Which Makes You A Bigger Asshole: Screaming “On Your Left” While Scootering Past Someone, Or Saying Nothing At All?

The low hum of a scooter engine gets louder and louder, a sound that almost outweighs the sound of your heart beating in your ears. A bead of sweat inches down your neck and your hands start to shake. You slowly turn your head, preparing yourself for a sight you’ve seen a thousand times. Mere inches from your face, you’re confronted with the lifeless, derision-filled eyes of a scooterer. What follows can only be described as a silent game of chicken, except in this game there are no winners. 

“There has to be a better way,” you think to yourself. 

But is there? So far, only one other option has presented itself. And it’s arguably equally bad. The alternative? A guttural yell of “ON YOUR LEFT” that leaves you scampering to whichever side of the path your brain decides “LEFT” is in that moment. 

And this moment of panic is not the only repercussion of the scooterer’s exclamation. Even if you are able to avoid being run over and squished like a sorority girl’s organs in a tube top, you’re left with the haunting knowledge that you’ve kept the precious scooterer from arriving at their destination .02 seconds earlier. What can one do with this immense guilt? 

Usually, this remorse is channeled into one response: hatred of the scooterer. But how do the infamous scooterers feel in these situations? 

Now, I have a hunch that they hate us pedestrians too. After all, we block their precious pathways, clog their morning commutes, and overall represent a less evolved community on campus. Thus, once again, we’re stuck at an impasse: pedestrians despise the scooterers, and scooterers can’t stand the pedestrians. 

So where do we go from here? In my opinion, only one option remains. If compromise isn’t possible, why not fully embrace the asshole in all of us? 

To the scooterers, I say go crazy. Swerve as much as possible. See how close you can get to hitting that chemistry professor that crushed your premed dreams. Try to land that weird X-Games scooter routine that appeared in your feed (extra points if you crash into a Rand wall table). In other words, act like those kids driving the car in that one scene of Fahrenheit 451 that I always think about for some reason.

To the pedestrians, I suggest being ruthless. Put loose branches and banana peels on all the sidewalks. Create a scooter slip-n-slide by dousing all nearby streets in lube. Step in front of every scooter you can and keep your lawyer on speed dial.

Scooter-pedestrian tensions are at an all-time high on campus. Reviewing all our options, it can be discouraging to realize there are few ways to resolve this conflict. But if being a younger sibling has taught me anything, it’s that if you don’t know how to make things better, what’s stopping you from making things significantly worse?