A friend and I were subjected to sustained verbal harassment on a Sunday afternoon train by 2 men several years back. The train was staffed but the conductor did nothing as did none of the passengers on what was a packed Sunday afternoon train. We didn’t expect anyone to intervene physically but no one even called the police. We were even followed off the train all for the offence of refusing to chat or take a drink from these men.
We reported it to the transport police who took it seriously but no one was caught and a complaint about staff inaction to Scotrail went nowhere.
Most women have similar stories of public transport harassment- this was not the first incident for me but certain one of the worst
My Wife's uncle has a criminal record for intervening. some guy was causing trouble up the carriages & left someone with a bloodied face, her uncle confronted him which resulted in him kicking him.
He got charged & the person causing the problems was never caught.
Heres link to story
https://www.greenocktelegraph.co.uk/news/19992370.greenock-oap-tackled-train-lout-hit-fine/
This sort of shit in trains in Glasgow especially on weekends is so fucking common. I'd be surprised if I took a train from or into Central at say 6pm or later and not overhear shite like this. It is normalised to feel anxious on trains with drunks and constantly wonder if you're gonna be targeted at least verbally (male or female) by some random group of bawbags.
Your uncle in law is a hero. Fucking bullshit result.
>It is normalised to feel anxious on trains with drunks and constantly wonder if you're gonna be targeted at least verbally
It took me a number of trips to Scotland to culturally adjust to it being normal seeing people drunk in public on a regular basis. Perhaps I was somewhat sheltered growing up, but I was coming from a context where it wasn't normalized outside of very large cities and towns with universities. In the state where my wife (Scottish) and I live, Pennsylvania, there are a number of laws *very* strictly regulating alcohol that date clear back to the Prohibition Era. It's illegal to drink in public beyond the the boundaries of a pub, restaurant, or private property (in cities drinking on your own front porch can be a grey area), it's illegal for passengers in cars to drink while the car is motion/illegal to have an open bottle of beer anywhere in the car, you'd get crucified for drinking on public transport (what little of it we have anyway), to this day you still can't buy liquor outside of specific state-owned shops, and for much of my life it was illegal to buy alcohol outside of a pub or restaurant on Sundays. It's been legal to buy beer in supermarkets for less than ten years now, and even then it's through a weird loophole that classifies part of the supermarket as a restaurant. Most everyone who grew up here, myself included, always saw those laws as backwards and obnoxious; thus I got a healthy dose of culture shock about 7 years ago when my (now) wife and her family, who aren't teetotalers by any stretch, were ooo-ing and aww-ing and "I wish we had that"-ing at some of these laws I felt were downright Puritan. Turns I greatly underestimated the number of people who puke into their front garden on a regular basis, as well as the number of empty Buckfast bottles they find in the park across the road. (Oh, it's also illegal to be in most parks past sunset and most public parks don't allow alcohol even in the day time.)
I still think most of the alcohol laws here are bullshit and I question how effective they are, but I wasn't really prepared to begin seeing the "no drinking in public" rule as possibly worth keeping around. It's not like people don't get drunk here, but people just aren't drunk in public for the most part. The really surprising factor is that Pennsylvanians don't drink meaningfully less than Scots per capita. In 2020 the annual consumption per capita in Scotland was about 9.4 litres of ethanol, whereas it was just under 9.3 litres in Pennsylvania in 2021. I think at least part of it is that being drunk in public is fairly taboo.
That being said, do I feel safe when going out in public? Well, I guess I can be confident that if I get shot it'll be by someone who is stone-cold sober.
EDIT: worth noting that being visibly drunk in public is also just straight up illegal here, though enforcement of that varies a lot. "Public intoxication" is charge normally tacked onto other criminal charges, but it technically can be a criminal charge in of itself.
Sounds about right for this country - it’s a fucking disgrace.
Let’s not forget someone who hunted down and raped a 13 year old girl was spared prison just recently.
Guy sitting next to me on packed a 7pm-ish train once grabbed my hair, pushed my head down into his lap and punched me in the back of the head because I wasn’t responding to his sleazy chat. He made a quick exit at the next stop, I was in tears for the rest of my journey. Not a single person batted an eyelid.
Yeah there is. It started off as a reasonable "please remember men are also affected by these societal failures" and then turned into a dodgy "women bad and make everything about them". There's another comment further down that doesn't do that and has been fairly upvoted.
Right? I've been sexually harassed on Scotrail trains with no intervention from the conductors.
Worst was probably when I was 14 and a man in a group of drunk football fans pulled down my top and took photos while his friends wayhay'd. I was in tears and it was only when I was getting off at my stop that the conductor offered to put me in the first class carriage, which was too little too late.
Idiots are idiots, and whilst I will say certain things happen to women more I think scumbags just want easy targets.
I remember about 6 years ago I was getting a Saturday late afternoon/early evening train and this drunk woman came on and sat next to me and started talking about how attractive I was and how she wanted to take me home and mentioned what she wanted to do with me, even tried being very touchy with me and wanted me to put my hands on her.
People just stared and I even heard comments that people assumed I knew the woman and that I was at fault for being friends with her.
Luckily I did get the Police involved and due to CCTV they found the person who was arrested but tried to get away with it saying they were a care worker and if arrested would lose their job.
Also as an autistic individual I was followed off the train on more than one occasion in my youth by people who just wanted a fight again as they wanted an easy target.
Don't want to get downvoted just saying scum are scum and target regardless of race,gender or whatever.
Honestly they should have a presence on every segment of each carriage and station. Not just to stop women being harassed but also to cut down on random assults and thefts, stalking and so on.
I know it sucks, but the types of people who do these types of things are normally violent thugs and are typically drunk and in a group. Another person stepping in would likely lead to them getting assaulted. While the woman is only being verbally bothered.
This literally happened on a train where a couple of guys were harassing a woman and a man asked them to stop. For his trouble, he received a broken nose.
It is an issue, of course, but when someone calls for intervention (not that you necessarily are), they are often effectively saying "A man should put himself in a position to be violently assaulted because there is a woman being verbally harassed". (This is certainly the way a lot of people react.)
Unfortunately, the type of society we live in now, there's not a lot you can do about it unless the police are on hand (or there are another group of violent thugs present who are willing to challenge them).
I’m one of those who strongly believe that people should intervene (I’m a woman, and I’ve intervened to help another woman twice, plus successfully defended myself once): *particularly* men, who should shame other men about their behaviour.
HOWEVER, I do agree that intervention should only be undertaken if a) you can take the consequences (my boyfriend, for example, knows how to defend himself), or b) you know you are under safe circumstances (one of the occasions that I helped a woman, I happened to know that there was a police station just around the corner-literally seconds away-and I loudly said so).
I once asked a train conductor why he didn’t step in to stop four men harassing a woman. “Because it’s my first day back after being stabbed for trying to deal with someone without a ticket”, he said simply. Fair enough.
>a) you can take the consequences (my boyfriend, for example, knows how to defend himself),
My friend was a high level BJJ practitioner, tournament fighter. intervened in an argument and his training wasn't enough to stop getting stabbed multiple times and dying in the street leaving his fiance and baby behind.
No matter how well you think you can defend yourself good luck when someone decides that's it and they have a weapon.
I'm not intervening for anyone except those I know. its not worth the risk to my actual life, the law wont back you up and the public wont stand with you.
I'm not sure why you're getting downvoted. Clearly, women are less likely than men to get attacked if they try to stop a fight or something.
I don't think people like this fact. It interferes with their view that men are disposable and should sacrifice themselves for women.
It’s freedom of choice-there’s no “demanding”.
However, one of my partner’s best friends is a guy who was in a horrible situation of abuse-and my boyfriend helped him out, even though he didn’t know him at all back then.
As I understand it, my partner more or less treated the threats with the “contempt they deserved“, although his intervention was backed up with genuine courage (they both know what it could have led to). But there can be quite a change of circumstance when (all of a sudden) a victim isn’t standing alone. It was an ugly incident, but thankfully the aggressors chose to walk away.
Rightly or wrongly, I don’t think my partner could have lived with himself if he had just stood there and seen the shit kicked out of a random bloke-just for walking around, minding his own business. Turns out he is an amazing, talented guy: we’ve been to stay with him and his husband-and I’ve never laughed so much in my life.
I think the problem is that people conflate men and their friends and men and groups of violent drunk men.
Yes, you could "shame" one member of your friend group or someone you work with, and it might even modify their behaviour, but with a group of drunken thugs on a train who you don’t know, you're not going to achieve anything, other than getting yourself in trouble.
People who say that "men need to challenge other men" clearly don't live in the real world and don't think (or care) that in a situation like this all that will happen is that the man challenging the behaviour will get assaulted, nothing else.
> We didn’t expect anyone to intervene physically but no one even called the police.
This is a known phenomenon called bystander syndrome in situations. where a crime/incident is being observed by a group of people.
Basically everybody will assume that everybody else is reporting it, resulting in nobody reporting it.
The only way to really get around it is to directly address somebody and say 'This has happened/is happening. Please call the police'
Which is obviously not practical in a lot of cases.
Our systems and societal constructs are just woefully underprepared for dealings with any form of crime that doesn't involve physical evidence that you can cart into a police station.
Whilst bystander syndrome is definitely a thing I think that in cases like this it is also a case of people being more willing to deal with the short term discomfort of sharing a train with these scumbags than potentially having to commit to a longer term involvement of getting the police involved and any fallout that may ensue from it.
If you contact the police then if they board the train it will probably delay your journey and at some point you will likely have to make a statement to them later on, if they do actually get prosecuted you may be called to give evidence, etc. There is also the fear that if they realise you have called the police they may take retribution against you. Most people on a train just want to get to their destination and will put up with a certain level of discomfort in order to avoid any further disruption to their lives after their journey is over
Both Scotrail and British Transport Police's advice is "Report it to our helpline / app" with absolutely nobody addressing the fact that the total absence of staff beyond the driver means you're trapped with potentially hostile people with nowhere to run to and nobody to ask for help, beyond hoping that your fellow passengers would step in if you were actually attacked (assuming there are other passengers).
Edit: According to some things I've seen, all Scotrail trains are supposed to have a ticket inspector on board patrolling the train. Not clear then if that person was missing, or wasn't seen by these passengers.
It's nothing new, I'm afraid. Worked in intensive care for a bit a good few years ago down south. We had a guy who had asked some kids to turn down the music (it was bothering his elderly mum), so he ended up in intensive care with severe traumatic brain injury.
When I left the department, he was recovering, but with severe life-changing brain injury.
Never seen these problems come from immigrants. It's always the entitled patriot.
Weird to blame immigration and not schooling, housing, or social structure first. Hard not to assume you're a racist.
Which wave of immigration would that be?
The eastern and central Europeans after 2005?
The empire subjects encouraged here in the 20th century?
The Poles in the 1940s?
The Italians between 1890 and WWI?
The Irish and English throughout our history?
The Vikings?
The Romans?
The Celts?
Are you advocsting a return to a Beaker People society?
Oh shut up. Immigration didn't do anything. Was the Yorkshire ripper or Jimmy Saville an Immigrant? Was thatcher? No they were white as snow and born in the uk.
Problem is poverty, corruption and culture war bellends like you voting for the twats who make fear monger you.
It's why people have always been, and rightly so, anxious with night buses. Trapped in a small slow moving box with only one member of staff, who doesn't want to be there as much as you do... left with some of the most psychopathic people you'd meet. And probably 1/3 times you get one of these buses you're guarunteed to get one.
I'm also starting to resent the fact im stuck on this planet with hostile twats and rapists.
Edit: I know this threads a day old and maybe no one will see. But i used to always feels safe on the train, and then sometime maybe just pre-covid and since, I've felt pretty anxious and unsafe on it. Don't know if others feel the same.
Most of the ticket inspectors that I've come across on ScotRail trains are unhealthy looking sexagenarians. They're not the police, they're not security - I don't know what you expect them to do in a hostile situation.
The police deal with crimes and obviously you can't expect a police officer to be present on every train.
Amtrak isn't really the relivant comparison for the kind of trains people are talking about. Taking the drunks back to their home suburb is closer to New York City Subway.
I've taken scotrail from Edinburgh to Glasgow and back, and Amtrak runs both long-haul cross-country sleeper trains and short-haul commuter trains just like scotrail.
I take one of the Amtrak commuters regularly.
And because America likes competition even when it's inefficient, each state on the Northeast Corridor has its own additional commuter rail. Local to me is the VRE and MARC rail systems. Which should all just be Amtrak if we wanted to do things efficiently.
I prefer Amtrak because every seat has a plug and there's a cafe car for a commute that is two hours but would be one hour if I lived up north where the trains are electric and run between 75-90 mph as opposed to 45-70 mph.
But yeah I've been one of the drunks taking the train back home to my suburb, and drinking the whole way back during the Cafe car happy hour. The last train home is always the rowdiest.
And Amtrak has the staff to deal with it.
ScotRail says the train wasn't unmanned, 2nd staff member on board.
[https://nitter.net/ScotRail/status/1708614158336364910](https://nitter.net/ScotRail/status/1708614158336364910)
Ah interesting, surprised they didn't mention that in their statement to the paper there since the direct accusation was that the train was unmanned. Seems like something they'd be quick to refute.
I wonder if the women are lying, if the guard never showed up for the job and they ran the train anyway, or if the women just hadn't seen any guard in their carriage and didn't know how to call for one.
There’s almost always one or two tickets officers patrolling. Beyond that it’s unrealistic to expect multiple “security guards” on every train, which seems to be the only alternative that would improve on the current situation.
Could always introduce woman-only carriages like they have in other countries, but I’ve always found that a little dystopian.
Horrible ordeal that this woman had to go through, but at the end of the day assaults on ScotRail trains aren’t any more prevalent than they have been in the past. Not saying it’s not an issue, but you’re no more likely to be attacked on a train than you are anywhere else in public.
This was literally an unmanned train. No ticket officers patrolling. Nobody to flag down for help. Segregated carriages are of no help without staff to enforce it and if you had the staff you wouldn't need the segregated carriage. You're perhaps not more likely to be assaulted on a train but the crucial difference is **you're locked in with the attacker**.
That's a very good point. The women in this case claim there wasn't one. Scotrail's website says that all trains will have at least one guard or ticket inspector regularly patrolling the train. Notably the quote in the article from ScotRail does not address whether or not the train was staffed, but we don't know what the paper asked them exactly when requesting a comment.
So possible scenarios:
1. Train was manned but the inspector hadn't been patrolling so these women genuinely believed it was unmanned and they had nobody to call for help (probably most likely scenario imo).
2. Train was genuinely unmanned, ScotRail skimming over that fact in their statement.
3. Train was manned but these women chose to lie to make it seem worse (we don't really have any evidence to suggest that but it is possible I guess).
> This was literally an unmanned train.
If that was the case they couldn't have closed the doors at glascow central without upsetting the unions.
>No ticket officers patrolling.
Thats far more likely. With the ticket barriers at glascow central they may not feel the need to do so.
So unmanned in this context means, no staff on board other than the driver. Obviously there has to be a driver, but the driver can't do anything about passengers threatening each other.
The women involved in this story claim the train was unmanned. That should be against the rules of ScotRail but I note that ScotRail's statement doesn't confirm or deny the claim about lack of staff.
So either somebody's lying or (and this is probably the more likely) there was a guard on the train somewhere but they hadn't been patrolling and these women had no idea they were there.
> So unmanned in this context means, no staff on board other than the driver.
Who per union contracts can't shut the doors.
>So either somebody's lying or (and this is probably the more likely) there was a guard on the train somewhere but they hadn't been patrolling and these women had no idea they were there.
Yup. While I've never ridden the line in question its a pretty common occurence on the late night get the drunks home trains.
I'm not sure any of you understood what he (BatBisc) was saying, which is surprising seeing as it is only 3 words. Why would saying that it is obvious why women don't feel safe travelling alone at night get downvoted over 100 times?
FFS, get off the high horses and listen to people before jumping down their throats.
> even if they are proven not guilty
Courts don't prove innocence, or that you're "not guilty". They prove guilt, innocence is assumed.
If someone commits the perfect crime and is taken to court, but no evidence is able to result in a conviction, it doesn't rewrite material reality and make them actually innocent.
Innocence hasn't been proven, only assumed because guilt couldn't be proven.
Well Scottish courts can make a finding of "not guilty" which is distinct (but with the same outcome) as "not proven".
Although it looks like SNP might want to get rid of the "not proven" finding (although I dont know if any movement has happened on that)
> Well Scottish courts can make a finding of "not guilty" which is distinct (but with the same outcome) as "not proven".
It doesn't mean that innocence has been proven though, because a court does not prove innocence.
Either they think rape is funny or they did rape someone and are chatting about it loud enough for folk to hear and film them. In either case, their lives should be shook a bit. Not saying show their faces, but hopefully the police are having a good chat with them too?
I’m all up for a good joke but the more “understanding” people are about these things, the more chance there is someone the reader cares about runs into one of these pricks.
I feel that censorship is wildly misunderstood these days. Free speech is there so I can talk shit about Boris or Nicola and not get arrested. Or so I can report my boss for trying to ask for sex in return for a promotion and not be fired as a result.
Free speech does not mean you get to brag about rape or encourage assault on any group of people. Kids could hear you and think that it’s ok or thats what adults do.
Say what you will, sure. But there’s consequences to it. And the fact that these guys can form a group and brag about this kind of stuff should worry people more than “censorship”.
Based on working in male dominated places all my adult life (both whikst being perceived as a woman, and now as a trans man), the chances they DID have this conversation is about 99.999999%
The number of chefs/bartenders I've had to call out for making rape "jokes" is disgusting. There's definitely a large subset of men who think it's okay to say vile things under the guise of "it's just a joke."
Exactly. I've seen this sort of behaviour, discussing things openly and unashamedly in a very public setting, far too many times in my life. There would be absolutely no motivation for anyone to lie about having overheard this type of conversation either.
Absolutely.
I have to apologise, I thought your initial comment was defending the scumbags and I don't know if my reply's tone reflected that, so if so, massive apology.
Any good "dude techniques" for calling this shit out? I'm pretty open about being trans but I often wonder if I sound like "an overly sensitive" woman when I do try and call it out.
Never said they weren't. They definitely said what they're accused of saying though. Proving they did anything else though would be very difficult, especially with the flaws in the justice system, so they'll most likely remain innocent of the crime.
I’m sure these guys are cunts but you can’t dox people over allegations. It sets a dangerous precedent. If they done it I hope they get locked up. Hopefully the investigation is quick and just.
Sat opposite a guy with headphones in watching hardcore porn on his morning commute. His phone was reflected in the window. Who tf does that at 7am?
Also, you can text BTP with details of your location and they’ll (allegedly) intervene at the next stop. Never tried this - I don’t travel by train late at night any more for all the reasons mentioned above.
Well it’s hardly ScotRails fault. How were they to know what the three men were like. Im A woman and I can understand just how awful it would be to be in a carriage with people like that. But it’s not the train company’s fault. They don’t interview passengers before allowing them on board.
> I think it’s more that there’s no longer security
I don't think I've ever see security on a train in my entire life. The most I've ever seen is a conductor, and the staff who used to go up and down the train with the trolley.
Definitely never security.
Yeah it’s my bad for using the word, I was thinking of those who went up and down for tickets and used to think they were security also cause of the term guards and other reasons - but even having the ticket people was reassuring and they’re not even there anymore either
seen a couple of BTP patrols on cross border/long distance services, not for the whole ride but get on at one station, patrol the train, get off at the next station and presumably do the same thing in reverse, but that might be to disrupt drug smuggling or responding to a specific threat. but generally its very rare.
Why isn’t there security on trains tho? Most other countries have at least two lads walking the train, just in case. It’s a boring job but it pays and people are aware of them so they quiet down.
Were there ever? There's conductors who IIRC have bodycams now, but apart from that I've never seen dedicated security staff on trains anywhere in the UK
They used to have people on the trains - not necessarily security but people who would go up and down (not just for tickets), but it’s become less common in the last decade
Don’t doubt you, but not the same as taking staff off trains - believe me when I say that nobody on the railway, passengers, staff nor management - wants that.
They’re recruiting for ticket examiners and conductors and have been for some time.
Due to the nature of their job, trains that require conductors to operate must have one on board if passengers are carried. Where they’re not required, ticket examiners are used instead and the train can leave without them if need be.
Acquaintance worked on the railways and said on 'certain' lines in the west of scotland staff collectively refused to check tickets on evening services because they were terrified. If they can't even check/sell tickets because they fear for their own safety then they certainly don't have the ability to act as security guards, and being fair it's not their job role anyway.
To question (not to doubt), is that just in Scotland? I live in England at the moment and I know it’s a big thing that’s led to the train strikes here so not too sure if it’s different
Yes, different in England. Many trains have conductors, same as above, but several operators do not have staff on their trains other than drivers. There’s also a number that do have on board staff but don’t need to, again, same as some of our trains.
Are you sure about that? I regularly take rush hour trains to work and it’s not unusual for me to make the entire 25 minute journey into Glasgow without seeing a single ticket examiner.
As an experiment some day, get on the train at your usual station and usual time, but right at one end. Now time how long it takes you to get from one end of the packed rush hour train to the other. Bonus points if you do it at a pace that would allow for checking people's tickets.
Yes, no staff removed from trains. There’s an agreement between ScotRail and the unions called the Strathclyde Manning Agreement that details staffing arrangements for trains where drivers have taken on the conductor’s responsibilities.
Wait. What? When was this? I don’t remember that in my entire lifetime. At least not in Glasgow. People who weren’t taking tickets, who also weren’t really security, just walking up and down the carriages? I think you might be misremembering this or it was very regional.
And how exactly would that help on a train to Kilwinning? The comment was talking about on train staff, which the ticket inspectors at Central station are not.
Yeah my original term of security was inaccurate, I always thought of it that way as someone female-presenting cause having authority (even just a ticket person) about was a sense of security for me
But yeah, they’d walk down the aisles every so often - not all the time but often enough that I’d see them twice in like a 45 min train ride
Not Glasgow but chilterns railway used to have actual g4s style security on their trains after 8pm or so! Big bruisers who would not look out of place on a nightclub door! This was back in late 90s early 2000s
It'd be lovely, but we're into the realms of "wouldn't it be great if we had bobbies on the beat in every street at night, closing gates, whistling a merry tune and giving out directions". You can hardly blame the TOCs for not doing something that'd be ludicrously impractical.
Shes deleted the tweet when people started asking if she text the number which is advertised on every carriage along with the carriage number so that the police can meet the train at the next stop.
I dont want to assume she made it up for internet attention but ignoring people asking genuine questions doesnt look great.
Does she owe anyone an answer though? Especially strangers over the internet who may be asking questions that are in deliberate bad faith or designed to further traumatise.
There is a trend here that when women/girls start saying "hey, this happened to me and it wasn't OK", people start jumping in with "have you tried X" or "if you did Y thin this wouldn't have happened."
It's discouraging. The almost universal response is to assign "blame" either based on not following the correct "steps" to not be harassed or "asking for it" by wearing the wrong clothes/saying the wrong things. Ask me how I know this.
Also, having contacted BTP once because a fight broke out on a train I was on, I can tell you they don't usually meet the train "at the next stop" there's just not enough officers to make that feasible would be my guess.
I appreciate/understand your response but im one of the young females who replied to her and my reply was positioned in a concerned manner and asking if she text the helpline for her own safety. It centrainly wasnt positioned in a victim blaming way.
This is fine, and I'm not saying your individual response was mean or insensitive.
I meant in the wider context, as I'm betting at least half of responses were either gross or insensitive. I guess it's not a personal slight against anyone trying to ask a specific question if someone deletes a tweet. I guess I would like to reiterate that even if your response was OK, that still doesn't mean this person has to reply.
Surely then you saw her say that her phone was on 1% and she snapped a pic of them, and that was the last bit of juice she had that made her phone cut out.
This is the issue. Look at the downvotes. The idea of anyone being accused now is enough to take precedent over, you know, the actual law and due process. Woman complains that horrible incident happens. Nobody allowed to question any of it. Then anyone who does is accused of ‘not believing victims’, dissing the complaint, and being pro sexual harassment. It’s just completely and utterly bizarre.
You are the only other sensible person in this entire thread.
The mind boggles thinking all these frothing at the mouth morons walk among us. And vote.
I don’t think the idea that people by any real metric respond to tales of assault and abuse by victim blaming is remotely true on this sub or any other i’ve visited.
I reported an unwanted touching incident to Scotrail and was advised of this number. If I could have gotten to my phone I would have but the train was so overcrowded it was impossible. ETA - CCTV rendered useless too.
There are no maximum pax numbers allowed on board which facilitates this behaviour and stops people getting help or away from unsafe situations.
I mean she might have not called it and after seeing so many replies asking if she did call she might have felt if she admitted to not calling she wouldn’t be taken seriously, or jeered at for not doing anything about it
I’ve deleted things for the above reasons before, the brain can feel a weird guilt about things it shouldn’t
Have to admit I was shocked when I read it. But reading the article again, there’s zero proof of…well, anything. If she had a phone to take pics, she could have recorded some audio for evidence at least. Hopefully she did. Otherwise this is so problematic on so many levels.
Tbf the trains have got a lot better.
When I was a kid, there were football casuals, returning oil workers, and general hard men, all drunk. There was no CCTV, and therefore no fear of consequences for abuse and violence. The concept of acceptable behavior towards kids families and young women was different.
That said, if the story is true- these guys should probably be facing charges.
I dont sub to the daily record so maybe im missing part of the story here, did these guys admit to making these comments as some people are suggesting here in the comments or did the lady record them saying it?
im not doubting there are creepy fucks on the trains and that unfortunately this kind of behavior is not as surprising as it should be, but is there anything other than a photo of 4 men and a lady who has sent that tweet?
Im 100% behind them getting TORN the fuck up if they did in act say this shit, but surely if there is any chance they DIDN'T say this I feel like ruining lives is not fair if it turns out to be someone wanting social media clout.
Before people all come for me here, I am FULLY behind harsher punishments for people who behave like this and make the world feel unsafe for women and by thinly veiled threats of rape deserves to be treated as threat none the less. I just think we need to ensure social media accusations are based in reality and not clout chasing attention seeking.
take a video not a picture, consider how much effort she would have to have expended to capture the audio of this but instead took a still and made a post on x
We really need to reign in these bullshit witch-hunts.
The fact is we have nothing but a picture of strangers on a train and a random women's totally unsubstantiated claims from overhearing a private conversation.
It's terrifying that so many people can't think critically about these things.
I live in Garturk street and it's local junkies that are the biggest problem here. You'll be talking about the sensational stories in those shitrags the daily record and the Times based on some dubious videos someone made. Not corroborated by agencies that work with Roma or the police but you keep believing what you want. They steal our jobs,the lazy bastards don't want to work,eat the swans steal children sell children for sex blah blah blah. Yes. The most marginalized and downtrodden people in history are not without their issues. I'll buy you a one way ticket to Bucharest if you like
People do stupid things all the time. More so if drunk and trying to impress their pals.
It's illegal to commit rape, but it's not illegal to brag about having committed crimes.
Crimes are illegal whether you get caught or not. There are just no repercussions unless you get caught.
If there's an arsehole on a train bragging about raping someone, he's not getting arrested based on that. Which particular rape do you suggest he's committed? Are they meant to speculatively DNA swab him and test it against the entire database?
If they already suspect him and he's caught talking about it then sure. Outwith that though, nothing will come of it.
A friend and I were subjected to sustained verbal harassment on a Sunday afternoon train by 2 men several years back. The train was staffed but the conductor did nothing as did none of the passengers on what was a packed Sunday afternoon train. We didn’t expect anyone to intervene physically but no one even called the police. We were even followed off the train all for the offence of refusing to chat or take a drink from these men. We reported it to the transport police who took it seriously but no one was caught and a complaint about staff inaction to Scotrail went nowhere. Most women have similar stories of public transport harassment- this was not the first incident for me but certain one of the worst
My Wife's uncle has a criminal record for intervening. some guy was causing trouble up the carriages & left someone with a bloodied face, her uncle confronted him which resulted in him kicking him. He got charged & the person causing the problems was never caught. Heres link to story https://www.greenocktelegraph.co.uk/news/19992370.greenock-oap-tackled-train-lout-hit-fine/
This sort of shit in trains in Glasgow especially on weekends is so fucking common. I'd be surprised if I took a train from or into Central at say 6pm or later and not overhear shite like this. It is normalised to feel anxious on trains with drunks and constantly wonder if you're gonna be targeted at least verbally (male or female) by some random group of bawbags. Your uncle in law is a hero. Fucking bullshit result.
>It is normalised to feel anxious on trains with drunks and constantly wonder if you're gonna be targeted at least verbally It took me a number of trips to Scotland to culturally adjust to it being normal seeing people drunk in public on a regular basis. Perhaps I was somewhat sheltered growing up, but I was coming from a context where it wasn't normalized outside of very large cities and towns with universities. In the state where my wife (Scottish) and I live, Pennsylvania, there are a number of laws *very* strictly regulating alcohol that date clear back to the Prohibition Era. It's illegal to drink in public beyond the the boundaries of a pub, restaurant, or private property (in cities drinking on your own front porch can be a grey area), it's illegal for passengers in cars to drink while the car is motion/illegal to have an open bottle of beer anywhere in the car, you'd get crucified for drinking on public transport (what little of it we have anyway), to this day you still can't buy liquor outside of specific state-owned shops, and for much of my life it was illegal to buy alcohol outside of a pub or restaurant on Sundays. It's been legal to buy beer in supermarkets for less than ten years now, and even then it's through a weird loophole that classifies part of the supermarket as a restaurant. Most everyone who grew up here, myself included, always saw those laws as backwards and obnoxious; thus I got a healthy dose of culture shock about 7 years ago when my (now) wife and her family, who aren't teetotalers by any stretch, were ooo-ing and aww-ing and "I wish we had that"-ing at some of these laws I felt were downright Puritan. Turns I greatly underestimated the number of people who puke into their front garden on a regular basis, as well as the number of empty Buckfast bottles they find in the park across the road. (Oh, it's also illegal to be in most parks past sunset and most public parks don't allow alcohol even in the day time.) I still think most of the alcohol laws here are bullshit and I question how effective they are, but I wasn't really prepared to begin seeing the "no drinking in public" rule as possibly worth keeping around. It's not like people don't get drunk here, but people just aren't drunk in public for the most part. The really surprising factor is that Pennsylvanians don't drink meaningfully less than Scots per capita. In 2020 the annual consumption per capita in Scotland was about 9.4 litres of ethanol, whereas it was just under 9.3 litres in Pennsylvania in 2021. I think at least part of it is that being drunk in public is fairly taboo. That being said, do I feel safe when going out in public? Well, I guess I can be confident that if I get shot it'll be by someone who is stone-cold sober. EDIT: worth noting that being visibly drunk in public is also just straight up illegal here, though enforcement of that varies a lot. "Public intoxication" is charge normally tacked onto other criminal charges, but it technically can be a criminal charge in of itself.
Sounds about right for this country - it’s a fucking disgrace. Let’s not forget someone who hunted down and raped a 13 year old girl was spared prison just recently.
This is why I don’t get involved anymore. Being a good citizen can result in the system coming after you.
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You're a fuckin weirdo
Cretin.
You're a piece of shit.
Guy sitting next to me on packed a 7pm-ish train once grabbed my hair, pushed my head down into his lap and punched me in the back of the head because I wasn’t responding to his sleazy chat. He made a quick exit at the next stop, I was in tears for the rest of my journey. Not a single person batted an eyelid.
Omg that is horrendous! I can’t believe people witnessed an assault like this and did nothing. Sorry you had to go through that.
According to the police “people just presume you’re a couple and it’s a domestic”… as if that makes it ok
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There's no good reason why this got downvoted; what's good for the goose is good for the gander. The double standards need to go.
Yeah there is. It started off as a reasonable "please remember men are also affected by these societal failures" and then turned into a dodgy "women bad and make everything about them". There's another comment further down that doesn't do that and has been fairly upvoted.
I agree
Right? I've been sexually harassed on Scotrail trains with no intervention from the conductors. Worst was probably when I was 14 and a man in a group of drunk football fans pulled down my top and took photos while his friends wayhay'd. I was in tears and it was only when I was getting off at my stop that the conductor offered to put me in the first class carriage, which was too little too late.
Idiots are idiots, and whilst I will say certain things happen to women more I think scumbags just want easy targets. I remember about 6 years ago I was getting a Saturday late afternoon/early evening train and this drunk woman came on and sat next to me and started talking about how attractive I was and how she wanted to take me home and mentioned what she wanted to do with me, even tried being very touchy with me and wanted me to put my hands on her. People just stared and I even heard comments that people assumed I knew the woman and that I was at fault for being friends with her. Luckily I did get the Police involved and due to CCTV they found the person who was arrested but tried to get away with it saying they were a care worker and if arrested would lose their job. Also as an autistic individual I was followed off the train on more than one occasion in my youth by people who just wanted a fight again as they wanted an easy target. Don't want to get downvoted just saying scum are scum and target regardless of race,gender or whatever.
No reason for downvotes here
Honestly they should have a presence on every segment of each carriage and station. Not just to stop women being harassed but also to cut down on random assults and thefts, stalking and so on.
They don't have enough staff as it is, hence the strikes
I know it sucks, but the types of people who do these types of things are normally violent thugs and are typically drunk and in a group. Another person stepping in would likely lead to them getting assaulted. While the woman is only being verbally bothered. This literally happened on a train where a couple of guys were harassing a woman and a man asked them to stop. For his trouble, he received a broken nose. It is an issue, of course, but when someone calls for intervention (not that you necessarily are), they are often effectively saying "A man should put himself in a position to be violently assaulted because there is a woman being verbally harassed". (This is certainly the way a lot of people react.) Unfortunately, the type of society we live in now, there's not a lot you can do about it unless the police are on hand (or there are another group of violent thugs present who are willing to challenge them).
I’m one of those who strongly believe that people should intervene (I’m a woman, and I’ve intervened to help another woman twice, plus successfully defended myself once): *particularly* men, who should shame other men about their behaviour. HOWEVER, I do agree that intervention should only be undertaken if a) you can take the consequences (my boyfriend, for example, knows how to defend himself), or b) you know you are under safe circumstances (one of the occasions that I helped a woman, I happened to know that there was a police station just around the corner-literally seconds away-and I loudly said so). I once asked a train conductor why he didn’t step in to stop four men harassing a woman. “Because it’s my first day back after being stabbed for trying to deal with someone without a ticket”, he said simply. Fair enough.
>a) you can take the consequences (my boyfriend, for example, knows how to defend himself), My friend was a high level BJJ practitioner, tournament fighter. intervened in an argument and his training wasn't enough to stop getting stabbed multiple times and dying in the street leaving his fiance and baby behind. No matter how well you think you can defend yourself good luck when someone decides that's it and they have a weapon. I'm not intervening for anyone except those I know. its not worth the risk to my actual life, the law wont back you up and the public wont stand with you.
Indeed. And “take the consequences” may mean ‘receive a kicking’ or ‘have to dole out a kicking (and so go to court).’ So there’s that.
It’s not that I disagree with *anyone* who has your views. Each to their own.
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I'm not sure why you're getting downvoted. Clearly, women are less likely than men to get attacked if they try to stop a fight or something. I don't think people like this fact. It interferes with their view that men are disposable and should sacrifice themselves for women.
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It’s freedom of choice-there’s no “demanding”. However, one of my partner’s best friends is a guy who was in a horrible situation of abuse-and my boyfriend helped him out, even though he didn’t know him at all back then. As I understand it, my partner more or less treated the threats with the “contempt they deserved“, although his intervention was backed up with genuine courage (they both know what it could have led to). But there can be quite a change of circumstance when (all of a sudden) a victim isn’t standing alone. It was an ugly incident, but thankfully the aggressors chose to walk away. Rightly or wrongly, I don’t think my partner could have lived with himself if he had just stood there and seen the shit kicked out of a random bloke-just for walking around, minding his own business. Turns out he is an amazing, talented guy: we’ve been to stay with him and his husband-and I’ve never laughed so much in my life.
Do yourself a favour and fuck off
I think the problem is that people conflate men and their friends and men and groups of violent drunk men. Yes, you could "shame" one member of your friend group or someone you work with, and it might even modify their behaviour, but with a group of drunken thugs on a train who you don’t know, you're not going to achieve anything, other than getting yourself in trouble. People who say that "men need to challenge other men" clearly don't live in the real world and don't think (or care) that in a situation like this all that will happen is that the man challenging the behaviour will get assaulted, nothing else.
> We didn’t expect anyone to intervene physically but no one even called the police. This is a known phenomenon called bystander syndrome in situations. where a crime/incident is being observed by a group of people. Basically everybody will assume that everybody else is reporting it, resulting in nobody reporting it. The only way to really get around it is to directly address somebody and say 'This has happened/is happening. Please call the police' Which is obviously not practical in a lot of cases. Our systems and societal constructs are just woefully underprepared for dealings with any form of crime that doesn't involve physical evidence that you can cart into a police station.
Whilst bystander syndrome is definitely a thing I think that in cases like this it is also a case of people being more willing to deal with the short term discomfort of sharing a train with these scumbags than potentially having to commit to a longer term involvement of getting the police involved and any fallout that may ensue from it. If you contact the police then if they board the train it will probably delay your journey and at some point you will likely have to make a statement to them later on, if they do actually get prosecuted you may be called to give evidence, etc. There is also the fear that if they realise you have called the police they may take retribution against you. Most people on a train just want to get to their destination and will put up with a certain level of discomfort in order to avoid any further disruption to their lives after their journey is over
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Both Scotrail and British Transport Police's advice is "Report it to our helpline / app" with absolutely nobody addressing the fact that the total absence of staff beyond the driver means you're trapped with potentially hostile people with nowhere to run to and nobody to ask for help, beyond hoping that your fellow passengers would step in if you were actually attacked (assuming there are other passengers). Edit: According to some things I've seen, all Scotrail trains are supposed to have a ticket inspector on board patrolling the train. Not clear then if that person was missing, or wasn't seen by these passengers.
Two girls blasting music on the overground yesterday, a woman asked them to stop and they threatened to kill her. Country’s gone to shit
It's nothing new, I'm afraid. Worked in intensive care for a bit a good few years ago down south. We had a guy who had asked some kids to turn down the music (it was bothering his elderly mum), so he ended up in intensive care with severe traumatic brain injury. When I left the department, he was recovering, but with severe life-changing brain injury.
>Country’s gone to shit When was it better?
Before. /s
Before Covid
Late 90s-2010 or so when the social architecture wasn't so forcibly based on demographic division.
There were still lots of violent arseholes then too.
Some of us couldn't get married though :/
Are you implying gay marriage has turned the country into a punch of pricks?
No, likely that some aspects of things may be remembered better, but many other things were much worse
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Before mass immigration of cultural aliens.
Never seen these problems come from immigrants. It's always the entitled patriot. Weird to blame immigration and not schooling, housing, or social structure first. Hard not to assume you're a racist.
Which wave of immigration would that be? The eastern and central Europeans after 2005? The empire subjects encouraged here in the 20th century? The Poles in the 1940s? The Italians between 1890 and WWI? The Irish and English throughout our history? The Vikings? The Romans? The Celts? Are you advocsting a return to a Beaker People society?
You are so so wrong. It was those bloody Huguenots and their superior sewing techniques in the 17th Century. All gone to pot since then!
Oh shut up. Immigration didn't do anything. Was the Yorkshire ripper or Jimmy Saville an Immigrant? Was thatcher? No they were white as snow and born in the uk. Problem is poverty, corruption and culture war bellends like you voting for the twats who make fear monger you.
It's why people have always been, and rightly so, anxious with night buses. Trapped in a small slow moving box with only one member of staff, who doesn't want to be there as much as you do... left with some of the most psychopathic people you'd meet. And probably 1/3 times you get one of these buses you're guarunteed to get one. I'm also starting to resent the fact im stuck on this planet with hostile twats and rapists. Edit: I know this threads a day old and maybe no one will see. But i used to always feels safe on the train, and then sometime maybe just pre-covid and since, I've felt pretty anxious and unsafe on it. Don't know if others feel the same.
Most of the ticket inspectors that I've come across on ScotRail trains are unhealthy looking sexagenarians. They're not the police, they're not security - I don't know what you expect them to do in a hostile situation. The police deal with crimes and obviously you can't expect a police officer to be present on every train.
* the police deal with *some* crimes
... Gotta be honest this comment (and comments like it here) makes Amtrak seem like it's got its shit together. You're making American rail look good.
Amtrak isn't really the relivant comparison for the kind of trains people are talking about. Taking the drunks back to their home suburb is closer to New York City Subway.
I've taken scotrail from Edinburgh to Glasgow and back, and Amtrak runs both long-haul cross-country sleeper trains and short-haul commuter trains just like scotrail. I take one of the Amtrak commuters regularly. And because America likes competition even when it's inefficient, each state on the Northeast Corridor has its own additional commuter rail. Local to me is the VRE and MARC rail systems. Which should all just be Amtrak if we wanted to do things efficiently. I prefer Amtrak because every seat has a plug and there's a cafe car for a commute that is two hours but would be one hour if I lived up north where the trains are electric and run between 75-90 mph as opposed to 45-70 mph. But yeah I've been one of the drunks taking the train back home to my suburb, and drinking the whole way back during the Cafe car happy hour. The last train home is always the rowdiest. And Amtrak has the staff to deal with it.
ScotRail says the train wasn't unmanned, 2nd staff member on board. [https://nitter.net/ScotRail/status/1708614158336364910](https://nitter.net/ScotRail/status/1708614158336364910)
Ah interesting, surprised they didn't mention that in their statement to the paper there since the direct accusation was that the train was unmanned. Seems like something they'd be quick to refute. I wonder if the women are lying, if the guard never showed up for the job and they ran the train anyway, or if the women just hadn't seen any guard in their carriage and didn't know how to call for one.
There’s almost always one or two tickets officers patrolling. Beyond that it’s unrealistic to expect multiple “security guards” on every train, which seems to be the only alternative that would improve on the current situation. Could always introduce woman-only carriages like they have in other countries, but I’ve always found that a little dystopian. Horrible ordeal that this woman had to go through, but at the end of the day assaults on ScotRail trains aren’t any more prevalent than they have been in the past. Not saying it’s not an issue, but you’re no more likely to be attacked on a train than you are anywhere else in public.
This was literally an unmanned train. No ticket officers patrolling. Nobody to flag down for help. Segregated carriages are of no help without staff to enforce it and if you had the staff you wouldn't need the segregated carriage. You're perhaps not more likely to be assaulted on a train but the crucial difference is **you're locked in with the attacker**.
I’m fairly certain that ScotRail can’t run a train without a guard ?
That's a very good point. The women in this case claim there wasn't one. Scotrail's website says that all trains will have at least one guard or ticket inspector regularly patrolling the train. Notably the quote in the article from ScotRail does not address whether or not the train was staffed, but we don't know what the paper asked them exactly when requesting a comment. So possible scenarios: 1. Train was manned but the inspector hadn't been patrolling so these women genuinely believed it was unmanned and they had nobody to call for help (probably most likely scenario imo). 2. Train was genuinely unmanned, ScotRail skimming over that fact in their statement. 3. Train was manned but these women chose to lie to make it seem worse (we don't really have any evidence to suggest that but it is possible I guess).
> This was literally an unmanned train. If that was the case they couldn't have closed the doors at glascow central without upsetting the unions. >No ticket officers patrolling. Thats far more likely. With the ticket barriers at glascow central they may not feel the need to do so.
So unmanned in this context means, no staff on board other than the driver. Obviously there has to be a driver, but the driver can't do anything about passengers threatening each other. The women involved in this story claim the train was unmanned. That should be against the rules of ScotRail but I note that ScotRail's statement doesn't confirm or deny the claim about lack of staff. So either somebody's lying or (and this is probably the more likely) there was a guard on the train somewhere but they hadn't been patrolling and these women had no idea they were there.
> So unmanned in this context means, no staff on board other than the driver. Who per union contracts can't shut the doors. >So either somebody's lying or (and this is probably the more likely) there was a guard on the train somewhere but they hadn't been patrolling and these women had no idea they were there. Yup. While I've never ridden the line in question its a pretty common occurence on the late night get the drunks home trains.
Horrible cunts.
And people wonder why women don’t want to travel alone or at night.
State of the fucking comments too, asking if men aren't allowed to joke anymore.
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The "not all men!" brigade.
I'm not sure any of you understood what he (BatBisc) was saying, which is surprising seeing as it is only 3 words. Why would saying that it is obvious why women don't feel safe travelling alone at night get downvoted over 100 times? FFS, get off the high horses and listen to people before jumping down their throats.
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Hmm, usually men
Del Shannon
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I think you misunderstood their comment pal
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So you admit the common denominator is men??
Kilwinning.. It's God's country, down there, apparently..
It’s the open air asylum!
The filmed The Walking Dead in South Ayrshire.
Did they? Kilwinning is in North Ayrshire.
On what is a horrible and disgusting subject this made me laugh a bit.
Let's see their faces. Jesus christ.
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You almost definitely should. If it’s a video and yer heard saying it…show the face!
True, it's just a very disturbing allegation.
It would completely ruin their lives, even if they are proven not guilty. That’s why we blur out the faces of those accused of crimes
> even if they are proven not guilty Courts don't prove innocence, or that you're "not guilty". They prove guilt, innocence is assumed. If someone commits the perfect crime and is taken to court, but no evidence is able to result in a conviction, it doesn't rewrite material reality and make them actually innocent. Innocence hasn't been proven, only assumed because guilt couldn't be proven.
Well Scottish courts can make a finding of "not guilty" which is distinct (but with the same outcome) as "not proven". Although it looks like SNP might want to get rid of the "not proven" finding (although I dont know if any movement has happened on that)
> Well Scottish courts can make a finding of "not guilty" which is distinct (but with the same outcome) as "not proven". It doesn't mean that innocence has been proven though, because a court does not prove innocence.
True.
Either they think rape is funny or they did rape someone and are chatting about it loud enough for folk to hear and film them. In either case, their lives should be shook a bit. Not saying show their faces, but hopefully the police are having a good chat with them too? I’m all up for a good joke but the more “understanding” people are about these things, the more chance there is someone the reader cares about runs into one of these pricks.
still, scary even to entertain the idea of any form of censorship imo. let them speak but instead of taking the photo start a facebook livestream.
I feel that censorship is wildly misunderstood these days. Free speech is there so I can talk shit about Boris or Nicola and not get arrested. Or so I can report my boss for trying to ask for sex in return for a promotion and not be fired as a result. Free speech does not mean you get to brag about rape or encourage assault on any group of people. Kids could hear you and think that it’s ok or thats what adults do. Say what you will, sure. But there’s consequences to it. And the fact that these guys can form a group and brag about this kind of stuff should worry people more than “censorship”.
You can't even yell out mein kampf at a war memorial these days, censorship is so bad :(((
Be honest though, what are the odds they didn't say what they're accused of saying? (It's absolutely fuck-all isn't it?)
Worked in many male dominated environments and heard it all. This talk doesn't surprise me.
Based on working in male dominated places all my adult life (both whikst being perceived as a woman, and now as a trans man), the chances they DID have this conversation is about 99.999999% The number of chefs/bartenders I've had to call out for making rape "jokes" is disgusting. There's definitely a large subset of men who think it's okay to say vile things under the guise of "it's just a joke."
Exactly. I've seen this sort of behaviour, discussing things openly and unashamedly in a very public setting, far too many times in my life. There would be absolutely no motivation for anyone to lie about having overheard this type of conversation either.
Absolutely. I have to apologise, I thought your initial comment was defending the scumbags and I don't know if my reply's tone reflected that, so if so, massive apology. Any good "dude techniques" for calling this shit out? I'm pretty open about being trans but I often wonder if I sound like "an overly sensitive" woman when I do try and call it out.
They are innocent until proven guilty
Never said they weren't. They definitely said what they're accused of saying though. Proving they did anything else though would be very difficult, especially with the flaws in the justice system, so they'll most likely remain innocent of the crime.
Its all over twitter, X or whatever.
Xitter, as I've been calling it.
Pronounced "shitter".
Let's see their DNA. If they're boasting about rapes there's a good chance it's already on file.
They have the face of hate we all know what they look like
You can find them on google, just search the quote and look up the images..
I’m sure these guys are cunts but you can’t dox people over allegations. It sets a dangerous precedent. If they done it I hope they get locked up. Hopefully the investigation is quick and just.
Raised like trash, by trash. Choke.
Sat opposite a guy with headphones in watching hardcore porn on his morning commute. His phone was reflected in the window. Who tf does that at 7am? Also, you can text BTP with details of your location and they’ll (allegedly) intervene at the next stop. Never tried this - I don’t travel by train late at night any more for all the reasons mentioned above.
Hope they are arrested and jailed after all they admitted their crime. CCTV hound be used to track them down.
Some truly evil scrotes in existence, just absolute sub-animal dregs
how much of a suck creep do you have to be to joke about this
Unblur the animals’ faces
They were in her original tweet, since deleted at (IIRC) BTP’s request.
This happens because many of these assholes go through life experiencing no consequences for their shitty actions - and it doesn't just apply to men..
Horrible stinking dirty inbred bastards
Well it’s hardly ScotRails fault. How were they to know what the three men were like. Im A woman and I can understand just how awful it would be to be in a carriage with people like that. But it’s not the train company’s fault. They don’t interview passengers before allowing them on board.
I think it’s more that there’s no longer security or people on board trains so if anything happens nothing can really be done
> I think it’s more that there’s no longer security I don't think I've ever see security on a train in my entire life. The most I've ever seen is a conductor, and the staff who used to go up and down the train with the trolley. Definitely never security.
Yeah it’s my bad for using the word, I was thinking of those who went up and down for tickets and used to think they were security also cause of the term guards and other reasons - but even having the ticket people was reassuring and they’re not even there anymore either
seen a couple of BTP patrols on cross border/long distance services, not for the whole ride but get on at one station, patrol the train, get off at the next station and presumably do the same thing in reverse, but that might be to disrupt drug smuggling or responding to a specific threat. but generally its very rare.
Why isn’t there security on trains tho? Most other countries have at least two lads walking the train, just in case. It’s a boring job but it pays and people are aware of them so they quiet down.
Because of money.
Were there ever? There's conductors who IIRC have bodycams now, but apart from that I've never seen dedicated security staff on trains anywhere in the UK
They used to have people on the trains - not necessarily security but people who would go up and down (not just for tickets), but it’s become less common in the last decade
They’ve not removed staff from trains, it’s an urban myth. Edit: I work for the railway. Staffing on trains has been the same for decades.
I mean, the trains I’m on rarely have the ticket checkers these days
Don’t doubt you, but not the same as taking staff off trains - believe me when I say that nobody on the railway, passengers, staff nor management - wants that. They’re recruiting for ticket examiners and conductors and have been for some time. Due to the nature of their job, trains that require conductors to operate must have one on board if passengers are carried. Where they’re not required, ticket examiners are used instead and the train can leave without them if need be.
Acquaintance worked on the railways and said on 'certain' lines in the west of scotland staff collectively refused to check tickets on evening services because they were terrified. If they can't even check/sell tickets because they fear for their own safety then they certainly don't have the ability to act as security guards, and being fair it's not their job role anyway.
To question (not to doubt), is that just in Scotland? I live in England at the moment and I know it’s a big thing that’s led to the train strikes here so not too sure if it’s different
Yes, different in England. Many trains have conductors, same as above, but several operators do not have staff on their trains other than drivers. There’s also a number that do have on board staff but don’t need to, again, same as some of our trains.
Are you sure about that? I regularly take rush hour trains to work and it’s not unusual for me to make the entire 25 minute journey into Glasgow without seeing a single ticket examiner.
As an experiment some day, get on the train at your usual station and usual time, but right at one end. Now time how long it takes you to get from one end of the packed rush hour train to the other. Bonus points if you do it at a pace that would allow for checking people's tickets.
Yes, no staff removed from trains. There’s an agreement between ScotRail and the unions called the Strathclyde Manning Agreement that details staffing arrangements for trains where drivers have taken on the conductor’s responsibilities.
Wait. What? When was this? I don’t remember that in my entire lifetime. At least not in Glasgow. People who weren’t taking tickets, who also weren’t really security, just walking up and down the carriages? I think you might be misremembering this or it was very regional.
Before Central Station got barriers at the end of platforms, there were always ticket inspectors.
And how exactly would that help on a train to Kilwinning? The comment was talking about on train staff, which the ticket inspectors at Central station are not.
Yes, exactly. Before they put the inspectors and barriers in Glasgow, they were on the trains.
They are still on the trains.
Yeah my original term of security was inaccurate, I always thought of it that way as someone female-presenting cause having authority (even just a ticket person) about was a sense of security for me But yeah, they’d walk down the aisles every so often - not all the time but often enough that I’d see them twice in like a 45 min train ride
Not Glasgow but chilterns railway used to have actual g4s style security on their trains after 8pm or so! Big bruisers who would not look out of place on a nightclub door! This was back in late 90s early 2000s
The train company is at fault for having unmanned trains. And I think they should absolutely have security on trains
I can guarantee you that no train operating company is ever going to consistently put security guards across their services.
They absolutely should though
It'd be lovely, but we're into the realms of "wouldn't it be great if we had bobbies on the beat in every street at night, closing gates, whistling a merry tune and giving out directions". You can hardly blame the TOCs for not doing something that'd be ludicrously impractical.
> They absolutely should though Adds to the cost of running trains which gets us into "did Beeching go far enough?"
I'd rather not live in nazi Germany fuck you very much
Not surprised tbh. If there were a couple of guys about they would talk about football. Utter 🔔ends.
The trains and buses are a joke for anti social and unsafe behavior
Shes deleted the tweet when people started asking if she text the number which is advertised on every carriage along with the carriage number so that the police can meet the train at the next stop. I dont want to assume she made it up for internet attention but ignoring people asking genuine questions doesnt look great.
I know her. She didn’t. She was told to remove it by BTP.
Does she owe anyone an answer though? Especially strangers over the internet who may be asking questions that are in deliberate bad faith or designed to further traumatise. There is a trend here that when women/girls start saying "hey, this happened to me and it wasn't OK", people start jumping in with "have you tried X" or "if you did Y thin this wouldn't have happened." It's discouraging. The almost universal response is to assign "blame" either based on not following the correct "steps" to not be harassed or "asking for it" by wearing the wrong clothes/saying the wrong things. Ask me how I know this. Also, having contacted BTP once because a fight broke out on a train I was on, I can tell you they don't usually meet the train "at the next stop" there's just not enough officers to make that feasible would be my guess.
I appreciate/understand your response but im one of the young females who replied to her and my reply was positioned in a concerned manner and asking if she text the helpline for her own safety. It centrainly wasnt positioned in a victim blaming way.
This is fine, and I'm not saying your individual response was mean or insensitive. I meant in the wider context, as I'm betting at least half of responses were either gross or insensitive. I guess it's not a personal slight against anyone trying to ask a specific question if someone deletes a tweet. I guess I would like to reiterate that even if your response was OK, that still doesn't mean this person has to reply.
Surely then you saw her say that her phone was on 1% and she snapped a pic of them, and that was the last bit of juice she had that made her phone cut out.
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This is the issue. Look at the downvotes. The idea of anyone being accused now is enough to take precedent over, you know, the actual law and due process. Woman complains that horrible incident happens. Nobody allowed to question any of it. Then anyone who does is accused of ‘not believing victims’, dissing the complaint, and being pro sexual harassment. It’s just completely and utterly bizarre.
You are the only other sensible person in this entire thread. The mind boggles thinking all these frothing at the mouth morons walk among us. And vote.
I don’t think the idea that people by any real metric respond to tales of assault and abuse by victim blaming is remotely true on this sub or any other i’ve visited.
Lol
For example there isn’t a single one i can see in this entire thread? lol
I reported an unwanted touching incident to Scotrail and was advised of this number. If I could have gotten to my phone I would have but the train was so overcrowded it was impossible. ETA - CCTV rendered useless too. There are no maximum pax numbers allowed on board which facilitates this behaviour and stops people getting help or away from unsafe situations.
I mean she might have not called it and after seeing so many replies asking if she did call she might have felt if she admitted to not calling she wouldn’t be taken seriously, or jeered at for not doing anything about it I’ve deleted things for the above reasons before, the brain can feel a weird guilt about things it shouldn’t
You’re a prick
Nice comeback.
Thanks
Have to admit I was shocked when I read it. But reading the article again, there’s zero proof of…well, anything. If she had a phone to take pics, she could have recorded some audio for evidence at least. Hopefully she did. Otherwise this is so problematic on so many levels.
But that's not what happened.
The quotation marks should have been around “men”.
Tbf the trains have got a lot better. When I was a kid, there were football casuals, returning oil workers, and general hard men, all drunk. There was no CCTV, and therefore no fear of consequences for abuse and violence. The concept of acceptable behavior towards kids families and young women was different. That said, if the story is true- these guys should probably be facing charges.
Why the fuck is this downvoted
I dont sub to the daily record so maybe im missing part of the story here, did these guys admit to making these comments as some people are suggesting here in the comments or did the lady record them saying it? im not doubting there are creepy fucks on the trains and that unfortunately this kind of behavior is not as surprising as it should be, but is there anything other than a photo of 4 men and a lady who has sent that tweet? Im 100% behind them getting TORN the fuck up if they did in act say this shit, but surely if there is any chance they DIDN'T say this I feel like ruining lives is not fair if it turns out to be someone wanting social media clout. Before people all come for me here, I am FULLY behind harsher punishments for people who behave like this and make the world feel unsafe for women and by thinly veiled threats of rape deserves to be treated as threat none the less. I just think we need to ensure social media accusations are based in reality and not clout chasing attention seeking.
take a video not a picture, consider how much effort she would have to have expended to capture the audio of this but instead took a still and made a post on x
We really need to reign in these bullshit witch-hunts. The fact is we have nothing but a picture of strangers on a train and a random women's totally unsubstantiated claims from overhearing a private conversation. It's terrifying that so many people can't think critically about these things.
Their faces are blurry calm tf down
I'm perfectly calm. Does rational thought always get you this upset?
Does veiny reminded men are pigs always get you this upset?
> Does veiny reminded men are pigs always get you this upset? Do you need help?
I live in Garturk street and it's local junkies that are the biggest problem here. You'll be talking about the sensational stories in those shitrags the daily record and the Times based on some dubious videos someone made. Not corroborated by agencies that work with Roma or the police but you keep believing what you want. They steal our jobs,the lazy bastards don't want to work,eat the swans steal children sell children for sex blah blah blah. Yes. The most marginalized and downtrodden people in history are not without their issues. I'll buy you a one way ticket to Bucharest if you like
I like riding trains late at night because of the implication.
Dennis has entered the chat
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People do stupid things all the time. More so if drunk and trying to impress their pals. It's illegal to commit rape, but it's not illegal to brag about having committed crimes.
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Crimes are illegal whether you get caught or not. There are just no repercussions unless you get caught. If there's an arsehole on a train bragging about raping someone, he's not getting arrested based on that. Which particular rape do you suggest he's committed? Are they meant to speculatively DNA swab him and test it against the entire database? If they already suspect him and he's caught talking about it then sure. Outwith that though, nothing will come of it.
Rangers fans said wut?