No doubt an insult shouted from the safety of a crowd does not deserve your rebuttal, it is not a man who has insulted you but a barking dog. As for looks, even laughs, it's natural for folks to do both when seeing you dressed so far outside of social norms for the very first time. What looks like mean stares are most often folks just taking a really good look at you. If you smile they'll universally smile back.

Pay no mind to annonymous insults, but, if such a thing happens at your normal pub or family gathering you should put a stop to it right then and there. If you don't then you will become the "easy target" every time you show up and you will have to put up with it for as long as you will put up with it. The longer you wait to confront such borish behavior the harder and more dramatic it will be to stop it later, if it can be stopped at all.

My favorite hang out is a Honky Tonk called the Rig. When I first showed up in my kilt I was imeadiately hit with the "nice skirt" comment made in a very insulting manner before I even got in the door. This comment was not made from a crowd it was made by one of two cowboys both of which had at least 4" of height on me. I stopped dead in my tracks and said, "Nice Hat!" Both of them brusseled up and said again, "Nice SKIRT." I took a step toward them and said, "NICE HAT!" Before I could finish the word 'hat' they both were disappearing into the parking lot.

Later that night one of them showed back up and appologized. He wound up telling pretty much everybody else at the bar that I had bigger balls than all of them and that my kilt just proves it. It's funny, sometimes I'll go into the Rig and some new guy will start to set up for a smartass comment ... before he can even get it out somebody else invariably stops him.

If you let one person insult you then latter let another and another it won't be long before you become the clown of the bar ... at that point even the most aggressive "barking back" will only make you look like a pityful whiner. No matter what you say it will sound like "Stop Picking on Me!" If you ask for help from the staff you'll look like you're crying for your Mamma. After that it's time for a new bar and possibly for a new town.

I've said it many times, once in this post: You will have to put up with it for as long as you put up with it. So don't put up with it and ....

Kilt On!

Chris Webb