‘Shut up b****!’ Blue Springs woman’s tirade at teens over ATV was way out of line | Opinion
This week, I watched a disturbing video that has been circulating on social media. In the short clip posted earlier in the week to the Kansas City Reel Instagram account, a woman can be seen berating a group of teens.
While the brief footage doesn’t show what led up to the encounter, what was captured on video infuriated me. The unidentified woman’s behavior was out of line.
Apparently, the incident took place in Blue Springs, according to what the woman said about local laws. I’m hesitant to inject race into this, but the adult was white and the teens were Black, which may or may not have influenced her anger. That, I don’t know. But what I witnessed on video was inexcusable.
“Shut up bitch, OK?” the woman yells at the start of the video, which is less than 80 seconds long. Her ire is apparently directed at a young Black woman standing off camera.
“I have kids your age, too,” the woman says.
If what the woman said about being a parent was true, that only makes her outburst look worse. How would she like it if an adult approached her children ranting and raving and cursing at them?
The woman, with a teal bicycle, then turns to a young Black man sitting on an all-terrain vehicle and accuses him of breaking the law. She was right: Riding an ATV on the sidewalk is illegal in Blue Springs, according to Michael J. Hunt, Blue Springs city prosecutor.
“An ATV is considered a motorized vehicle and is prohibited from being operated on sidewalks,” Hunt wrote in an email.
But the woman’s approach to the situation lacked human decency. She should own up to her antagonizing antics and find these young people and their parents to apologize.
“Where’s your parents?” the woman snaps at the male teen.
“Don’t worry about that,” he says.
“Don’t drive this on this path,” the woman says. “Put it on the road.”
The teen then asks, calmly: “Is there a law against it?”
“There is a law,” she says. “Look up Blue Springs, Missouri, laws. A four wheeler has to be on the street.”
“OK,” the male teen says. “Have a nice day.”
In an act of defiance, the woman refuses to leave the scene and continues her unwarranted tirade. She accused the male teen of almost running over a man and his family — a claim the young man and his friends denied on camera.
“I will find your parents,” she says to the male teen.
“Have fun with that,” he says.
Then the woman turns to the person recording this strange encounter and goes on a sarcastic tangent unbecoming of any self-respecting adult.
“Hey everybody,” she says, waving to the camera. “Hi. I’m just a homeowner here. Yeah, videotape it. Woo-hoo.”
I’ve watched this clip about a half-dozen times. I marveled at the composure shown by the teen and his friends. The adult in this incident unnecessarily escalated the situation. What grown person with any sense of decorum yells obscenities at another’s child?
Ironically, the woman may have broken the law herself. Blue Springs city code states: “Whenever any person is riding a bicycle upon a sidewalk, such person shall yield the right-of-way to any pedestrian and shall give audible signal before overtaking and passing such pedestrian.” The woman didn’t pause a single second as she rode off on her bike and forced another teen off the pavement and onto the grass nearby as she cycles away.
As with any edited video clip, we don’t know the whole story behind this dustup. What is known is that the young man involved should not have ridden the ATV on the sidewalk — a tough lesson to learn under the circumstances.
But what must be said is the woman needs a lesson in manners. Her behavior shown on this video is hard to ignore. She cursed at a child who wasn’t her own.
And that shouldn’t sit right with any of us.
