‘I demand to be put in a seat that reclines!’ Man Learns Too Late That Delaying A Flight Will Not Get Him His Way

Unless you have the money to fly first or business class, you probably go into long flights relegated to coach realizing it’s not going to be the most comfortable few hours of your life.

At 6’3, this man knows that for sure, and was resigned to suffering an extremely long 16 hours to Singapore.

A few years ago I was on a flight from LA to Singapore (takes 16+ hours). I’m a tall dude – around 6’3″ (~190cm) – so I don’t fit very well in economy class seats.

On most planes my knees are often very close or right up against the seat in front of me. This makes it impossible for the person in front of me to recline their seat, which usually isn’t a problem once the person in front of me sees how cramped I am in those tiny seats.

16 hours that would have been made even longer by the man in front of him demanding to be able to recline his seat.

However for this particular flight, the man in front of me was not having it. He tried to recline his seat, but couldn’t because my legs were there.

He turns around and sees what’s happening and asks me something along the lines of, “Do you mind letting me put my seat back?”

OP told him he literally couldn’t move his knees, sorry, but the man just kept laying back into his legs while screaming for the flight attendant.

At this point he starts to get angry and just starts pushing as hard as he can back on his seat. Needless to say, this was not particularly pleasant for me. I ask him to please stop, and he says, “I’ll stop when I can put my seat back.”

I decide I’ll just wait him out; he’ll eventually get tired. After about 10-15 minutes of this, he calls a flight attendant over and proceeds to demand a new seat.

She couldn’t placate him, as what he wanted was a new seat but every coach seat was full, so he demanded to see the pilot.

The flight attendant tells him there are no available seats and he will have to deal with it. He demands to speak to the pilot.

The co-pilot came back and they went through the same argument, until finally the co-pilot offered a business class seat.

So the flight attendant goes up front to talk to the cockpit. Keep in mind that throughout this he is still pressing with all his might against my knees, with only short breaks to yell at the flight attendant.

After a couple of minutes, the co-pilot (he wanted to speak to the pilot and wan’t happy about this) comes back and tries to explain to the man that he can’t change seats because there are no other coach seats free.

The man continues to demand a seat that is able to recline, give me an upgrade, this is unacceptable, making a scene etc.

The co-pilot finally gives in and says while looking at the man, “Sir, would you like to sit up in business class?”

But for OP, not the instigator.

The man stands up and mutters something similar to, “F**king finally.”

To which the co-pilot responds, “Sir, sit down. I wasn’t talking to you.” He turns to me and repeats, “How would you like a seat in business class?”

I have, to this day, never seen someone as furious as the man as I walked past him to my new business class seat (with free drinks).

Has Reddit ever heard of something like this? Let’s see!

The top commenter wondered if they high-fived on the way to business class.

Other tall dudes were living vicariously.

This tall person said they would not have been so kind.

This commenter says the guy is lucky he didn’t get arrested upon landing.

They can’t believe he really bothered the pilot with this.

Sometimes justice is really sweet.

Luckily for OP’s knees, this time it was also relatively swift.