Man Suing His Date For Texting Is Same Guy Behind Infamous, Awful 'Leaving Chicago' Letter

By Stephen Gossett in News on May 18, 2017 5:20PM

Brandon Vezmar / Facebook

Color us not the least bit surprised: the guy at the center of the theater-texting lawsuit in Texas is the same guy who penned the infamous "I'm leaving Chicago and I'm never coming back" letter published by the Tribune.

By now you're surely painfully familiar with the tale of the Man Who Sued His Date After She Texted In A Theater. It was two days and roughly 300 Takes ago that news emerged, via the Austin Statesman, about Brandon Vezmar. He filed suit against a woman for $17.31—which is how much one ticket for Guardians in the Galaxy, Vol. 2 in 3D in central Texas runs—after she abandoned a first date at the movies when Vezmar asked her to text outside rather than in the theater.

(We'll spare you a warmed-over re-litigation and just throw out our hat in with the lot that says, yes, texting in the theater is indeed annoying—though infinitely less so than pettily taking the matter to court and contorting it all into a chapter in the Men's Rights saga.)

It turns out the suit isn't the first high-profile SMDH move on the part of Vezmar—and Chicagoans will certainly recall a previous one well: Vezmar's letter to the Tribune from back in January, in which he trollishly announced his abandonment of his Chicago hometown—except that it wasn't even really his hometown.

We were made aware of the link from a tweet by Daniel Kay Hertz, a Senior Policy Analyst at the CTBA and a prominent urban policy writer in Chicago.

Well, Vezmar, who's the president of a media consultancy firm called The Messaging Company and is certainly still on message, doubled down on both his lawsuit and his half-baked Chicago shade (see our takedown)

When asked about critics who called his actions regarding Textgate an act of entitlement, Vezmar was quick to dismiss the very notion in a message to Chicagoist. "Entitled? ENTITLED TO WHAT? To buy other people things? To not be able to enjoy a movie? To be disrespected? The premise of the question is absurd, and only the most hopeless Progressive could even conjure it up. This is man hate WRIT LARGE," he wrote to us.

He was less vehement against the charge that he's misusing the court system, although only to a degree. "I can see where someone would be coming from on this. I'd like to state that I filed in "small claims court" which exists to mediate "smaller" disputes. Also, I've paid filing fees which support the court's business," he said. "Courts exist to dispense justice, and unfortunately, that's where I've ended up in my search for it."

And as for miserable old Chicago, Vezmar remains the charmer. "Chicago is still a hellhole and I'm still never coming back," he said. "I love Austin and so does everyone else who's fleeing Chicago and coming here."

We'd say nice knowing you, but we get the feeling he'll find new and not-all-that-interesting ways of thrusting back on the radar.