In September 1783, a unique event in the history of mankind happened – for the first time, an air flight took place without a single quarrel between passengers. Perhaps this happened because the basket of the Montgolfier brothers’ first balloon contained only a sheep, a chicken and a duck. The next flight took place with people, and since then, passenger dramas have become an almost sacred aerial tradition.

Passengers confront flight attendants and fight with each other, trying to trick others into getting a more comfortable seat on the plane. And then, after landing, when the ardor and enthusiasm subsides, people just wonder how wrong they were in general. Like in this story from the user u/dankyou420.

The author of the post once had a flight home with a budget airline and was issued a $40 upgrade for the front row

Image credits: Aero Icarus (not the actual photo)

When the guy stepped onto the plane, he saw a middle-aged couple there with the wife sitting in his booked middle seat

Image credits: dankyou420

Image credits: airbusky (not the actual photo)

Image credits: dankyou420

The spouses offered the author to exchange seats but he was adamant and even put on a show to express his indignation

Image credits: Michael Coghlan (not the actual photo)

Image credits: dankyou420

The spouses were a bit confused – so the author started pondering whether he did something wrong, after landing

Image credits: Natã Romualdo (not the actual photo)

Image credits: dankyou420

However, the man just thought his behavior was justified by the couple’s alleged ‘trickery’ against him

So, the Original Poster (OP) tells how he was flying home in economy class one day, and during check-in, he saw that there was a $40 upgrade to a front row seat. No, it wasn’t first class – the airline was budget, so there was some extra leg room. There was still an opportunity to get an average place, so our hero agreed and issued the upgrade.

When the man stepped onto the plane, he noticed that a middle aged couple was already sitting in his row, with the husband sitting on the aisle, and the wife comfortably sitting nearby, in the very seat that the author of the post had just booked. And then the OP, in his own words, suspected the spouses of trickery – they, as he decided, specially issued an upgrade in the expectation that the middle seat would remain free. But it was not there – the author decided to act on principle.

The couple offered him a place at the window, but the man was indignant and said that he would either sit on the aisle or call the flight attendant and demand his rightful seat. The neighbors were upset by such principledness on the OP’s part, but there was nothing left for them to do. What’s more, when the author put his bags in the overhead bin a couple aisles down, he decided to put on another little show…

The author of the post returned and said that he agreed to sit by the window. The couple looked confused and said it was fine. Then the OP put his headphones on, and the rest of the flight was spent working on his laptop. True, after landing, when the original poster calmed down a little, he still wondered how nice and ethically he acted in this particular situation.

Image credits:  Pixabay (not the actual photo)

Recently, many sources have appeared talking about the rules of plane etiquette, but the truth is that there are no absolutely well-established and strict rules of what is ethical to do on an airplane and what is not. At least as far as seat exchanges are concerned. “I know the crew prefers when passengers take their assigned seats upon boarding an aircraft,” Anaïs Monique, a former flight attendant, writes in her column on Insider.

“After all, if passengers swap seats without the crew’s knowledge, it can complicate what we understand about our cabin – for example, a flight crew’s manifest includes essential information associated with each seat number like severe allergies, meal allocations, and flight connections,” Anaïs Monique states.

Opinions were also divided about how the OP’s intentional and ostentatious adherence to principles was actually justified. On the one hand, commenters aptly wrote that the author of the post paid for a specific place, and had the right to demand that particular seat. On the other hand, it is obvious that the neighbors did not aggravate the conflict and tried their best to smooth the situation. Therefore, like someone in the comments wrote, “I don’t think they had bad intentions in asking you to take the window seat.” And what do you think, our dear readers?

People in the comments were in fact very divided, while some of the folks just thought the spouses didn’t have any bad intentions

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