what should i have done in this situation?

[Rextos]

yesterday i was on my laptop on a bench in a park like area, and this old lady comes up to me and screams "THATS MY DAUGHTERS LAPTOP YOU PUT THAT DOWN YOU THIEF!!" and it got real scary quick cus then everyone around was looking at this brown guy being accused by this white lady of stealing a macbook (i guess maybe they all look the same and she thought it was her daughters laptop? or maybe she was trying to steal mine that way?) but i got super nervous and for a second i almost gave it to her, but then im like NO! this is mine! get away from me.

and then some other people started walking my way and it got really scary i didnt know what to do. but i kept saying its mine and eventually she just walked away and said she would call  the police. :S

what should i have done in that situation? i have social anxiety and when i get thrown in situations like that it just really drives me insane.

[brewer]

Easy, say to her, "You are mistaken, this is mine. If you believe I'm a thief then call the police. Do you know the penalty for false arrest?".

[I_am_not_mafia]

The social anxiety probably made you look more suspicious unfortunately.

You could have asked her why she thought that it was her daughters. When she replied that it looks the same then you could easily point out that thousands are produced all looking the same.

[robvalue]

Sorry that happened You have no duty to explain yourself when randomly and hysterically accused of something.

If it was me, I'd have said "No, it's not" and walked away. She's unlikely to actually call the police, when she has no evidence you've done anything at all.

It could well have been a scam, like you say. Some people are that low.

[Chad32]

If you have a password on your laptop, I'd restart the computer and tell the woman to put in the password. Problem solved. Of course there's also the serial code that differentiates one computer from another. I can imagine it should be easy to prove the laptop is yours, so I would have let her call the police. Or done it yourself.

Sorry you have social anxiety, but I'm glad you didn't give her your computer.


If it was me, I probably would have said "Yeah, there's a LOT of porn on here. WOW. Just look at this search history."

[ErGingerbreadMandude]

"keep walking bitch"

[account_inactive]

Tell her to fuck off. Call the police and restart the laptop in front of them, prove to them it's yours and then the old lady gets arrested. Yay!

[paulpablo]

yesterday i was on my laptop on a bench in a park like area, and this old lady comes up to me and screams "THATS MY DAUGHTERS LAPTOP YOU PUT THAT DOWN YOU THIEF!!" and it got real scary quick cus then everyone around was looking at this brown guy being accused by this white lady of stealing a macbook (i guess maybe they all look the same and she thought it was her daughters laptop? or maybe she was trying to steal mine that way?) but i got super nervous and for a second i almost gave it to her, but then im like NO! this is mine! get away from me.

and then some other people started walking my way and it got really scary i didnt know what to do. but i kept saying its mine and eventually she just walked away and said she would call  the police. :S

what should i have done in that situation? i have social anxiety and when i get thrown in situations like that it just really drives me insane.

Assuming you still have your laptop and no one was harmed you should have done what you did, it seemed to have good results.

[Aoi Magi]

In these situations I'd stick to what my parents have taught me, don't be afraid if you have done nothing wrong! I know it can get awkward but you already did the right thing by sticking up for yourself, so don't fret over it too much. She could've just been senile or a con-artist but whatever the case, you didn't do anything disrestpectful and held your own, that's more than what most would do in your situation

[KUSA]

You should have said "get away from me you crazy cracka"!