defended as freedom of speech. Perhaps it's something we ought to accept we have to put up with.

A more salient question IMHO is this. Would the driver have tried to intervene if some yobs had started throwing bottles around, fighting (even have just with each other), threatening other passengers or really harassing them? If so, then I think it may be legitimate for him to control any passenger who is intruding into the life of other passengers.

Otherwise however, there is an increasing tendency for officials, whether bus drivers, police or whoever, to go for the easy hanging fruit, but to funk it when it comes to dealing with troublemakers where doing so might genuinely threaten their personal convenience or safety.

quote:
originally posted by Toujours Dan
This is par for the course on the New York Subway. I have to encounter this kind of preaching at least once a month, at least.

Your underground must be a much quieter mechanical environment than ours. Once a train starts, it's so noisy you have to suspend even a conversation with the person sitting next to you until it stops at the next station.

--------------------
Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson

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Mudfrog
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About 60 years ago it was the done thing for groups of trainee Salvation Army officers - cadets - to take the train/tube/bus to their various training venues. Travelling as a 'brigade' (maybe half a dozen) they would be led by a sergeant who, at various points on the journey would instruct 'Cadet Smith' to relate his/her testimony to the other passengers.

I thank God that this practice was long discontinued when i went into training.

Having said that we used to do short, enthusiastic open air meetings on Friday nights in Soho/Leicester Square/Gt Windmill Street. I remember standing in the doorway of a XXX cinema on Gt Windmill Street challenging people who looked like they wanted to go in.

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"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton

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Pomona
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quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:
... I don't want this to be a discussion about mental illness - because a lot of people think I'm mentally ill for believing that a guy rose from the dead and is in heaven with his father now. I want to talk about why preaching in public is almost universally seen as very terrible, but we are willing to suck it up for a whole other host of anti-social behavior when using public transport.

I'd like to come back on a slightly different issue here.

Someone preaching is pretty harmless. Nobody is being threatened. It's not a serious abuse. It's less of a nuisance than music or the beat of someone else's over-loud iPod. Furthermore it can be defended as freedom of speech. Perhaps it's something we ought to accept we have to put up with.

A more salient question IMHO is this. Would the driver have tried to intervene if some yobs had started throwing bottles around, fighting (even have just with each other), threatening other passengers or really harassing them? If so, then I think it may be legitimate for him to control any passenger who is intruding into the life of other passengers.

Otherwise however, there is an increasing tendency for officials, whether bus drivers, police or whoever, to go for the easy hanging fruit, but to funk it when it comes to dealing with troublemakers where doing so might genuinely threaten their personal convenience or safety.

quote:
originally posted by Toujours Dan
This is par for the course on the New York Subway. I have to encounter this kind of preaching at least once a month, at least.

Your underground must be a much quieter mechanical environment than ours. Once a train starts, it's so noisy you have to suspend even a conversation with the person sitting next to you until it stops at the next station.

Someone telling me that I am going to Hell is definitely threatening. I have also seen bus drivers intervene and stop anti-social behaviour of all kinds. YMMV of course but in my experience bus drivers are hardly shy and retiring, and are not scared to take someone up on their behaviour.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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SvitlanaV2
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I don't know if I'd find this kind of speechifying threatening, exactly. Unless the speaker were planning to dispatch me to hell forthwith I think I'd mostly just find it embarrassing.

OTOH, I might get worried if the individual looked and sounded half-crazed, it was 11pm at night, and I was the only other person on the bus....

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argona
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Seems to me this issue says a lot about how we regard public space these days. Was this woman actually intimidating anyone? I mean really intimidating, not simply interrupting their desire to travel in an isolationist bubble as though the world around them didn't exist, or at least didn't impinge on their wish to ignore it?

I love the noisy tumult of city life. On public transport, I'm fascinated by the people around me, the life on the streets we pass through. Idiosyncracy, even noisy idiosyncracy, is something to be treasured. But that's not where we're heading. Public space is to be tamed, pasteurised. Nothing tolerated that might divert us from the imperatives to work, make money and spend it. All else is disruption. Just plug your iPod into your ears and ignore it.

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Gwai
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Everyone keeps suggesting headphones. Speaking of public space, are we presuming a public space where everyone must be possessed of headphones? Must we choose between going about the world deaf because I've plugged my ears or being harassed by obnoxious people.

--------------------
A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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Lamb Chopped
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I'm going to suggest singing showtunes.

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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

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Mere Nick
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It could be worse. The lady could have pro poisonous snake handling beliefs and whip out a rattlesnake on the bus.

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"Well that's it, boys. I've been redeemed. The preacher's done warshed away all my sins and transgressions. It's the straight and narrow from here on out, and heaven everlasting's my reward."
Delmar O'Donnell

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Boogie

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# 13538

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quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:
Everyone keeps suggesting headphones. Speaking of public space, are we presuming a public space where everyone must be possessed of headphones? Must we choose between going about the world deaf because I've plugged my ears or being harassed by obnoxious people.

Not really - but it is an excellent way of blocking out extraneous noise, passing the time and listening to the podcast/novel/music you choose and enjoy. I'm learning German on mine.

[Smile]

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Garden. Room. Walk

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seekingsister
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quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Someone telling me that I am going to Hell is definitely threatening.

The woman was not preaching anything resembling this, nor was her speech indicative of any recognizable religion.

Just wish to reiterate this so we don't argue against straw men.

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Ariel
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quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:
quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Someone telling me that I am going to Hell is definitely threatening.

The woman was not preaching anything resembling this, nor was her speech indicative of any recognizable religion.
So what was she actually preaching, then? Almost all the street/transport preachers I've come across feature hellfire a lot and are usually pretty quick to bring in a mention.
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seekingsister
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quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
I'd like to come back on a slightly different issue here.

Someone preaching is pretty harmless. Nobody is being threatened. It's not a serious abuse. It's less of a nuisance than music or the beat of someone else's over-loud iPod. Furthermore it can be defended as freedom of speech. Perhaps it's something we ought to accept we have to put up with.

A more salient question IMHO is this. Would the driver have tried to intervene if some yobs had started throwing bottles around, fighting (even have just with each other), threatening other passengers or really harassing them? If so, then I think it may be legitimate for him to control any passenger who is intruding into the life of other passengers.

Otherwise however, there is an increasing tendency for officials, whether bus drivers, police or whoever, to go for the easy hanging fruit, but to funk it when it comes to dealing with troublemakers where doing so might genuinely threaten their personal convenience or safety.


That's exactly the point I was thinking about when I made this post.

A 50 year old woman preaching is not threatening - particularly the type of preaching in this case which was very new agey. The driver's behavior made everyone much more uncomfortable.

I've been on a London bus where a group of boys boarded and attempted to remove another boy sitting on the top deck by dragging him down the aisle and stairs onto the street. The bus driver just stopped and sat in his cubicle. He could have made an announcement that the police were being called and that all other passengers should exit while he contacts the authorities. Perhaps he did call someone but he did nothing to warn the boys about their behavior or to address the fears of other passengers.

So I agree with you, it seems that the low hanging fruit of a preaching lady is the one that gets attention - perhaps the pent-up rage of a bus driver who deals with a lot of nonsense that he is too nervous to address directly - and not the real issues of violence and intimidation that happen on a daily basis.

Here's a story I just read this morning about teens who attacked a man for asking them to stop pressing the "STOP" button:


Teens who attacked passenger spared jail

Posts: 1371 | From: London | Registered: May 2013  |  IP: Logged
Eirenist
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# 13343

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I was on a RER train in Paris when a young man got on at the Cite Universitaire and made a speech in which he told us that as a protest against the capitalist system he was refusing to work and needed money to buy food. He asked us, his fellow-passengers, to make a monetary contribution to his welfare. Nobody moved or offered him anything. He swore at us and got off at the next stop, presumably to try his luck on the next train. He was well-spoken and apparently sane.
Apologies for tangent.

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'I think I think, therefore I think I am'

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Boogie

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# 13538

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quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:

I've been on a London bus where a group of boys boarded and attempted to remove another boy sitting on the top deck by dragging him down the aisle and stairs onto the street. The bus driver just stopped and sat in his cubicle.

And I don't blame him! One of those lads could have had a knife.

As someone said upthread, in the USA it could have been a gun.

Maybe he did take his frustration out on preaching-woman, but she didn't exactly make life easy for herself either did she?

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Garden. Room. Walk

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seekingsister
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quote:
Originally posted by Ariel:
So what was she actually preaching, then? Almost all the street/transport preachers I've come across feature hellfire a lot and are usually pretty quick to bring in a mention.

I described it in the OP but to the best of my memory it was:

"Excuse me. I have received a prophecy that there is someone on this bus whose destiny has been blocked. There is a way for you to resolve this issue. An international fasting movement has started to help people unblock their destinies..." at which point I couldn't hear what she was saying over the bus driver who had started yelling at her.

Nothing about God, Bible, Christianity, hell, suffering, etc.

Posts: 1371 | From: London | Registered: May 2013  |  IP: Logged
Curiosity killed ...

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I've had that sort of preaching on the tube - and been handed leaflets.

And I've been on buses where they've stopped the bus and told the kids they've called the police.

The funniest was the lad who was vandalising the tube in front of me and another guy. I was doing my best teacher glare and debating how much else I was going to do when the guy got up and challenged the teenager. "What's it to do with you?"
"Well, I'm an off duty London Transport Police officer."
Kid got off at the next stop and I got to report the incident with descriptions with my new friend.

(The London gang culture in Bow is very scary - Tower Hamlets recently arrested 147 teenagers in an attempt to clamp down on this. Working with these challenging teenagers in the community we permanently have antennae on alert for gang stuff - and one of our kids is currently in custody awaiting trial for stabbing a couple of other kids.)

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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat

Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006  |  IP: Logged
Bullfrog.

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# 11014

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Chicago Transit Authority has posted rules against soliciting on buses. Seems to me that any preaching is some kind of solicitation. It's a spiritual solicitation, but you're still basically soliciting a response. It's a non-consensual interaction in a space that is governed by a mutual consent on norms and expectations.

The bus is not your church. The bus is not the public square. The bus is not a space of voluntary interaction.

I wish people had the courtesy to respect people's privacy in public places instead of abusing the fact that people, once on the bus, cannot leave voluntarily without incurring a substantial cost. It's a very mild form of abuse, violating someone else's privacy without their consent. If you want to preach on a street corner, I can cross the street, but on a train, I cannot step out of the train without adding 20 minutes to whatever errand I'm trying to run.

Preaching on the bus is one of those things where the manner in which the message is conveyed drowns out whatever the message is. And the message is that you're presumptuous and rude, and your preaching is so inept that the only way you can get anyone to listen is to capture an audience and hold them hostage.

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Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg

Posts: 7522 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006  |  IP: Logged
Bullfrog.

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Chicago Transit Authority has posted rules against soliciting on buses and train. Seems to me that any preaching is some kind of solicitation. It's a spiritual solicitation, but you're still basically soliciting a response. It's a non-consensual interaction in a space that is governed by a mutual consent on norms and expectations.

The bus is not your church. The bus is not the public square. The bus is not a space of voluntary interaction.

I wish people had the courtesy to respect people's privacy instead of abusing the fact that people, once on the bus, cannot leave voluntarily without incurring a substantial cost. It's a very mild form of abuse, violating someone else's privacy without their consent. If you want to preach on a street corner, I can cross the street, but on a train, I cannot step out of the train without adding 20 minutes to whatever errand I'm trying to run.

Preaching on the bus is one of those things where the manner in which the message is conveyed drowns out whatever the message is. And the message is that you're presumptuous and rude, and your preaching is so inept that the only way you can get anyone to listen is to capture an audience and hold them hostage.

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Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg

Posts: 7522 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006  |  IP: Logged
Enoch
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# 14322

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quote:
Originally posted by Bullfrog.:
Chicago Transit Authority has posted rules against soliciting on buses. Seems to me that any preaching is some kind of solicitation. It's a spiritual solicitation, but you're still basically soliciting a response. It's a non-consensual interaction in a space that is governed by a mutual consent on norms and expectations.

The bus is not your church. The bus is not the public square. The bus is not a space of voluntary interaction. ...

Sorry. However much you disapprove, it strikes me as spectacularly disproportionate to liken what this woman was doing to prostitution, or to describe what you regard as preaching in an inappropriate context as spiritual soliciting.

Besides, in this country, the argument about private and public space doesn't work because it's also illegal for prostitutes to solicit in the street.

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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson

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Marvin the Martian

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quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
Sorry. However much you disapprove, it strikes me as spectacularly disproportionate to liken what this woman was doing to prostitution, or to describe what you regard as preaching in an inappropriate context as spiritual soliciting.

"Soliciting" does not refer only to prostitution.

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Hail Gallaxhar

Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003  |  IP: Logged
Enoch
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quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
"Soliciting" does not refer only to prostitution.

That may be so in different contexts, but, unless it's used differently in Chicago, that's how it's understood in ordinary usage.

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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson

Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008  |  IP: Logged
Bullfrog.

Prophetic Amphibian
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quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
"Soliciting" does not refer only to prostitution.

That may be so in different contexts, but, unless it's used differently in Chicago, that's how it's understood in ordinary usage.
That's not what it means in this context, and that's not what I meant. The most common offense is begging.

In this town, prostitution in general is illegal everywhere, so the idea of there being legitimate places to solicit those kinds of favors doesn't make sense.

[ 19. February 2014, 18:24: Message edited by: Bullfrog. ]

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Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg

Posts: 7522 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006  |  IP: Logged
Marvin the Martian

Interplanetary
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[crosspost]

Not round here. Maybe that's just a Bristol thing.

[ 19. February 2014, 18:24: Message edited by: Marvin the Martian ]

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Hail Gallaxhar

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leo
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# 1458

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Ooh er my luvver. Down yer we love all they solicitors soliciting.

Problem is, my luvver, we can't afford 'em.

Ooh ar me harties.

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My Jewish-positive lectionary blog is at http://recognisingjewishrootsinthelectionary.wordpress.com/
My reviews at http://layreadersbookreviews.wordpress.com

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Golden Key
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# 1468

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I think the preaching woman was in the wrong, and that the driver's handling probably made things worse.

I don't think I've dealt with a bus preacher--but did have the misfortune to deal with a couple of missionaries (Mormon or JW) who got on the bus, started to work from the front to the back, and sat down where they could to share whatever. I think maybe one stood over people, where there wasn't a seat available, and witnessed to those particular people. It felt predatory, in a sense.

On SF public transportation, music devices are supposed to be inaudible to other passengers. Cell conversations are supposed to be kept to a low volume. (That isn't always observed, which annoys people. Then you get the person who is having a very audible, very private cell conversation--and gets mad because people are paying attention.)

Sometimes, there's violence: beatings, violent theft (in full sight of everyone), weapons, escalating conflicts. I was on a bus, a few years ago, when a couple of grown men had a verbal fight and were about to get off the bus and go at it. I think one of them left. The driver got into it so much with the remaining guy that he (the driver) became ragingly furious, and basically called the guy out--the driver and the guy were going to fight. Very scary. IIRC, the driver did put in a call to HQ for help. I think that's when I left the bus--fortunately, I was close to home.


I understand the argument that a bus preacher may be low-hanging fruit. But that doesn't mean that she should be able to do what she did.

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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged
Justinian
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quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:
Have you ridden a bus lately?

About half a dozen times per week since the new year. Only time I've had a problem with kids doing more than chatting noisily the bus drive threw them off.

quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
Someone preaching is pretty harmless. Nobody is being threatened.

Have you listened to the supposed Good News of the Gospel recently? It might not be immediately threatening - but find me a bigger threat than telling someone they are going to be tortured and burned for ever. And that's without getting into the homophobic messages woven into a lot of contemporary Christianity, especially the types that go in for being a public nuisance - and those are definitely threatening.

quote:
It's not a serious abuse. It's less of a nuisance than music or the beat of someone else's over-loud iPod.
That doesn't remotely match my experience. Speech projected for people to hear is far more disruptive to my peace than what is effectively white noise. If I'm given words that are intended to make sense and are aimed at me I can not ignore them.

quote:
Furthermore it can be defended as freedom of speech. Perhaps it's something we ought to accept we have to put up with.
Why on busses and trains?

And out of curiosity, what would your opinion be if an actual satanist got up and started evangelising? Or a Jihadist? Would you call for both those to be considered freedom of speech (never mind that it's not in a public space and you'd be politely or impolitely escorted out of a restaurant for the same behaviour).

quote:
A more salient question IMHO is this. Would the driver have tried to intervene if some yobs had started throwing bottles around, fighting (even have just with each other), threatening other passengers or really harassing them?
Some would, some wouldn't. They ought to and I've seen it happen.

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My real name consists of just four letters, but in billions of combinations.

Eudaimonaic Laughter - my blog.

Posts: 3926 | From: The Sea Coast of Bohemia | Registered: Dec 2003  |  IP: Logged
Golden Key
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# 1468

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Ethne Alba--

Cool experience with Micky.

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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")

Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged
Pomona
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# 17175

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quote:
Originally posted by seekingsister:
quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Someone telling me that I am going to Hell is definitely threatening.

The woman was not preaching anything resembling this, nor was her speech indicative of any recognizable religion.

Just wish to reiterate this so we don't argue against straw men.

Of course - I was talking about street (and indeed bus) preachers more generally, I should have clarified, sorry.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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