‘Should I get on it?’: Woman goes to Publix parking lot at night—to take a shuttle to someone’s birthday party she doesn’t know
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Getting in a vehicle, at night, with near-strangers is one of those situations that sets off every internal alarm bell at once—even when nothing is actually wrong.
One woman filmed herself fixing to enter that exact scenario. She was quick to voice her doubts to an army of viewers.
‘Should I get in it? It's black too. Hope I don't die'
A content creator (@t640741) shared a video from a Publix parking lot at night. Her video has since accumulated more than 568,000 views.
“I just drove to this location because a guy that I've only met once invited me to a birthday party,” she said. “The birthday of someone that I don't know.”
The creator explained that the “guy” in question had sent her a flyer, instructing guests to park at the Publix and wait for a shuttle to take them to the actual party location.
“I think that's the shuttle over there,” the creator said, pointing her camera at a large, black van. “Should I get in it? It's black too. Hope I don't die.”
In a follow-up video, she confirmed she was okay, saying “Hey, I'm alive. Alive and well.” In a second follow-up, she explained her reasoning in more detail, pushing back on commenters who felt she should have waited for the guy to pick her up personally.
“I wasn't trying to go out with him,” the creator said. “Don't even like the guy, I was just home. I had nothing to do.”
She also said seeing three other girls already in the shuttle reassured her enough to get in and stick with them for the night.
“We actually had a good time,” she said. “I made some cute girlfriends… I know I really shouldn't have done that, but do it for the plot.”
Is this the kind of setup typical of kidnappings?
Viewers in the creator's comment section seemed largely horrified by her perceived recklessness at the Publix.
“What do you want your documentary title to be?” one commented. Another wrote, “She always lit up a room.”
Two separate commenters asked some version of “Girl you ok, why would you go.” The creator replied, “I was bored.”
However, despite multiple commenters alluding to a possible kidnapping scheme, such a possibility was always slim. There's no verified reporting tying unmarked party shuttles to trafficking or kidnapping operations. In fact, there is a broader history of “stranger's unmarked vehicle” scares being internet misinformation.
@t640741
Internet tall tales about trafficking
Snopes and PolitiFact both found zero evidence to support a wave of near-identical viral claims in past years that vans were being used in coordinated trafficking abductions. These claims still caused a significant panic among the public; one Baltimore mayor, as per PolitiFact, repeated one such unsubstantiated warning in a televised interview.
CNN also reported that fact-checkers and local police departments across multiple states found no evidence behind viral posts driving the scare.
According to trafficking organization Guardian Group, the idea that traffickers primarily kidnap strangers off the street is a widespread misconception. It's far more common for traffickers to build a relationship with a victim over time and rely on psychological manipulation rather than a single spontaneous encounter.
LifeWay Network similarly notes that trafficking tends to be a gradual process rather than an instant abduction, and that traffickers are more likely to be someone the victim already knows—like a partner, employer, or family member—than an anonymous stranger in a vehicle.
Buzz News has reached out to the creator via TikTok comment.
