Only two privileged women who have never, in their whole lives, experienced any consequences for their actions could have escalated to this level of crazy. You don’t just wake up like this one day. Crazy #1 has definitely jumped onto a moving car before and crazy #2 has never backed down from a fight before…
I'm glad I'm in therapy. I'd never do something as entitled as jumping on someones car like that, but I'm sitting here feeling the driver is 100% in the right, and how is handle it. I'm apparently in the minority.
I'm right there with you and am bummed that the driver seems to be the only one really being punished for this interaction.
I mean, when you jump on someone's car and egg them on, after trying to open their doors and banging on the windows, can you really be all that upset/surprised when they start driving after repeatedly telling you to gtfo?
Well that's cuz you can't really get free labor or money out of an 85 year old. Stick the youngins with fines or jail time where you can make money off of it.
No I'm actually really surprised by the reaction here. Not half an hour ago I watched a video on Reddit where two guys jump out of a car to try and rob the driver and the driver drives into both of them. All of the comments were supporting the driver saying it was the right and only way to handle that situation. Why can we plow people down with the assumption that they're dangerous but this girl is in trouble when the person was banging on her door telling her to get out and hanging onto her car? Everyone is saying the driver escalated the situation but the full video shows that the lady hanging on escalated it multiple times first.
People who are insane / out of control don't get blamed. They're like animals or weather events, they're something to be managed by sane, responsible people.
You can only control what's in your power. Obviously the prime fault is with the woman on the car hood, but that is what it is - she's like that, you can't change that. The only levers we have available to pull is our response.
She was never in danger, ie the response was out or proportion. She was locked in her car she didn’t need to drive at that speed. I have complete sympathy for her and joping she gets a slap on the wrist, because that bitch on the hood deserves far worse.
At least you're aware of your own shortcomings, that's a start. It's true though: you can't just try and kill someone with your vehicle because they did something stupid first.
You said attempted manslaughter or at least reckless driving. Understand that's like saying someone could be charged with grand larceny or petty theft. Literally two opposite sides of the spectrum. For one, reckless driving isn't a felony.
I think your "100%" throws a bit of a spanner into the works of your comment my reading comprehension and the charge was not particularly hefty. You are indeed technically correct, which as we all know is the best kind of correct.
I think this situation highlights the danger of escalating confrontations. No doubt the driver was fearful when someone came up to her car and tried to open the door/break off the antennae. And no doubt the attacker was fearful when the driver just...drove off with her on the hood. When we choose to escalate a situation rather than deescalate it, this happens.
People often think as backing down from a fight as "losing". But really it's what protects both people from sentencing like what Shaw received. Two wrongs don't make a right, no matter how justified it feels in the moment to give someone some justice.
How does someone who is physically disabled deescalate a situation where someone is trying to break into their car and vandalize it when that person is willing to hop on the hood of their car to keep them from driving away?
I hope she called 9-11 (or Australian equivalent) first. But if the police are going to be a while, trying to figure out what these deescalation techniques would be.
Sure. It starts by putting your foot on the break, making sure your doors are locked, picking up your phone and calling the police.
Yes, it might take a while for police to arrive. Yes, you're in a scary and vulnerable position. Yes, it would be great if humans had derived some immediate alternative - but we haven't. I truly believe that escalation leads to greater escalation - on a mass scale - within socieities. We hear a story of someone shooting an intruder in self-defense, and so future robbers bring a gun with them, which leads homeowners to escalate to shooting someone on their front lawn, and so future criminals break in at night, and so we equip our homes with weapons and cameras and smart doorbells, and...and...and...
We build the society we live in, in the micro-decisions we make every day. And while most people don't think about the repercussion of their actions (and neither of these women did), their actions carry consequences not only for themselves, but for how our cultures adapt and evolve.
The best you can do, as an individual, is de-escalate. The doesn't make the aggressor "right", it doesn't mean they "win". But if we instead can turn our attention and energy to solving the root cause of aggression in the first place - people's mental state, livelihoods, ensuring they feel they're contributing to and part of a thriving community that cares about them - these things lower the rate of incidents and the need to ever de-escalate at all.
I also think that human nature is why escalations like this one happen. No one wants to feel unsafe. No one wants to feel trapped or threatened. It's a terrible feeling. AND retribution is something best-dissuaded from a societal perspective - barring of course, real life or death circumstances. Even carving that small sliver of circumstances out, we can see the gaps where self-defense is both warranted and often necessary. But for the majority of cases, I truly believe de-escalation is not only the smart thing to do, but the existentially-right thing to do.
I hope you'll take that to heart - as I will today - and spend some energy on addressing the root causes of aggression within your community. Even in small ways, we can make a big difference if we spend our time offline and in the world around us.
FUCKING THANK YOU. Reddit gets so bloodthirsty sometimes lol. “Hrmmm I was in the right m’lady, therefore I get to murder you hue hue hue.” Literally every thread that has a clear cut good guy-bad guy narrative there’s a comment with like 50,000 upvotes or someone saying “well personally I would have called in an orbital laser on the woman who was clearly crashing out from a mental episode and vaporized them on the spot and they would deserve it because I’M IN THE RIGHT AND THEY’RE NOT. Then you have another 50 replies after of these dudes slapping their big fat hands together in applause, “I would award this but I’m poor so I only have this meager updoot to give my good sir” tips fedora aggressively and then opens up their 3TB hentai folder
You can’t just run someone over with your car because you don’t like them, Imaginary-Bat. Lmaooo. Come on now, the driver was never in any real danger in that car. She was put in a ridiculous situation by a woman who clearly needs to be on lithium for the rest of her life but she was relatively harmless to someone locked inside a car. This was in Australia where there’s practically zero chance that this suburban white woman was packing heat. She may have been fearful and acted in accordance with that but that’s pretty much the same justification that American cops use to feign innocence when they mag-dump an unarmed homeless person. You can be in the right all you want but does that justify violence? Loads of bipolar people suffer semi frequent episodes of mania and psychosis, this could have actually been a woman who was normally very kind and peaceful who is just completely crashing out due to a medical episode… I’ve uh, been there, shamefully (😭)… Anyways what I’m trying to say is you can’t just hit people with your car, Bat, you just can’t!
That's exactly what I'm pushing back against. Is it Just to escalate against an aggressor? Maybe - it really depends on the aggression. But is it without repercussions? No. We accept, generally, that it is better within our society if we de-escalate and back down from confrontation. Why? Because different individuals within our society see "an eye for an eye" differently. I don't personally view snapping off my car antenna as equivalent to driving someone down the street at-speed until they fall off my car and onto the road.
You might think they are equivalent. Or you might think the driver should do worse. Let's kill someone for doing property damage. Let's cut off a hand. We don't allow individuals to seek Justice because it's impossible to be unbiased and apply equivalence to something that is inherently subjective. Leaving justice in the hands of individuals or vigilantes has, historically, resulted in worsened outcomes for human co-habitation and so there are (often) repercussions for conflict escalation. But further, what you might see as a reasonable way to interact with someone, someone else might see as aggression. Are they Just in applying their personal moral code against you? It's convenient when we look at situations from the view of a third party, but if we open the door to allow anyone to escalate to violence against anyone else as they see fit, we can quickly see how things can get out of hand. It's why we build societies, cultural norms, and laws.
Justice - the act of making a situation Just - is something we defer to our broader community through court systems and elected powers. You might disagree with that as a solution, but thousands of years of human habitation have brought the "Western" world to that cultural value.
It’s in Australia so there was no risk of a gun being involved and basically no risk of any other weapon. It certainly wouldn’t have been something the driver was concerned about.
To add to that, I do also think that whether justice is applied on the spot, so to speak, or post-hoc; if the society is such that all transgressions are replied with equal or greater measure of retribution...
That results in a society where all the sane law abiding members are wary of each other all the time and very polite to avoid giving offence. And the non-sane or just temporarily non-sane get shot, have their life ruined in court afterwards, or penalised massively in other ways.
In other words, it's a society that destroys all non-conforming members and/or excludes them from public existence by their loved ones who don't want to see them penalized and therefore must be hidden away to keep that appearance of sane politeness.
On a grand scale, I completely agree. What others in this thread aren't comprehending is that when we look at this specific case we can see how escalation feels reasonable. Someone jumped on the driver's car - they fucked around and found out. And no one was hurt badly enough in the aftermath of it all; the judgement of the case shows that appropriate consideration was given to the circumstances - the driver reacted like a human does, in the heat of the moment. They received a (small) punishment because in the moment they chose retribution and escalation over de-escalation.
What other responders proposing that this is "Just" miss is that if we leave escalation and judgement up to individuals, THEY too will apply their own meaning of justice. If someone bumps into you, maybe you respond by punching them. If someone gets in a fight with you, maybe you glass them in the face. If someone screams at you, maybe you throw a brick through their window. I understand the thought process - "if everyone expected everyone else in the world to escalate every transgression, then there would be less transgressions". And so I think you're right - that might lead to exactly what you're proposing: that the fear of offending anyone would lead to a pretty stale and stagnant life.
I think the main issue is really just the heat of the moment. Without prior experience, calling the police is probably quite rarely the thing on one's mind in our priviledged countries of Aus/NZ. In america... 911 quick!
Personally I'd have loved to google the nearest police station and drive her there on the bonnet at 15km/h if it was feasible, then just hold the horn down outside. Maybe just beep the whole way. Deafening could be fun, and there's valid reason to announce your presence to traffic.
Calling the police is undeniably the right answer though; perhaps blocking the traffic there would encourage somebody more active to shove her off [detain her] so everybody could move on.
You must be confused. The assailant, placed herself on the car. The driver didn't decide to do that. When you place yourself on a vehicle and it starts to move (as vehicles do), you can't then charge the driver with a crime. The criminal is the idiot on the hood.
Which is fine because she is unharmed. Australian law is just weak against assailants. She didn't have to do prison time and is safe from the attacker.
It is not about personal moral code. Viewed through the lens of property rights, aggression is clearly defined.
I like to make this distinction, because a state or some majority vote, does not make the currently enforced rules just. The state is by definition an unjust bandit.
If people do back down and deescalate for everything, it just gives malevolent people a free pass to skirt the lines however much they wish, with no repercussions.
Also I dislike eye for eye, it implies equivalence. The defending party should have a right to claim more in response. If they didn't want their eyes gouged out, they should not have aggressed.
Now that, is the world I want to live in. Even if it technically increases violence.
This is how I feel, it’s fucking insane to me that these people can act like this and get away with it with no consequences at all, yet the victim gets punished
If you live in a bad area like certain areas in south west Sydney and west Sydney, you know just how rough it is and how bad it can get
When someone can follow my 74 year old grandmother for about 2 kms and up to two roundabouts because that person was speeding and almost crashed into the back of her, and that person only backs off/down because I was in the passenger seat and they saw me, you won’t feel safe, when the houses you’ve lived in consistently get broken into and robbed, you won’t feel safe
When the cops can’t do shit because the judges just keep releasing these animals, you won’t feel safe
The people in these comments defending animals like this clearly don’t deal with it, must be nice living in a rich gated community, no wonder they don’t see the problem
These people sicken and disgust me, their viewpoint also never changes because they can’t see out of their small little bubble
Oh well, as long as everyone, including the criminally insane and criminals have complete freedom, it’s ok if the country goes to shit and people don’t feel safe
Guess we can’t ever hold anyone accountable for their actions, better get rid of cops, waste of money at this point 🤷🏼🙄
The driver driving off wasn't unreasonable in my eyes, but she quickly got to a speed where the instigator couldn't get off without major risk of serious injury.
Is she just supposed to sit there and see what other crazy things this lunatic tries to do? She was attempting to flee the situation - and de escalate- and the windshield lady repeatedly chose to insert herself in harm’s way.
It's one of those things where I can definitely empathize with the vengeance taken, while at the same time I recognize that the reason these actions are illegal and running someone over with your car like this would be punished is because if everyone solves their problems this way we'd be completely fucked as a society.
I find it weird that the crazy chick on the hood got off scott free from what is an altercation she started. I hope that doesn't embolden this kinda behavior.
Well.. no legal consequences. She got to briefly fear for her life and to enjoy some degree of pain and perhaps injury from failing onto the road at speed.
It would have been really good if she'd faced some sort of charge for her behaviour, as well, but at least she got something she didn't like.
Which confuses the hell out of me. Because I had to double check the article that the lunatic on the hood putting the driver's life in danger wasn't punished at all!? Meanwhile the driver is possibly going to lose her chance at the 2028 Olympics and lost her license. How the fuck? If a crazy person jumps on the hood of my car, I absolutely am not stopping until I am either at the authorities or the person is off my car.
Came here to say this. I walk around pretending to be sane apparently, cause I would have done what the driver did in this case, to get the leech off my car 😅
People like you scare me. This isn’t good behavior that other people should emulate, this isn’t good for anyone and isn’t how people should act in a society. Imagine if everyone responded to confrontation with murderous rage? Society has moved past Hammurabi’s code.
No, I asked how it was physically possible to assault somebody through the windscreen of a car.
The only possible way is a scenario or event that didn't happen.
IF someone went and got a rock to start smashing a windscreen, then driving off regardless of the other person is likely to be legally justified. That's not what happened though.
She is disabled and the person was actively trying to get into the vehicle for violence, the only thing she did wrong was act calm and collected in the video. If he hadn't she wouldn't be in trouble.
Thank you for saying so. As a disabled person, this is something that I have to take into account every day, even if I just want to go to the fucking grocery store. Too many people think that they should be judging who is and isn’t disabled “enough”, and they get AGGRESSIVE.
I am so much physically weaker, I have to be a lot more careful. I can be hurt or killed so much more easily, and quickly. Most people don’t understand what goes into that kind and level of vulnerability, unless they’ve lived it. Thank you for speaking on it.
Well, you're changing the goal posts. Your statement was that if you are inside a vehicle and a person is outside then you're in no physical danger of being harmed. As a general statement, ICBM not withstanding, it's simply wrong.
With all of the constraints and perfect hindsight provided by watching the video months after the fact, and the fact that we're not in the middle of a situation where a mentally unstable person is trying desperately to gain access to our vehicle and need to make quick decisions.... then sure. You can conclude that in this one case with hindsight the driver was probably not in danger.
I wouldn't have gone onto a main road with her clinging to my car at high speed (mostly as I don't want to catch a charge if she went under my tires or something), but I 100% would have sped up and then hit the brakes hard sending her into that bush/grass in the beginning.
I partially agree with you. I think lady on the hood fucked around and found out. I too found it satisfying watching her smugness turn to terror.
That said, I would not have taken this so far as to turn onto a main road and gun the car with a person on my hood. Especially when it was clear she was falling off. Driver could have run over her with the wheels. That’s just a crazy level of disregard for human life.
I am genuinely wondering what the “reasonable” options are to deal with this?
Get out and pull her off the car? Potential assault.
Call the cops? They’ll just laugh and show up in 3-5 business days.
Try to reason with her? If that were an option, she wouldn’t be holding onto a moving car.
I kinda agree that driving up to highway speed was also probably not a great choice, but she should face some consequences for antagonizing the driver. Or at least the driver should be forgiven if they don’t have a prior history of severe road incidents.
In reality the driver did little to nothing wrong. The "victim" could have been planning a stabbing or attack possibly with another car behind OP.
She could have slowed down to let her off to reduce risk of injury, that is really the big part for this particular case. The response is a little too harsh for the risk presented in the video, but at the same time you never know.
One thought exercise I like to do is imagine a fragile old grandma in BLANK situation. If OP's perspective was from an 85yo grandma the courts would have applauded her bravery..
Yeah what the actual fuck is with the article naming the driver, but not the attacker?! And then ok the driver lost her license for 6 months but what about the attacker?! Where are her consequences?! Hers should be worse!!! Like criminal assault/battery idk law stuff but seriously?! She was more wrong.
I agree, she was the aggressor. Against a disabled woman, and we have no way of knowing everything about that woman’s disabilities. We don’t know anything about what made her especially vulnerable, only she does. We cannot accurately judge how appropriate her fear was, because we don’t know the details. It could be worse than what we think.
I had a situation where someone cut in front of me in a drive through just a few hours before I saw this.
As a man who lives not far from where this happened I sat and thought, "Yeah, this makes me super angry, but is this worth a fight?"
I've been in plenty fights, lost enough to know I don't want one unless it's really worth it.
There was one guy who I got into a scuffle with who was selling some equipment with my sisters initials engraved on then that looked a lot like the ones that got stolen from the salon she works in. I do regret that one because the brushes and clippers got damaged.
There was a dude who kicked my dog so I chased him away from the house with a cricket bat.
There's one guy out there who I know is touching kids, police did nothing, so it's on sight for him but it seems to be on sight with a lot of people for him so he doesn't get out much.
But beyond that? No fights I really want. You can cut in front of me in line, that's not harming anyone.
If you've ever been in a real fight you learn what's important enough to keep you from getting into another.
not really, most men who act crazy have been punched in the teeth before. it hurts quite a bit. we're generally well mannered for that reason, another teeth punching could be coming if we mouth off.
I see two people who don't know how to de-escalate without losing face. Sounds like the "passenger" was driving the wrong way, refused to back up, got out of her car and tried to open the door and windows of the red car, but unfortunately the footage starts just after that moment. Driver wouldn't back off and saw red. Both were expecting the other to relent at any moment and neither did, and so here we all are, Friday morning umpiring.
IMO she did the right thing for the most part. Going too high of a speed is the excessive ending though - but the main question is, she's harassed, she's an innocent victim just trying to get food - why do the courts accuse her and defend the actual problem?
Start defending incident causers in favour of the real victims and it'll start happening more often. That's not a society we can afford to live in.
But the right response IMO would be to drive slowly, and just keep on driving. Imagine the long way back that woman would have to walk - while if you're going 10-15km/h, there's not much risk.
Personally I'd interpret her encouragement of "go on" as permission though - but it's still wreckless driving to do that with a permitting friend.
Nah, men of every social standing imaginable escalate shit to this level of crazy all the time. Your comment is just... garden variety internet misogyny.
Okay? But you’re acting like she has privilege, which is completely delusional and ableist.
I never said violence teaches conflict management. You were the one who assumed that she’s never dealt with violence, therefore she can’t resolve conflicts. You’re contradicting yourself
Only two privileged women who have never, in their whole lives, experienced any consequences for their actions could have escalated to this level of crazy.
Bro, men literally escalate to hospitalisations and deaths for staring at someone too long or accidentally bumping in to each other every night.
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u/Savemejeebus12 Apr 16 '26
Literally what I came to say.
Only two privileged women who have never, in their whole lives, experienced any consequences for their actions could have escalated to this level of crazy. You don’t just wake up like this one day. Crazy #1 has definitely jumped onto a moving car before and crazy #2 has never backed down from a fight before…