25 people who learned immediately that actions have consequences.

There are many ways to say it. What goes around comes around. Instant karma. F*ck around and find out. No matter the generation, the simple act of watching someone get exactly what's coming to them is perennial comfort food. On Reddit, countless threads chronicle just that kind of karmic justice. Here are 25 examples.

1.) From yesidumbx100:

I was in the passing lane on the highway slowly coming up on a couple of cars in the right lane. The speed limit was about to decrease ahead and then another car came up behind me going pretty fast.

Instead of gassing it to get ahead of the traffic to my right I slowed down and pulled in behind them, with the car behind me right on my ass. Once I got into the right lane the car floored it and passed me honking the horn and the passenger's body was half out of the car window yelling at me and flipping me off as they passed.

Turns out the car I pulled in behind was an unmarked state trooper who promptly pulled them over. Justice.

2.) From AdolphManson:

I'm an old guy (46) and I used to buy newspapers

One day I paid for one, but took two papers (because I was sick of co-workers rifling through MY paper). As I walked off with both newspapers, I noticed that my shirt tail got stuck in the newspaper box when it slammed shut. I had to put in another $0.25 to get my shirt out

3.) From Lemonface

Me, my brother, and our friend decided to be funny and get on an elevator ahead of our other friend so we could get to the hotel room first and lock our other friend out for sh*tz n giggles. We got trapped on the elevator for an hour and a half while our other friend that we ditched got to chill by the pool for that time. I guess we deserved it.

4.) From cervidaes:

Was buying some drinks at a circle K one day while visiting someone in Florida and these old tourists cut us in line, all the while complaining and bitching loudly about everything, how expensive everything is, how crowded the beach is, it’s too hot, etc. they are also really rude to the cashier and take forever arguing about the price of the hot dogs they were buying or something.

They leave and as we walk out we witness a seagull come and snatch the guy’s hot dog right out of his hand. His wife then shrieks and proceeds to drop hers out of surprise.

I know it isn’t that big of a deal but it was so f*cking hilarious watching that happening that I still remember it 5 years later.

5.) From Lostkiddo101:

Happened while visiting NY. I watched someone bend down to pick up a wallet someone ahead of them had just dropped. All of this was going down in the crosswalk and I was in the passenger seat with my dad driving. GuyA who picked up the wallet began run it to GuyB who was already across the street and while doing so, his wallet fell out of his pocket and on the sidewalk/crosswalk area.

Some sh*tty dude in the bike lane rode up a little ways ahead, bent down, and picked it up and just started heading off.

Just grabbed it and began to ride away like a bunch of cars hadn’t just watched him. My dad was about to say something when a cop car adjacent to us swerved in front of cycler and made him give it back. Cycler bumped into the cop car and was trying to go around when he was tackled. I think they might’ve arrested him but he light changed so we couldn’t stick around.

Coolest instant karma I’ve ever seen.

6.) From danpisha:

My wife was jogging, and a man starts driving slow and cat calling her. Doesn’t realize it’s a red light and rear-ends a truck, totally destroying his Prius. Cop was stopped at the same red light and saw the whole situation. Cop laughed and asked my wife to fill out a witness statement.

Edit: it was a busy street, so when I say “driving slow,” I mean he slowed down while passing her, probably hit the lady in the truck doing about 35 in a 50.

7.) From chum1ly:

Saw some lady road raging hard at slow traffic going over a dangerous mountain pass. She was trying to run people off the road trying to get around them. I've never seen anything like it, she could've killed someone. Saw her getting forcefully arrested by like 6 cops at the bottom of the mountain on the other side. Face-pinned to hood and screaming.

8.) From Outlander56

Watched an entitled angry man abuse and belittle his server to the point of tears. Then he hitched up his belt and looked pleased with himself as he swaggered off the restaurant deck, tripped on the stairs, and face planted in the sand on the beach. (This was a vacation in Fla.)

My wife looked mortified as I laughed right out loud at the guy. He got up, saw everyone staring and at least one person openly laughing, and quickstepped off down the beach.

9.) From Raych_arles:

I work at a movie theater. One afternoon I was selling tickets at the box office when an older lady came up and asked me a question about our app (it’s a Cinemark app).

I, however, wasn’t sure about the answer and told her that. She proceeded to say, very rudely, “isn’t is your job to know??? Are you stupid or something?”

Then, she turned around and noticed the mall cop was writing her a ticket for parking in a handicap spot when she did not have a handicap plate or placard. She took off running screaming “wait stop! That’s my car!”

I couldn’t keep the huge grin off my face for the rest of the day.

10.) From stovetopbrand:

One day a few years ago I was grabbing McDonalds near work to eat something last second before my shift. It was one of those two lane microphone deals. I blatantly finish ordering before the other lane before he stomps on the gas to cut me off.

His car breaks down right there, and I get to take my rightful turn in line.

11.) From killagoose:

Not 100% “instant” karma, but pretty quickly. See, I work for a staffing agency. I’m a recruiter. Pretty small team and this was actually another recruiter on my team that this happened to.

My co-worker was working with this guy who was pretty sharp. He was a programmer. His company was doing layoffs but he was told he wouldn’t be affected. My co-worker contacted him, chatted about the situation and he said he would be interested in looking around.

We just had a new client give us a position to help on that fit his background. We lined up an interview pretty quickly, he interviewed and got the position! Great. It was even a little salary bump. Straight direct hire, no contract stuff. He goes in, works his first week. All is great, all smiles.

Well, that next Monday shows up and he isn’t there. The company calls us asking where he is, so my co-worker calls him. He answers the phone and my co-worker asks “hey, is everything okay? You no call no showed today over at XYZ company.”

And the guy proceeds to tell us “Yeah, I never actually quit my job. I just took vacation for the week to see if I liked the place. It was okay but I’ll just stay here.” My co-worker responds “Man, is there anything I can do? This puts us in a tight spot, this is a brand new customer of ours, can I do anything?”

And the guy tells us “Quite frankly I don’t give a sh*t what kind of position it puts you in nor do I care if they are a new customer. I’m staying, don’t call me again.” And hangs up the phone.

He got laid off the next week.

12.) From aittlebitlittle:

The washers and dryers in my apartment building are run through Bluetooth and an app you download on your phone. I figured out that if I put my phone on airplane mode while simultaneously pressing the start button on the machine, the washer would start but I wouldn’t get charged.

I was so proud, tried the same thing on the dryer and it worked. Went to get my clothes out of the dryer an hour later and everything was covered in melted Hershey kisses

13.) From authoritrey:

I was at an All Good festival once and there was one of those dudes who was just pure id. You know, shouting insults, screaming, throwing shit at people, just an animal. He was slightly uphill from a main intersection, only maybe thirty feet from the crowd. I was standing around waiting for a friend.

The dude's campsite was total bullshit, with some poorly planned tarp-city thing held up by a nylon rope that was strung over a pickup truck and secured by slamming a car door shut on it.

Suddenly, the guy throws his beer at the crowd, crawls up on top of the car, and starts tight-roping it between the car and the truck. I was very impressed that he made it at least two steps before the rope slipped a few inches in the car door, the guy spread his legs, and he dropped three feet straight onto the suspended rope.

I have never in my life seen a guy wrack his balls so hard. In a fetal position, he spun around the rope in slow motion until he was upside down. Then the rope scraped across the roof of the truck, fell between the cab and the bed, partially collapsed the tarp city, and dropped the asshole a couple more feet onto his head in the mud.

The asshole got up, shut up, looked a little embarrassed, and limped away as his infuriated friends boiled out of their wrecked home.

14.) From AgainstBelief

My first car wasn't the greatest vehicle, but I managed to scrape some money together to be able to afford it, and it was something I was proud of being able to have when I was young.

I was out driving running errands in an affluent part of the city when I came to a red light, and these two dudes around my age in some expensive car that was obviously paid for by their parents, with music blaring through their expensive subs, pull up beside me and are kind of snickering to themselves, taking a few glances at me every now and then.

Whatever, it's fine. Eventually the driver rolls down his window and asks 'Hey, bro. Wanna put that pu**y thing to the test?' And starts revving his engine. Now me being a little sh*t, I start revving my engine because I knew they weren't expecting me to do that. The two bros go 'Ohhhh' and start getting fired up.

Green light comes, and we both slam on our accelerators, except I cap out at the speed limit. The two douches speed off in a big display and head around the bend.

Now the thing about this stretch of road, is that there are usually cops set up with speed traps. Lo and behold when I come around the bend, their car is pulled over to the side with a cop parked right behind them, lights flaring.

They did not seem amused by my smile and wave as I passed by them.

15.) From captfluffybunny:

While working for the fire department, on a call for a multi vehicle rollover accident on the interstate. We got on the interstate one exit away, running into traffic, so we moved over to the emergency lane with lights and siren.

We were about half way there and a BMW pulls in front of us trying to cut through the traffic, he didn't even look.

I laid into the air horn and he came to a complete stop, with his middle finger out the window.

I'd had a lot of people do stupid things when seeing lights coming at them, but this guy was being an ass for the sake of being an ass.

He got out of his car and started screaming at us.

Meanwhile he was blocking the only fire engine and 2 ambulances available. People were really hurt half a mile away, and he was making his stand because we honked our air horn at him for blocking us.

I looked out at my mirror to see a highway patrolman running between lanes towards us..he was pissed.

BMW boy was immediately arrested, his pretty car got pushed out of the way into a ditch and he went to jail.

The people in the accident were hurt bad, and 2 cars had to be cut open to get people extricated from bent metal.

It was frustrating.

16.) From Varioushandsoaps:

It was my own karma.

I was in eighth grade. I was standing on a bench when I watched some girl fall over in the yard, started laughing and pointing and then went to lean back onto the fence that was behind the bench. Turns out it had broken off where I was standing and I fell straight through and into the mud.

17.) From TheFire_Eagle:

I'm in the NYC subway. A guy elbows me out of the way to get into the turnstile first yelling vaguely that he 'has a train to catch' (no sh*t).

Through the turnstile, turn the corner and there are a few cops set up near a folding table and he gets pulled to have his bag searched.

18.) From Chileconcaveman:

I worked at a grocery store. I was stocking Instant Noodles on a big sale display. All I had was a cheap small step 2 step stool, you know the one with the bar that runs across the top step? Reaching down to the stool from the shelf I was standing on, was about 3 feet.

I had a 60% chance my foot would land on the top bar and collapse the thing. I asked a coworker to use his shoulder as a handle as I got down. My supervisor called me a “princess” for getting assistance.

Soon after he was stocking the 2-Liter Coke bottles on a sales display. He tried to get down. He took the 40% success rate jump onto the step. Hit the top bar. The step ladder collapsed. He broke his arm and took down half of the display. I just clocked out and left before they told me to clean up the spilled soda all over the place.

19.) From nosidammadison:

I was driving home on the highway during a horrible blizzard at night. The roads were extremely slick and dangerous, I was going about 30 mph. My daughter was a newborn and it was the first time I had ever driven in the snow with her. I was nervous.

Some jerk in a huge truck is doing 65, passing everyone in the slow lane and just being really risky and ignorant to the conditions and other drivers in general. He passed me, and I was like, 'You're gonna crash bro.'

Right at that moment, the dude fishtails, loses control, and crashes into a ditch. Don't worry, I'm not a sadist, he was completely fine. I know this because I saw him emerge from the truck and do a little angry freak out dance. His truck wasn't fine.

That's what you get for endangering others during a blizzard!

20.) From DarthReeder:

Driving through Philly in standstill traffic some asshat decides to use the shoulder as a lane to 'cut' in line. The vehicle he ended up cutting off was a state trooper. An instant whoop whoop and told to pull off the highway over a loudspeaker.

I couldn't stop laughing.

21.) From cruisefromottawa:

That time I had my SHOES stolen! I was 17. Went to a party where there were kids from two different high schools. When I went inside I took off my brand new Nike Air Mada shoes that I had just bought for $140.

Hours later, when I went to leave, my shoes were gone. We had an idea of who took them (a guy from the other school) but didn’t have proof. I was so sad and so embarrassed. I had to drive home in my socks.

Long story short ... a week later, Monica (the girl who threw the party) shows up on my doorstep holding something behind her back ... turns out she went to a party and saw the guy who stole my shoes - wearing them!

When he took them off after a smoke break she snagged them! Now, standing in front of me she reveals my Nikes!!! She told me the best part was watching him look for them (just like I had) and then leave in his socks!

22.) From korthlm:

Walking down the San Antonio Riverwalk. Guy in front of us gets pooped on by a bird. Friend turns to me and says, “sucks to suck!” Friend literally gets pooped on as well, right at this moment.

23.) From Grey_Gryphon:

Asshole kid in middle school kept trying to steal my cellphone (it was a cheap flip phone, but he'd do it just to piss me off). Our school had a rule that you couldn't have your phone out in class.

Teacher left the classroom for a second to have a brief word with an administrator, jerkass kid grabbed my phone. Teacher came back in a moment later and caught him red- handed with (my) phone out. She wouldn't believe it wasn't his phone. He got detention.

24.) From N3MO_:

My dog tried to eat my sushi while I was away from the table for a second. I came back to missing wasabi and a disgusted-looking dog

25.) From [deleted]:

In the UK, kids wear blazers and ties to school and a common bullying tactic that jerks used was to run up to kids, pull their ties so they get really tightly knotted.

On the bus home, the bus was really full, and I was standing in front of one such bully. He grabbed my tie JUST as the bus had to break sharply. He lost his footing and the only thing keeping him upright was the fact that he was holding my tie.

He had grabbed the wrong bit, it wasn't knotted, I simply untied it, he fell on his bum. That was the last time I was knotted.