harassment because your "different"

[Lucretia_my_Reflection]

Lately the harassment from others is seemingly more agressive, then the normal personal attacks. I was wondering how everyone else deals with the harassment, some days i can take it but others like today it just gets to me a little to much. I mean why do people do that and when your doing shopping people look at you look at your trolly then look at you again and make some snide, remark i come from, a large family where we do a large shop once every few weeks. So theres more then one trolly and is there any reason to be rude i mean seriously whats with that argh....i guess thats another formasion of jugement along with the name calling "ugly fat goth chick" "gothic slut" "winey dumb poser" and more extreme stuff like i've had bottles thrown at me oranges, apples i have been shoved out of peoples way. I asked someone what time it was and they knew i was talking to them she just keept ignoring me and walking. I mean even the staff at most shops are rude to me im a very polite person so i do not understand why they are being like this. I asked one of the floor staff at coloundras K-mart and she told me to find it my f**king self. Never again am i going there.

[james"bloody tears"]

most people are afraid of what they dont understand(and lets face it the goth subculuter is not understood) so they attack it in the hopes it will fade away. I'm sorry you go through what you do and hope one day things get better for you.

[HumanePain]

Two approaches come to mind:

a) Either look so bad ass that they will hesitate to say anything (sometimes I get into an elevator and everyone else all of a sudden shuts up, I think because of the chrome studs in my invasion boots, wrist strap and belt), or

b) wear a smile and be so friendly that people see that you are a nice person. Using the later has worked for me, and also, actually going to the same store repeatedly helped, because then the employees get comfortable with who you are, and learn that you won't bite. I ask them how their day is going, tell them about my grandson, blah blah blah, and then they let their guard down.
What is even more beneficial about this approach, is that they may learn to treat the next goth better.

[cradle]

Originally Posted by Lucretia_my_Reflection

Lately the harassment from others is seemingly more agressive, then the normal personal attacks. I was wondering how everyone else deals with the harassment, some days i can take it but others like today it just gets to me a little to much. I mean why do people do that and when your doing shopping people look at you look at your trolly then look at you again and make some snide, remark i come from, a large family where we do a large shop once every few weeks. So theres more then one trolly and is there any reason to be rude i mean seriously whats with that argh....i guess thats another formasion of jugement along with the name calling "ugly fat goth chick" "gothic slut" "winey dumb poser" and more extreme stuff like i've had bottles thrown at me oranges, apples i have been shoved out of peoples way. I asked someone what time it was and they knew i was talking to them she just keept ignoring me and walking. I mean even the staff at most shops are rude to me im a very polite person so i do not understand why they are being like this. I asked one of the floor staff at coloundras K-mart and she told me to find it my f**king self. Never again am i going there.

You know what?
The only reason they do this is because you look different.
Like the other day, my friend and I were at the high school, looking for skate spots and this art teacher comes out with a phone in her hand saying "Get out of here now! I don't want to see you back here again or I'll call the cops!"
Skateboarding IS allwed on school campus, she just didn't want us there because we had skateboards.Wtf, man.
And then we went around asking for money because the both of obviously had none.
Out of the twenty people we asked, only two wre generous enough to give us some.
People just don't want to associate with people that arte in to dfferent things.

Maybe it's just central Georgia, but people suck.

[Raptor]

Originally Posted by Lucretia_my_Reflection

I mean even the staff at most shops are rude to me im a very polite person so i do not understand why they are being like this. I asked one of the floor staff at coloundras K-mart and she told me to find it my f**king self. Never again am i going there.

That isn't acceptable, if it happens again I would get their name and ask to see their manager.

At the moment the only harassment I get is at school (I'm in my last year, its the lower years that shout stuff) and sometimes by chavs in the street. Its only been shouts so far, I usually just ignore them. A few weeks ago a car pulled up next to me when I was walking, rolled the window down, and turned the music up. They followed me down the street for a bit and then drove off. Probably got bored because all I did was smile at them, couldn't really hear the rap over my own music anyway.

I think HumanePains advice of letting them get to know you is good.

Though the image of walking into elevators and silencing everyone made me smile

[Underwater Ophelia]

Originally Posted by cradle

And then we went around asking for money because the both of obviously had none.
Out of the twenty people we asked, only two wre generous enough to give us some.

Well, two teenagers going around asking for money just doesn't sit right with a lot of people. They could have thought you wanted it for drugs, they could have thought "I have a job--get one yourself", they could have just not had money, or they could owe someone money, or maybe they needed it themselves. I just highly doubt it had to do with the fact that you had a skateboard.

[Aaroneet]

I've said this before; I've been harassed, simply because I thought a little differently and liked different things than others. I watched different shows, have different tastes in music, etc. Before I discovered the Gothic subculture, I was a confused little kid who was known by others as "the class idiot". However, it is because of my experiences being insulted and bullied that I wanted to embrace my differences. That's partially where Goth came in; it was a part of who I was and what I was; why not embrace it?

[cradle]

Originally Posted by Underwater Ophelia

Well, two teenagers going around asking for money just doesn't sit right with a lot of people. They could have thought you wanted it for drugs, they could have thought "I have a job--get one yourself", they could have just not had money, or they could owe someone money, or maybe they needed it themselves. I just highly doubt it had to do with the fact that you had a skateboard.

Nah, we were asking for as much as one dollar, and we even told them it was for a drink.
I'm too young to get a job, unfortunatly.
But yeah, I won't rule out the possibility that they had no money.

Yeah, I have no idea what I was doing thinking they didn't give us money because we had skateboards. :/

[biohazard]

I agree with Humane Pain. Being nice to people calms them down, since they think we are freaks or something. I ahve been hassed and still am at school, but what I do is ignore it and walk away. The less attention I pay to it, the less people care to harass me.

[deafasadoornail]

Interestingly, I've never noticed if I've been harassed for being goth because I'm so used to being harassed for being deaf, and often by people who should know better. I've developed a very thick skin and a rather long list of enemies, from the Human Resources gal who wouldn't hire me because "I don't think you can do this job," to salesclerks who look at me all shifty and refuse to help.

I don't have any real assistance to offer, sorry. People are crappy.

[Lucretia_my_Reflection]

Originally Posted by HumanePain

Two approaches come to mind:

a) Either look so bad ass that they will hesitate to say anything (sometimes I get into an elevator and everyone else all of a sudden shuts up, I think because of the chrome studs in my invasion boots, wrist strap and belt), or

b) wear a smile and be so friendly that people see that you are a nice person. Using the later has worked for me, and also, actually going to the same store repeatedly helped, because then the employees get comfortable with who you are, and learn that you won't bite. I ask them how their day is going, tell them about my grandson, blah blah blah, and then they let their guard down.
What is even more beneficial about this approach, is that they may learn to treat the next goth better.

sounds like a good idea, none of my friends go there anymore so its there loss of custermers

[Extraordinary]

Originally Posted by deafasadoornail

Interestingly, I've never noticed if I've been harassed for being goth because I'm so used to being harassed for being deaf, and often by people who should know better. I've developed a very thick skin and a rather long list of enemies, from the Human Resources gal who wouldn't hire me because "I don't think you can do this job," to salesclerks who look at me all shifty and refuse to help.

I don't have any real assistance to offer, sorry. People are crappy.

Deaf AND goth?! I'm in love!

[deafasadoornail]

Originally Posted by Extraordinary

Deaf AND goth?! I'm in love!

Really? Is this a fetish I wasn't aware of, or are you deaf also?

[Extraordinary]

Originally Posted by deafasadoornail

Is this a fetish I wasn't aware of

Uhm, well that sounds probable, but no, that isn't what I had in mind. The joke is, as they say, on me.

[Seraphynth]

I haven't had this trouble in a while unless it comes from my mother (who I'm thankfully unrelated to, YAY! ).
I do what HumanePain suggested, just be nice. I'm always nice and courteous unless I'm in a hurry and my "thank you" comes out a bit too late. ^^; I'm not rude or snide, and anytime someone makes a joke about me I laugh with them. You wouldn't believe the reaction you get from people when you do that. They suddenly become interested in you.
The only other problems I've had (I had none at school after I started admitting to being a goth and that I was different, I actually gained friends then O_o) have been with old ladies. They crowd around me crooning how cute I look and asking me where I work. When they find out I don't have a job and it's not my uniform, they scuttle off in a hurry, scared to death. -_-
Little kids seem to love the way I dress most of all.

Really, just be nice and courteous (please, thank you, yes ma'am, no ma'am). And smile. :]

[Graveyard.Crow]

Honestly I don't get harrased that much. The only people who harras me are 16 year old wangster kids and the only thing they say is "holy shit". The reason is because most people are actually scared to harras me (I have a lot of friends haha).
I think being friendly (even if you are pretending) helps and also kinda act as if you don't look the way you do. It kind of makes people think twice before throwing something at you.

[Graveyard.Crow]

Also being nice makes the person feel like an ass if they were rude to you.

[prophecyofdoom]

I didn't even realize how badly I was being treated for the way I dressed until I borrowed several suits from my mother to go job hunting in. I was shocked at how well-treated I was wherever I went. Professional-types even made small talk with me at the train station. It was nice. Then I put my own clothes back on and it made me feel really shitty, how people either treated me like I was invisible or eyed me distainfully.

[Extraordinary]

That's interesting you should say that, prophecyofdoom. For a while I've been considering some kind of experiment in just that: Wearing different types of clothes to see the different reactions in people.

Except I don't feel like actually doing that...but I would like to know.

[HumanePain]

It is true, big difference in how people treat you due to preconceived notions about you. I dress like an average 50 year old, I get "good morning" and smiles. I dress in my daily blacks and I get stares and quiet, or sometimes questions.

And it is fun to see the differences. The one difference I enjoy the most: young people talk to me more and are more accepting of me.

[Raptor]

Originally Posted by Seraphynth

Little kids seem to love the way I dress most of all.

I did some volunteer work in an infant school and the kids kept playing with my hair lol. Strange how they can be like that with an older person and yet so horrible to each other sometimes.

[Breathless Horror]

It's true, young children don't seem to mind me. My theory is that they haven't been ingrained with thier parents' prejudices yet. I generally go for the "Too bad-ass to fuck with" approach though, so the little kids love for me is in-explicable.

[Raptor]

Yeh thats probably right, they know each other so I guess they're harsh to people they genuinely don't like. Plus they're more likely to say things to each other rather than to an adult.

I don't think they associate your clothes with personality so much. Some of them told me I look like a girl because of my hair lol, but they were all nice to me anyway

[Kraven de Sade]

Originally Posted by cradle

And then we went around asking for money because the both of obviously had none.
Out of the twenty people we asked, only two wre generous enough to give us some.

Trust me, chances are that the reason you get much wasn't because of being different, but because most people don't like to give money away. I used to live on the streets, and the vast majority of the people I've asked either said "no" or just ignored me.

[Minyaliel]

Originally Posted by Extraordinary

For a while I've been considering some kind of experiment in just that: Wearing different types of clothes to see the different reactions in people.

Except I don't feel like actually doing that...but I would like to know.

I've been doing that for quite a while, actually, and it is rather amusing. The contents of my wardrobe can be put together in such a way that I can dress in any style I like and still look rather authentic (which is a cool coincidence, by the way), and so I've been experimenting with it. So far, I've stuck with one style for 1-3 weeks (in one case it was 2 months, because I was really enjoying the responses this particular style gave me), and then swapped to another. I've been through punk, hippie, stereotypical metal fan, death rock (this slightly mixed into the punk weeks because I was wearing a hawk for both), Neo- victorian, emo (lol), MTV style "gangsta chick" clothes, stereotypical goth (perfectly hilarious) and "normal".

The most entertaining weeks were the ones when I went for punk/ death rock and metal style; as a close second comes the Neo- Victorian and stereotype goth weeks. I constantly got stared at. I'm used to this, being an artist and performer at heart, and found it most amusing. Everyone thought I was insane when they saw me come down the street with my hawk. I know I unintentionally scared the living hell out of one employee in a second- hand shop (which was more distressing than amusing; I truly pitied the poor girl), but there was also this one beggar who always recognized me when I passed and greeted me with a handshake and a few words in passing. In one instance I was complimented by a guy who supposedly worked as a nurse/ social worker, who told me that my choice of style showed great strength of character and a strong self- confidence. Nice guy.

I've also found that if you wear spikes, the kids will love you and all others are most likely to shun you (good for days when you don't feel like talking to anyone).

Elderly ladies love the Neo- Victorian style, even if it leaves you breathless and fainting, and will compliment you for it. Most other people will ask you which play you're going to perform in.

I felt very odd and slightly uncomfortable in casual, and horrible in the typical "gangsta chick" clothes. It made me feel very invisible and part of the crowd; like anyone else. I know it sounds odd - I guess I like being an individual.