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This is the flight rule you didn’t know you were breaking

If you dare to press that little button you’re a disrespectful jerk, according to an incensed travel writer. But is this really a rule we shouldn’t break?

Kate SchneiderKate Schneider
@SchneiderK
8 min read
April 1, 2019 - 3:04PM
The weirdest stuff you can take on a plane

The engines roar as our speed picks up, and the nose of the plane tips up as we lift off the runway and soar into the sky.

Eventually, we level out, and after cruising for a while, the illuminated seatbelt sign above our heads switches off. Passengers start making adjustments — some repack items from their bags, others meander down the aisle and a few chatter.

At this point, many of us reach over and press the little button that reclines our seats, grateful to no longer be forced bolt upright. However, this simple act of comfort that many of us do automatically could infuriate those seated behind and unknowingly propel us to the status of the “worst flyers ever”.

That’s according to an article published on popular American outdoors and travel magazine Outside Online, which slammed passengers who dare to recline their seats as disrespectful jerks and called for an immediate end to the practice.

The eyebrow-raising piece, which has received a mixed reaction on social media, begins with a fairly understandable plea about taking care when reclining your seat, but as the writer steamed ahead, her argument derailed.

“There’s one thing I hate about flying, and it’s not the overpriced tickets or the baby crying three rows ahead of me in economy class. It’s the people who recline their seats with total disregard for the person behind them,” she said.

I agree that if you’re going to lean back, you should proceed in such a way as to make the motion as smooth as possible. Also, a quick glance behind to ascertain the situation of the person behind is often a good idea. Are they mid-meal, or do they have a drink or laptop balanced on their tray? Do they have long legs that are already painfully crammed into the back of your seat? Or a baby or child on their lap? In these cases you may decide against reclining, wait, or gently move to a lesser incline.

Please do remember that if it’s meal time, you must be upright. Keep in mind some people such as vegetarians or those with gluten-free options usually get their meal earlier — or later — than the majority of the plane, so the person behind you could be munching away when you least expect it.

If you recline, apparently you’re a disrespectful jerk.
If you recline, apparently you’re a disrespectful jerk.

OK, fairly logical so far. But next came this:

“Economy-class members who recline their seats are the worst,” the author declared.

“ … The thing is, you know you suck when you hit that recline button, but just in case you truly are ignorant, hear this: your actions have direct consequences for the people around you — any space you take is taken from someone else. The person behind you deserves the same respect you give the person in front of and beside you by not kicking their seat or elbowing them over the armrest.”

Hold on to your armrests folks, I bet you never considered the possibility you’re actually the devil incarnate for daring to press that little button to your side. You know, the one built in as a basic function of your seat.

First, Outside Online, you are not the plane police. Second, you’re plane wrong.

Newsflash, our decision about reclining does not — and should not — revolve entirely around the passenger behind us. It’s not all about you. Perhaps those who call for an end to reclining seats are the ones who may need to look outside their selves and consider the plethora of reasons a person may not enjoy sitting at a 90-degree angle.

The writer continues: “Let’s get real. Those extra three degrees of slope on your reclined seat back aren’t going to make you more comfortable. Your leg room isn’t magically larger. All you’re doing is encroaching upon the person behind you …”

You don’t know another person’s story. Sure, that boisterous middle-aged woman with the rosy cheeks and wiry hair may seem fine, but I bet you don’t know about the debilitating pain she’s been left in from a shocking car accident, and the agony of sitting upright on a plane is eased slightly by those precious few centimetres of recline.

You don’t know about the 20-year-old man who has just undergone an emergency appendectomy overseas, making sitting bolt upright so excruciating he is on the verge of fainting or vomiting.

It’s a simple act that most people do without hesitation, but it turns out it could be infuriating your fellow passengers.
It’s a simple act that most people do without hesitation, but it turns out it could be infuriating your fellow passengers.

Now let’s consider those who lean their seat back for reasons other than pain; perhaps it makes that young woman more comfortable in general. Perhaps she is a nervous flyer, and it eases her anxiety a touch. Maybe she’s an exhausted mother who needs a little more room as she feeds her baby in her lap. Or could it be that someone in front of her has reclined their seat, lessening her space, and she’s simply evening things out.

Remember, people travel for all sorts of reasons, not everyone is on holiday. There are also bound to be passengers on-board who are grieving the loss of a beloved family member and are understandably distracted, so they haven’t spared a moment to think about how the stranger behind them feels about them leaning back. Maybe they are simply jet-lagged. It may have never even occurred to them it’s an issue, and you know what, it shouldn’t be!

So come on, give us all a break. Don’t criticise until you’ve walked a mile in someone else’s shoes. Besides, there’s a genius solution to this “problem-that’s-not-really-a-problem-but-is-merely-a-whinge”: That little button is on every seat. You can press yours and magically you have the same amount of room again. Nobody “stole” anything from you.

Remember, due to the anatomy of the plane, reclining has a domino effect. One person reclines, the next person behind them reclines and recovers the same amount of room back and so on. So unless the recline functions are removed altogether, that’s just the way things are; if the person in front you reclines, you also can recline.

As the Outside Online article continued, the writer attempted to set a rule around the timing of reclining, which is flawed.

She wrote: “Let me be clear: reclining is perfectly acceptable on flights longer than, say, four or five hours, especially if it’s an overnighter. If you are flying long enough to need real sleep, recline away. But if you’re reclining your seat on a two-hour, midday puddle jump, I hope you miss your connection and get stuck at LaGuardia Airport without even an $8 coffee to comfort you.”

Right, so essentially those who recline deserve to suffer for making the person behind them suffer because that was their goal, to make someone else miserable? Wrong again. The thing is, you don’t know how long that person has been in transit; this flight may be three hours long, but they could have just endured a marathon 15 hours in the sky on their previous connection. Perhaps they were then stuck in the airport for another several hours before finally making it on-board your flight. They could simply be exhausted or uncomfortable.

If you recline, are you really the ‘worst flyer ever’.
If you recline, are you really the ‘worst flyer ever’.

The writer then suggests the problem could be solved by having reclining passengers pay more to sit at the pointy end of the plane: “So if you want to lounge back and make life a little bit worse in an already untenable situation, I suggest you get rich, leave us common folk behind, and live it up in business class.”

Ah-hem, I do believe you’ve missed the point here. If you want more room and can’t handle the simple act of someone using a basic function of their seat, perhaps you should ensure you book an exit row seat or land yourself in the economy plus or business sections. If something like this infuriates you so much, maybe you should reconsider your means of transport altogether.

Even better, some airlines such as British Airways and Ryanair are ditching the recline function altogether. You can go fly with them.

Besides, what is this magical “get rich” trick anyway? Do share.

Don’t get me wrong, I do feel for tall flyers whose legs are squished into the seat in front of them. But blame the airlines, not your fellow flyers. It’s not their fault carriers are cost-cutting to such an extent comfort is flying out the window. We all know that seats are shrinking while people are expanding, and flight duration is also increasing. In that equation, everyone’s comfort is sacrificed.

By the way, if you’re interested to see how Australian airlines size up, comparison site Finder.com.au has released an informative chart. Seat pitch — the distance from the back of your seat to the back of the seat in front of you — is a crucial factor and varies from around 78 centimetres on Qantas and Virgin to as low as 71cm on Jetstar.

Unfortunately, there’s little hope of this changing anytime soon. The bottom line is the more seats airlines can cram on-board, the more revenue they make and the cheaper everyone’s plane ticket will be. What’s more, the US Federal Aviation Administration, of whose standards Australia often follows, has recently declined to put a stop to the squeeze, rejecting a proposed rule that would have set a minimum seat size for planes because shrinking seats “do not impact consumer safety”.

Doing this simple thing could make you the world's worst flyer.
Doing this simple thing could make you the world's worst flyer.

So let’s try to be understanding of everyone’s unique situation in life and remember reclining passengers aren’t hoping to make a trying trip even worse for the person behind. We are just trying to survive.

Common courtesy and ensuring the seat is eased back gently when reclining — during appropriate times — is all that’s required. If an issue arises, try to resolve it amicably or seek the help of a flight attendant. It’s ridiculous people fly into such a rage over these things they end up embroiled in mid-air fistfights.

Such incidents happen too often these days; earlier this month a Hawaiian Airlines flight was forced to turn back after an altercation between two passengers, sparked when one bumped another while reclining a seat and culminating in yelling, swearing and one charging at the other before a crew member tried to step in and restrain them.

Whatever happened to flight or fight, anyway? Let’s keep it to one or the other, let them not intermingle. And please don’t even think about using one of those ridiculous Knee Defender gadgets that lock the seat in front of you so it can’t recline. That would undoubtedly propel you to the status of “the worst”.

Let’s conclude with some viewpoints from fellow “recliners” posted on Twitter.

Oh, and if you want to see what travellers acting badly really looks like, visit Passenger Shaming. That should put things into perspective.

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Original URL: https://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-advice/flights/this-is-the-flight-rule-you-didnt-know-you-were-breaking/news-story/f2756b7536f3e8c4010df5295c711160