Last week a video of an anonymous woman being violently yelled at by her Uber driver went viral. I first heard about the video on the radio while driving to work. The DJs played a small portion of the three-minute clip while laughing and cracking jokes, calling the guy crazy, saying that he obviously had anger issues and ultimately, defending the woman. I noticed, though, that they didn't say anything about what sparked the argument or why he was so incredibly angry. I decided to check it out for myself.
The man is already upset when the video begins. You can clearly hear the woman begin to ask, "Where is my destination?," but the man interrupts her to firmly state: "You are at the hospital. Administration is right here. Get in there." The woman responds, saying, "I'm going to the emergency room, sir," and starts to ask again where she is when the man interrupts a second time—louder this time—telling the woman to get out of his car.
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The two go back and forth like this for at least the first half of the video, with the man becoming angrier and angrier, the woman not budging from the car and repeatedly asking where she is or where her destination is. It's at this point that the man gets out of the car and opens her door. His yelling at this point seems desperate, almost begging. He yells that the woman has been "extremely rude, extremely condescending"; the video ends when an anonymous man approaches the car and offers to help the woman locate the emergency room.
Technology rules today's society. News topics are brought about by way of social media, which also contributes to the spread of that news and even protests against issues. As of late, video footage has been released almost on a regular basis to reveal the tragedies of innocent lives taken by police officers; footage recorded on a passer-by's cell phone is making a much more prominent appearance related to serious news stories than in years past. (Monica Anderson and Andrea Caumont discuss this issue further in their article.)
At first look, this video appears to have been meant to serve a similar purpose-- to reveal sexist behavior and the assumed-dangerous situation this white male willingly thrust on a female. There are some who might watch the video and see only the fact that the man degraded the woman, calling her a "f***ing moron" and repeatedly interrupt her when she clearly only needed help.
Most people, though, did not side with the woman. Instead, they bombarded her with hate and questioning. One YouTuber commented on the video: "He was clearly aggravated before she started recording...I want to know why." Another says, "She had this planned. people like her need to be punched in the face!" (there were many other comments regarding to the woman deserving physical punishment). Another states: "The description of this video is misleading. This poor driver is not to blame. This bitch needs to get out of the car. I am sure she instigated it." Why is there so much hate here?
It's true that no one knows the woman's true intentions behind this video, but in a world where most people are documenting their horrifying experiences, I would like to think the woman was recording for her own safety. Granted, I agree she handled the situation immaturely and pushed the man beyond any rational point (it would have been much easier to leave the car, enter the hospital and ask for directions to the emergency room), but I hope this wasn't a setup for five minutes of fame. But perhaps that's where the hateful comments are coming from—families are losing their loved ones due to injustice and this woman appears to have the nerve to create a "Me too!" video. We need to band together to stand up for those without voices, but creating a problem to prove that there's a problem isn't the way to do it. And part of me is glad to see that people didn't rush to blame this particular white man; they remained level-headed enough to see that—at least this time—someone was simply crying wolf.
