Sometimes people are awful.
My mom's in town. We try to go to a show when she's here, so yesterday afternoon we headed over to the Times Square TKTS booth. At the corner was a scalper offering 'Billy Elliot' tickets. She's wanted to see it for a while, and I wanted to make it happen, so I bought them for $80 each. I know, bad idea.
We were a little uneasy, so I suggested we run by the theater right away to confirm that they were legitimate. They were real tickets for $40 seats.
My mom was steamed and insisted we go back. I expected the guy to say it was our fault for buying them. I didn't expect him and his associates (who wandered up as the conversation went on) to treat her like a crazy person. After promising a refund, he had her hand the tickets to an associate. The guy with the tickets starts edging away, possibly to disappear into the crowd with our only bargaining chip, so my mom snatched the tickets back, winning her an accusation from the main man that now she was stealing his stuff. At this point, another associate who'd been looking on started on about how she was "acting mental." After some more back and forth, tickets and cash returned to their previous owners, and we left. I was shaken, but my mom didn't care one bit.
In hindsight, their reaction makes sense: these guys' success depends on their credibility. Better to browbeat and badmouth a woman with a legitimate complaint than to cop to selling tickets at 2x markup. All the same, I'm appalled by their behaviour. I'm also ashamed of my cowardice and immensely proud of my mom's indifference.