When a traveller moved a seat over from his wife on the plane, he wasn't expecting to be chastised for it by a fellow passenger. Photo / 123rf
When a traveller moved a seat over from his wife on the plane, he wasn't expecting to be chastised for it by a fellow passenger. Photo / 123rf
A woman who tried to escape a crying baby on a plane by moving seats then went on to scold a fellow passenger for not moving back to his original seat, leaving the internet divided over whether he should’ve moved or whether the woman could’ve taken a better approach.
A plane passenger has sparked a heated debate after refusing to move seats for a woman trying to escape a crying baby, according to a viral Reddit thread posted this week.
The anonymous 34-year-old man, traveling with his wife, 36, from Dublin to Washington DC, was initially assigned a window and middle seat in economy class. However, when no one claimed the aisle seat in their row, the man moved over for more space, reported People.
Before the incident, the flight attendants did not ask for the man to move to their original seat, and as per the user, they were “amazing” and even gave extra drinks.
Four and a half hours hours into the eight-hour flight, a random passenger across the aisle approached the couple with her friend from the back of the plane.
According to the author of the post, the woman rudely announced that her friend, who was trying to get away from a crying baby at her original seat, would now be taking the middle seat since it was free.
“She did not ask - she told us this was happening,” he wrote.
Confused, the man called over the flight attendant for assistance, who explained to both that the woman asking to change seats needed to find an available aisle spot that didn’t “disrupt anyone’s seating arrangements.”
This caused an even bigger scene, since the man shared that the woman started “b****ing about how I was assigned the middle but then moved to the aisle before takeoff, so I shouldn’t even have that aisle seat.”
The two women disappeared for a few minutes to ask another flight attendant about the situation, but upon returning to her seat, she called the man a “f***ing a**hole” and informed him that “her friend would not be sitting there - not because she was not allowed to, but because I was so incredibly rude.”
“The only thing I did this entire time was ask to talk to the flight attendant. I did not say anything else to this woman, though I would have liked to.”
Reddit users were quick to give their opinion, with people debating whether he really was “an a**hole” for refusing to give up the empty seat in his row.
Some took the man’s side, stating that calling the flight attendant was the right way to resolve the situation.
One user wrote, “Absolutely, getting the FA involved was the right move. Their reaction was uncalled for.”
Others ridiculed the attitude of the woman who asked, with comments like, “wanted to get away from a crybaby just to become a crybaby”, while some people dubbed him “entitled”.
A user sarcastically commented on his hypocrisy by commenting, “You shouldn’t be able to move seats!!!!!! But I should!”
One user commented, “Why would they need to ask since it wasn’t technically your seat to have to agree to give up. You paid for 2 seats and had 2 seats. That seat was empty and no longer yours. So taking it wasn’t messing with your seating arrangement.”
Travel expert, Nicole Campoy Jackson, said the right thing to do is involve the flight attendants. Photo / 123rf
Nicole Campoy Jackson, a travel expert, writer, and adviser for Fora Travel, weighed in the debate and sided with the anonymous poster.
She told People that involving the flight attendant was most definitely “the right move.”
“I am always in the camp of getting a flight attendant involved for sticky in-flight situations,” she said.
“Tensions run high when we’re traveling plus they would know, for example, if there was another aisle seat or another solution to this problem. They have more context than we, the passengers, do.”
Although Jackson agrees that the man isn’t “entitled to the unoccupied aisle next to him,” she still agreed with the decision as “the other passenger isn’t entitled to move because of an inconvenience at her seat” either.
“Unlike moving to accommodate someone while you’re still on the ground, when you’re more than halfway through the flight and then asked to move? That is disruptive,” Jackson continued. “I understand why he would have been resistant to the idea.”
She also agrees that a different approach and attitude could’ve easily resolved the issue. “The best way to approach this situation would have been to walk over to the man and explain, ‘I’ve been having a difficult flight because of the baby next to me. I know this aisle seat was open before we took off, would it be okay for me to sit here for the rest of the flight?’”
“Switching seats does always boil down to flexibility, understanding, and kindness of our fellow passengers,” she added.
