G.C.Montgomery wrote:I agree that this sounds like Sangiovese successfully "failed" the selection process for an attack. And I like his planned challenge just fine. I know John Farnam would be proud. Asking "Can I help you?" with a firm command presence in your stance and demeanor will work just fine for queuing up BGs to the fact you aren't food. As John would say, "…courteous to all, friendly to none…”
On the other hand, "Could you hold up right there?" is no less of an "invite" for a conversation. Knowing the mindset of the knuckleheads I've grown up with on the east side of Houston, I know that sort of opener can and will come off as a straight up challenge. It gets even worse if you seem "cocky" at the time because there will be some moron willing to try you. The result is you may initiate a confrontation that will just keep going downhill once it starts.
YMMV, but that's my experience.
In my opinion, "Can I help you?" is not as useful as, "Hold up, dude."
The former (“Can I help you?”) can be really useful to surprise and establish to the unknown individual that you are, in fact, aware of his presence when you believe that he thinks you are unaware of him. However, if the aspect of surprise fails, it can segue immediately into a back-and-forth conversation where the distance can easily close. Such conversation is not warranted at this moment, and neither is closer distance. The latter (“Hold up, dude,” or some variant) conveys that you are aware of the other person, but also sets up a little tripwire that an innocent contact (and perhaps an astute or uncommitted criminal) will respect, but a stupid or more determined criminal will disregard. This piece of information---whether the contact respects your claimed space or not---is very valuable. In the case of an innocent contact, once you have established a modicum of control over the encounter and looked after your own safety, then you can give him the opportunity to say what he wants and consider whether or not you can help him.
If someone is going to get offended and assault you just for claiming reasonable space (the context under consideration is open public space, not some swanky hipster lounge where people are jammed together shoulder to shoulder), then it seems you are facing a sociopath who does not respect other people's boundaries, claimed or unclaimed. I am very reluctant to give such a person any opportunity to physically encroach and distract me with verbiage, so even passively drawing in such a person by inquiring how I can assist said person seems counterproductive. On the other hand, requesting some type of passive compliance (hold up, dude) is a reasonable test that will help you understand what type of individual you are facing. At the beginning of an unknown encounter, it is more useful for you to control proxemics than to initiate a verbal information transfer---no matter whether you are facing an innocent contact, a opportunist criminal or the twisted sociopath (there may be considerable overlap between the latter two).
Taken together, the command presence, "say when" demeanor, fence, appropriate footwork and verbiage (in one form or another) will go a long way to discouraging probing behavior---or if not, position you more advantageously for a potential fight.