If I didn’t find the term offensive, I might have called this post “The Attack of the Karens” (The first love of my life, in high school, was named Karen. She married my best friend. I don’t want to talk about it…). It’s also another Spuds story. Let me state right up front: this is one bias I have no intention of banishing.
We live in a cul-de-sac by a church, its parking lot and a public grade school, with a picnic area, a playground and an athletic field nearby. Spuds needed to attend to his morning toilette, so as I have for the nearly three years we have had the pleasure of his company, I followed my pit bull mix on his leash as he went to his favorite peeing place, on the grass just across the cul-de-sac from our home. My dog was just about to complete the job, whereupon he would quickly return to his perch on our sofa, when we were interrupted by a woman, who walked up to within about 15 feet of us and said, “Sir, dogs upset my animals.”
I had noticed that on this day the church or the school had set up a temporary petting zoo near the picnic tables and by the school playground, about 10 yards from where Spuds and I were. Quite a few young kids and their parents were crowded around a pen that appeared to contain a couple of goats, a lamb or two, and an alpaca.
“Why are you telling me this?” I asked, annoyed at her attitude.
“Well, sir, I don’t want you to bring your dog up to the pen. It will upset my animals.”
I was not in the mood to put up with this, in part because I have long vowed not to.
“You know, my dog is upset when strangers confront us when he’s on a leash. Without you interrupting him, he would be finished relieving himself by now and on the way home. What makes you think it is appropriate to tell me not to do something I would never do, when I have given no indication that I might do it and when it would be a stupid thing to do anyway? I don’t take Spuds into groups of small children, much less groups of small children with other animals. I resent your implication. You should get back to your business and let my dog get back to his.”
At this point an officious church representative decided to get involved. “Sir, she was just trying to warn you not to take your dog up to the event,” this woman said. “And I live right there,” I replied, pointing to my house. I do not appreciate being treated like an idiot, or being told not to do what I would never do.”
“Well, I don’t appreciate your tone,” she responded.
“I didn’t appreciate her tone! There was no reason to lecture me on dogs and animals. I don’t appreciate your tone either.”
“You know, sir, you’re now on church property,” she snapped back. This was the Saint’s Excuse, Rationalization #13 on the list, raising its holy head. It’s a church, and does good things, so its agents are entitled to act like assholes.
She shouldn’t have gone there.
“You know, I’ve lived here for 40 years, and we have accommodated your church frequently, like allowing your members to crowd out our parking spaces on Sundays even though there’s a whole parking lot right over there. As for this property, there is a public easement from the cul-de-sac to the walking and biking path right by your “event.” About 30 people, often with their dogs, use it daily for access. I bet it’s even on the map. Don’t try changing the subject from your friend’s obnoxious intrusion to the church’s property rights. You want to litigate an easement against the whole neighborhood? Great, bring it on. You just found someone who would really enjoy making the church look foolish.”
“We will just get on with our day, then!” she said, and turned back to the alpaca.
“Good!” I replied, narrowly avoiding the much-deserved, “and bite me.” Spuds finally did his job, and we went home.
“Why bother?” you may ask. Why not just grit my teeth and nicely tell the first woman not to worry, and thanks for the alert? Because behaving in an officious, presumptuous and insulting manner is a power play, a form of dominance game-playing, and it needs to be discouraged. I made that encounter thoroughly unpleasant for both of those women, and maybe, just maybe, they will think twice before assuming someone is going to behave unethically when there is no evidence at all that such conduct is impending. Their next victim might just lower his or her head in submission.
I considered making a complaint to the church about the neighborhood not being alerted to the morning petting zoo in advance, which would have been fair and responsible. After all, I had as much reason to walk up to the women and say, “Animals upset my dog” as they did to do the reverse. My wife talked me out of it.
I’m going out with Spuds to use that easement now…
Ethics Alarms 
I suppose most of the confrontation could have been avoided if she started with a polite, “Excuse me, sir, but may I make a small request?” and then continued to detail the situation, and how she did not know if you intended to take your dog into the event, but if you had been planning that, would you mind not doing so?
Opening with “Dogs upset my animals” seems unnecessarily confrontational and accusatory, and set the tone for the entire encounter.
That’s certainly correct, but I suspect I would have bristled even at that. To me, it’s like walking up to a stranger and saying, “Littering is wrong,” or someone passing by one’s home and saying, “I don’t like people walking on my lawn.” A request to do something is always fair. A request that one not do something stupid and irresponsible with no reason to expect such conduct is not fair. It’s an insult and presumptuous. There are about a hundred dogs in close proximity of the church. Four temporary signs would have done the job without targeting any one dog owner in the neighborhood.
Unfortunately, people don’t think; they react.
The event’s animal owner reacted and the official tried to back her by reacting.
You could have attempted to mitigate the dispute by thanking the animal owner for the warning and assuring her that you had no intention of approaching the pen with Spuds.
However, officious and presumptuous people often respond with a skeptical, “Okayyyyyyyyy” with a tone that mirrors what they would use with a 5-year-old denying that she was going to take any cookies after being caught with a hand in the cookie jar itself.
I’d rather stick needles in my eyes than thank someone for treating me like that. Why should I have to assure someone that I’m not going to do something stupid and reckless?
And by the way—react to WHAT? A man holding a leash 30 feet away, down a hill, whose dog was lifting his leg? How was that a threat, a flashing red light, or anything justifying a confrontation? My wife thinks this was more pit bull phobia: “Ohhh, I hope that scary dog isn’t coming up here!” Maybe—I don’t think so myself.
I did not take her comment about Church property to be a Saint’s Excuse.
I took it more to be a prelude to a “Get off my lawn!” demand.
-Jut
Could be an assumption on my part. I have had a few “heed me, for I am with the Church!” encounters here before.
Only somewhat related, but why are they called ‘Karens’? Shouldn’t they be called ‘Carens’ after the original Caren?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caren_Turner
like allowing your members to crowd out our parking spaces on Sundays
I am confused by this. Are you saying they park in your driveway?
I explained that my cul de sac is near the church–in fact, our home faces the back of the church across the church parking lot lot. The access to the lot is from the same street that runs parallel to our [dead end] street, hence the cul de sac. For many years, every space in front of the four houses on our street would be taken up by church patrons’ cars. If I happened to be on an errant when they arrived, I would have no place to park. Finally, the combination of a widened lot, reduced membership and my son’s car collection eliminated the problem—after more than 30 years in which we tolerated the inconvenience.
Well to be fair, you don’t own the parking spots on the street so you’re not really allowing them to park anywhere.
Or am I missing something?
Yeah, ethics. Where do you live, a jungle? It is standard neighborhood ethics that the street bordering on a home’s property is considered that home’s parking area, and it is rude and inconsiderate to take up all of such space so those in the home have no place to park (garages are rare in Northern Virginia) It is particularly rude for an organization that provides a parking lot to fail to alert its members that clogging a cul de sac next door so Sunday becomes an ongoing inconvenience is both unnecessary and inappropriate, and in this case, un-Christian. That they might have a legal right to park there is irrelevant. Law vs, Ethics. It’s even a tag. Do your homework.
You’re saying it’s unethical to park on a residential street where you don’t live?
It’s also rude and unethical to claim you own a public parking spot just because your house is in front of it.
You don’t own that spot and anyone can park there.
Not having a place to park in front of your house is annoying and an inconvenience but it has nothing to do with ethics. You live across the street from a church, you’re going to have your spot taken from time to time.
I feel like this is just another instance of you claiming something is unethical just because it annoys you.
Fine—you’re a troll, a “gotcha’ specialist, and quite possibly an idiot. I’m not wasting any more time with you: this isn’t good faith arguing. You’re banned. Usually I issue a warning, but I’ve reviewed your posts. There is no chance that you are capable or inclined to offer objective analysis here, meaning you are wasting my time and polluting the blog.
The clincher is your first sentence: “You’re saying it’s unethical to park on a residential street where you don’t live?” That’s not what I wrote, not what I meant, and clearly so. If you think it is, then you’re also an idiot—and that’s grounds to ban you too: check the Comment policies.
If you try to sneak a comment on here, including a response to this, it will not be read, and will be spammed the second I see it. The degree of assholishness of banned commenters is directly proportional to how many times they try to comment after they are banned.