SINGAPORE: “Say please first.” That was the reply a teenage girl gave after an uncle allegedly barked at her to give up her seat on the MRT. Her account has since sparked conversation online, with many netizens applauding her for standing her ground and insisting on basic courtesy.
On Tuesday (March 3), the teen shared her experience on Reddit’s r/SMRTRabak forum, recounting what happened during her ride on the purple line that afternoon.
In her post, she wrote that she was “minding my own business” when a random uncle came up to her, leaned over, and began scolding her. He allegedly shouted, “YOU GET UP give this seat for the elderly,” even though the seat next to her was empty.
She said she was taken aback by the way he spoke to her. “Like, NO WAY I’m giving up my seat for you if you aren’t going to at least ask nicely,” she wrote. “So I told him to ask nicely and say ‘please,’ then I’ll give up my seat.”
According to the teen, the man looked shocked by her response but “continued scolding” her and kept yelling for her to get up.
“He was continuously yelling at me to get up but I wouldn’t budge unless he said the word ‘please.’”
Eventually, she said, he muttered a nearly inaudible “please” before raising his voice again to say, “GET UP LA, I SAY 1000 TIMES ALREADY.”
“It was in fact the first time he said ‘please,’ so I got up; whatever, I didn’t want to embarrass him more,” she wrote.
The teen added that she couldn’t believe that a fully grown man needed to be reminded by someone much younger about simple manners. She maintained that she had no issue giving up her seat and would have done so immediately if he had approached her politely.
Ending her post on a lighter note, she reminded fellow commuters to stay safe, saying the MRT can be a “wild place,” and urged people to remember their manners when asking for a seat.
“He probably thinks you’re easy to bully.”
The post quickly gained traction online, racking up more than 680 upvotes and over 120 comments. A large number of users voiced support for the teenage girl, commending her for standing up for herself.
One user said, “Great on you for standing up for yourself in such situations. I would have simply put on my headphones and pretended not to hear him if I were in your position.”
Another commented, “He probably thinks you’re easy to bully. Good on you.”
A third netizen remarked, “Good, these people need to learn manners.”
A fourth wrote, “Slay lahh. But really, the elderly need to understand that priority seats are not called ‘entitled seats.’ Sometimes I wonder, do they really need the seat? They can do a 100-meter dash and squeeze through people who are aligning the train to grab a seat. Where I live, I would see an uncle dash through underpasses and escalators to snatch/find or maybe give a pity face for a seat.”
Still, not everyone supported the teen. A handful of commenters criticised her for not automatically offering her seat when she saw an elderly passenger. Some also took issue with her posting the man’s photo online.
One user wrote, “Why is it that people don’t offer the seat automatically when they see elderly passengers, and not only do you not feel embarrassed for not doing so when called out by elderly passengers, but you also mock them, take their picture and post it on the internet, and criticise them? Please ask your parents if this is appropriate behavior.”
Another asked, “Did you have his consent before posting his face on social media and shaming him?”
A third added, “Imagine if it was someone else who said the same thing and posted your father in this Reddit. How would you feel?”
In other news, a woman is seeking advice online after losing the 10% CPF down payment she contributed to a Build-To-Order flat she applied for with her ex-partner, who later cheated on her.
“I would like to ask if there is any way for me to recover the CPF used for the 10% downpayment after the BTO has been cancelled,” she wrote on the r/asksg forum on Monday (Mar 2). “Has anyone experienced something similar before? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.”
Read more: Woman asks if she can recover 10% CPF down payment after ex cancels BTO and marries colleague
