Men, keep your loud conversations to yourself. Your verbal manspreading is ruining commuting for everyone

It’s bad enough that you take up so much physical space. As riveting as you think your self-important monologues are, public transport is not the place to deliver them, writes Jenny Eclair

First chairs and now phones, some men keep finding new ways to take up space (iStock)

I think I’ve coined a new phrase. Apologies to anyone else who has already been using it, but if no one has, then I’m bagsying it: “verbal manspreading”. It’s the practice of men talking as loudly as they like on public transport, for as long as they like about any subject they like, in front of anyone they like.

I had a particularly ugly incident concerning “verbal manspreading” last week, when I tackled a 40-something bloke who’d been dominating several train carriages with an incessant business conversation which he conducted on his mobile at a million decibels.

For ages, I presumed he’d forgotten that he was wearing his headphones and was unaware of how loud he was being, but no, he just didn’t care. It didn’t bother him whether other people were trying to read, snooze or conduct their own personal one to one conversations, he had stuff to say to someone on the other end of the phone and it required shouting.

Getting off the train, I informed him on the platform that the entire train had been party to every detail of his conversation. What business was it of mine? He demanded. “None,” I replied. “You made it my business, I moved as far away from you as possible and still I heard every word”. At this point he called me a “mad old woman”, at which point I completely lost it and told him to “f*** off”. Sadly, I did this rather loudly, at which point a mother walked past with her young child who apparently looked at me in horror. Sorry kid. But you know what? I reckon it was possibly the anger in my voice that was potentially more traumatising to a little person than the actual word. Lets face it, small people hate conflict even more than appalling language.

At this point, another man joined in the row, informing me that although he wasn’t party to the original argument, I was a public disgrace, how dare I swear in front of a child? Great, so now I was being rounded on by two men, two men who obviously considered themselves vastly superior in every way to my menopausal hyena act.

Ok, I know, I know, you always lose the moral high ground when you swear. Unfortunately, old 80s stand up habits die hard and whenever I feel personally attacked, my first point of refuge is the language of the late night show at the comedy store circa 1990. But that’s no excuse and I totally acknowledge that swearing in front of other people’s children is bad manners (although I genuinely hope that even a tiny tot can sense the difference between being sworn at and sworn in front of) but if I caused the mother and child any offence, I apologise.

That said, I am utterly heartily sick of having my journeys around the country dominated by men who have absolutely no regard for anyone else’s personal space. Not content with taking up more than their fair share of it, knees wide, feet out, there is a percentage of men who cannot see anything wrong with also invading the personal aural space of anyone else they might be travelling with.

In recent months, I’ve shared journeys with men listening to matches without headphones, I’ve sat next to lads whose headphones are leaking monstrously loud rap music complete with lyrics containing even more swear words than I can accidentally hurl at a three year old and I recently shared a trip into the west end with a bloke who spent 40 minutes describing the sexual pros and cons of the two women he was sleeping with. All this in graphic detail to someone on the other end of the line who obviously had hearing problems, maybe it was his nan?

Listen, I know women and girls get noisy too; I dread travelling on the bus at school chucking out time on certain routes because I know the top deck will be full of screaming teenage girls; I shrivel on intercity trains when my carriage is full of screeching hens, but I can forgive natural exuberance, even if it’s migraine-inducing. What I can’t stand is the self-important monologue delivered as if it were a Shakespearian speech that needs to reach the back of the stalls. And sorry guys, but it’s mostly men who do this.

I understand that occasionally a dramatic thing will happen that needs dealing with pronto while you’re in transit, but cant you just email or text? The great thing about either of those two options is that you can’t be interrupted, you get to say what you really want to say and then just press “send” without boring everyone else within 50ft of you.

So, please and I’m asking politely here, would you mind giving us all a break, boys? And when you’re in a shared space on public transport, would you kindly close your legs and turn the volume down a bit? Yours, the “mad old woman” of south London.