Couple singing Peppa Pig to toddler forced off bus for "racism"

a reply to: EvillerBob

You are absolutely right - the company has no obligation to carry you "no matter what", however it is pretty sad that someone should find the Peppa Pig song annoying - it is certainly the preferred option if the other is a distressed child.

originally posted by: TrueBrit

While my respect for what is legal, as opposed to what is just, is relatively minimal, I can see exactly where they would have come afoul of the two paragraphs you mentioned.

There has always been a massive problem with "law" in general, whether statute or contract as in this case. It is an attempt to codify or define a range of human behaviour based on a limited number of parameters, when human behaviour is really far too broad a spectrum to ever be clearly defined in that way.

So, the following type of situation occurs. People get annoyed with drunken football fans yelling obscene songs from the back seat of the bus and frightening poor old Mrs. Miggins half to death. People demand something is done! New conditions of carriage are drafted to control this behaviour... but because of the difficulty in trying to codify human behaviour, the conditions of breach end up applying to a hundred other situations that were never in the minds of the people who wrote it.

Singing to a crying child to calm them down might technically be in breach of contract (I believe the actual PSV Regs might only address the use of instruments/music players), but could the people who wrote the terms ever really have intended that to be the case?

originally posted by: stumason
a reply to: EvillerBob

You are absolutely right - the company has no obligation to carry you "no matter what", however it is pretty sad that someone should find the Peppa Pig song annoying - it is certainly the preferred option if the other is a distressed child.

As a big fan of Peppa Pig (I think we as parents enjoyed watching it more than the kids did") I heartily agree.

Daddy Pig is a role model of mine.

a reply to: EvillerBob

Haha, me too! My son was into Peppa when he was a bit smaller (still watches it now at 4) and I love Daddy Pig

originally posted by: EvillerBob

originally posted by: SearchLightsInc
I would not have left the bus. Simple as.

If they want you off the bus, you're getting off the bus. Simple as. The law is on their side in this case, and there are specific regulations in place to require a passenger to leave a public service vehicle when directed to do so by the driver or a police constable.

Kicking up a fuss or being stubborn and refusing to move won't stop it happening eventually, it will just prolong the affair and annoy everyone else.

My uncle is a bus driver so i know what they can and cant do. What i mean is that i would refuse to leave the bus until the police turned up and escorted me off. If someone is going to be daft enough to waste my time with their perceived offence of a song then i can absolutely join in with the crazy and refuse to move until the police show up.

originally posted by: stumason
a reply to: beansidhe

A statement from First does confirm that the argument was between the couple and an "Asian lady", as seen on the bus CCTV, so while the driver may have been unaware of what was said, that particular factoid from the incident does hold up.

he investigation is ongoing but we have viewed CCTV footage. It does show the customer leaving the bus at the location he describes and it does show a conversation between a lady customer on the bus and the driver, and the driver speaking to the customer.

We're speaking with our driver and with the customer to clarify the circumstances in which they left the bus. At this point I'm not in a position to confirm that they were forced to leave.

It is clear they left the vehicle. The driver responded to a customer complaint on the service. There was a single complaint from a passenger, she was an Asian lady.

The driver told us he heard no reference to racism but we are investigating the incident and have not yet drawn a conclusion.
Read more at www.snopes.com...

I have trawled the interwebs and it seems that there isn't a single follow up piece of journalism for this story that I can find. All seem to be around the same time and then die off.

Bus company probably gave them a small settlement contingent on them signing an NDA, and that's the end of it.

I'd take Peppa Pig for my little ones ANY DAY over that whiny Caillou crap. If they had been singing anything about Caillou I would have had to ask them to leave the bus as well.

a reply to: stumason

Yep, me too. It must have been resolved internally.
Daddy Pig, lol! I had a strange post-natal affection for Grampy Rabbit but it wore off when the hormones straightened out.