I’ll be flying cross-country next week, so you can bet your back-hair that this story caught my attention:
The fight started when the male passenger, seated in a middle seat of row 12, used the Knee Defender to stop the woman in front of him from reclining while he was on his laptop, according to a law enforcement official…
Why do I keep reading about unimportant things like Climate Change and not this? The Knee Defender is the ultimate in Sit Your Ground and it only costs $22. It reflects that take-matters-into-your-own-hands spirit exemplified by American revolutionaries kicking British butt at Bunker Hill. It’s totally American.
But the woman wishing to recline failed to see this. So she threw water on the guy behind her. The flight attendant tried to get the guy to remove his lockable Freedom Clamps, but she didn’t have much leverage.
“What are you gonna do?” the guy probably reasoned, “withhold my bag of peanuts?”
The plane rerouted, landed, and the combatants were arrested. The remaining passengers got to their destination a mere 1hr, 40 minutes later, a small price to pay for preserving freedom. And the guy? He’s facing a $25,000 fine for an incident provoked by his $22 purchase. That kind of math is totally American.
But getting serious for a moment, these diversions are hugely expensive to airlines and inconvenient to passengers. So here’s a constructive idea — why don’t airlines keep to the original flight plan and just make people like Laptop-Guy sit in a bathroom for the remainder of the flight. Once enough people show up, Laptop-Guy will learn just how valuable his original space was, regardless of its miniscule size.
This leads to two very important conclusions:
1) Since most airlines ban the Knee Defender, you need to travel with Super-Glu.
2) Airlines need to take note of this incident and stop serving water.
You’ve totally inspired me to write about this. I’ll link to your piece when I do.
Maybe this would be a bad time to point out to the guy that the Americans lost the Battle of Bunker Hill …
As someone who gets a lot of water thrown at him, I feel for the poor guy. Wait a min…is this what empathy is?
Geez, all this fighting on planes! I’ve given up on American airline companies. I only fly Malaysian now. I truly never know when I’ll be home again.
Thanks for the laugh.
I agree with Kathy. Laptop guy was justified. I need to get me a Knee Defender.
Where was the lap defender when I needed it commuting upstate for 20 years? I spent 20 years with the seat in front of me under my nose simply because the person felt entitled to push it back all the way. I won all the fights without a scratch and the bus never was diverted.
Busses are a bit different. People expect violence. Glad to see you came out on top. The votes here are strongly in Laptop Guy’s favor. Might be time to legalize the Defender.
I’m with Laptop Guy. Riding in coach is cramped enough without having someone in front of you minimizing your space even more.
And 3) All airlines should restore the seating dimensions to accommodate the 21st Century Human, instead of the current trend of setting it for the 3 million year old Australopithecus body. Haven’t seen much of him lately.
I think the last one said “yeah, I can perform the task of opening the emergency door” while in-flight. He got sucked out.