Aggressive confrontation on TTC subway

If you ever ride public transit, you may have come across some uncomfortable situations, like an argument or what looks like bullying or even racism.

An incident captured on video Wednesday on a TTC subway and posted to Twitter shows a man aggressively intervening after someone allegedly made offensive remarks towards a woman.

*We have censored the explicit language used in the video below*

Paul Hyman, a de-escalation expert from Brain Fitness International, says there are a few things to keep in mind if you choose to intervene in order to diffuse the situation rather than make it worse.

1) Staying grounded
“Are you breathing? Are you feeling centered?”
2) Use your voice
“You want to be able to use your voice as a tool because when we talked about communication models about seven per cent of the words being used, are being listened to. You want to be very precise. ‘Sir I need you to lower your voice’… 38 percent of communication is our tone of voice.”
3) Call the ABC’s
“Call (out) the behaviour that needs to be modified, mitigated, tell the reason why it has to be stopped and give a couple options… you’re basically buying time, as long as you get that person talking.”
4) Proximity Space
“If you can see my feet and my eyes at the same time, even if I attempted to kick you my leg isn’t long enough.”
5) Make it easy to agree
“Make it to easy to agree and make it hard to disagree. Who is going to argue with somebody who is obliging all their yes answers?”