

Airplane Seat Swapping, Once a Gentle Sport, Turns Rough-And-Tumble - robbiet480
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/14/business/airplane-seat-swapping-once-a-gentle-sport-turns-rough-and-tumble.html

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veidr
What a weird article. I get that airlines are sleazy and their shitty systems
are causing more people to not be able to to choose a seat in advance.

But do people really commonly _refuse_ to move out of somebody else's seat? I
fly a couple times every month, and while I have found people sitting in my
assigned seat from time to time, I have never had anybody actually _refuse_ to
move once I politely point this out and show them my ticket stub.

Is this really a thing?

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jawngee
I've had it happen to me twice in the last year. One wasn't even a refusal,
instead a simple dismissive hand waving gesture. I didn't relent and
eventually got my seat, but had to have flight attendants intervene.

It's kind of astonishing to experience, to be honest. To witness someone
committing to a thought process that is completely unfathomable to you.

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scorpioxy
I've had that happen to me a couple of times too. One of the most entertaining
times was when someone refused to move from my window seat was because they
wanted to "look out from the window". After I showed her my ticket stub, she
just looked at me blankly. Then I explained to her that she is sitting in the
wrong seat to which she replied that she doesn't understand.

I did relent because the flight attendant asked me nicely if I mind just
taking the middle seat. It was the first time I got a window seat that wasn't
over the wing!

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veidr
These responses are enough anecdata[1] to convince me that this is a real
thing.

I would guess that it is probably gradual adaptation to flight attendants not
wanting to properly step in and deal with enforcing the rules, thereby
empowering the most obnoxious/rude/sociopathic passenger to "win".

Now I kind of hope it happens to me sometime... sounds like a vaguely
interesting problem to deal with.

[1]: the _best_ kind of data!!

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smokey_the_bear
I never used to care much which seat I got on a plane. But now that I'm flying
with my husband and children, I find it stressful that I can't usually get us
seats together in advance. They've always accommodated us at the actual
airport checkin so far, but it does add a big worry to the travel day.

Solo travelers prefer to choose a seat in an empty row, but the plane is going
to be full anyway. It's just an inefficient system.

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rhizome
I'm so glad I live in an area where I almost never have to fly anywhere, I can
think of no reason ever to give an airline any money except in an emergency.

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EliRivers
(Almost) everyone lives in an area where they almost never have to fly. There
are very few people who need to fire up the helicopter to pick up some milk.

