I live a pretty vanilla life these days. I don't go our late at night and never witness altercations but what do you know…Halloween weekend at the mall is all it takes, apparently. One of those mall kiosk vendors - looking mid 30s, about 6'4'' and rather thin - was sitting in a high chair doing nothing. A second guy – early 40sish, looked about 6'2'' and on the heavy weight side - holding a plastic bag approaches and asks “excuse me, do you know where I could find a cash machine?”. The kiosk guy doesn't say a word, proceeds to look the other way and barely makes a face as if to say “no idea, get lost”. As he walks past the kiosk guy, the plastic bag man goes “you’re not gonna say a word?? Alright then…” and keeps walking. The Kiosk Guy jumps out of his chair and angrily yells “HEY!!!”. Plastic bag Man turns around. Kiosk guy approaches: PBM: I was just asking a question. KG: “You need to [expletive] off and get off my face!” PBM: “You need to calm down, man”. He gives the kiosk guy a stare for a second and walks away. The guy with the plastic bag was not standing flush but at an angled stance. It could be that he had some sort of training or could be that just he happened not to turn all the way when the kiosk guy yelled at him. Hard to tell. How do you think plastic bag man handle it from a self defense standpoint? I thought he did fairly well (other than the remark that set it all off in the first place, I suppose). He diffused it as well as he could and walked away. He could have tried to deescalate further and apologize I suppose, but from what I could see the kiosk guy looked like a total knucklehead so not sure what offering a handshake would have led to. What do you guys think?
All's well that ends well. Plastic Bag neither escalated the situation into violence nor made himself look like an easy target. I wouldn't offer a handshake as you're potentially entering striking range of an angry individual. I think a simple "Never mind, then" and walking off is a good compromise.
I hope Kiosk guy was reported to the mall managment. They should revoke his license to have a kiosk there.
