General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Airplane Etiquette [View all]lostnfound
(16,178 posts)Fine lines.
I dont blame you for resenting what was done to you. Not only were you stuck in a middle seat but you were stuck judging a situation with incomplete information. There are a tiny handful of circumstances in which you might have felt it was an honorable sacrifice. For example, a parent with a disabled child or for the sake of reuniting some one with dementia with their caregiver.
Ablehodied adults doing it for the own comfort or convenience are beyond selfish. I have asked for trades myself on occasion, but only if the seat I was giving away was at least as good as the one I was getting an aisle for an aisle, or taking a middle in exchange for a window seat.
Once I traded away my first class seat to a colleague who was having back spasms, and spent a blissful few hours crammed in the worst middle seat on the plane. I say blissful because it happened to be a joy to sacrifice something special for this person that I secretly adored in which case it genuinely is better to give than receive and I spent the flight writing a poem called Skywriter about the pleasure of it. Love conquers all.
There have been times in my life when, in a feeling of religious practice and spirituality, such sacrifice might have felt like a happy prayer, or an experiment in charity, for the sake of spreading joy to a fellow human being.
Your irritation and resentment at being asked is completely valid, however. Giving up the seat freely is one thing, being coerced into it by a selfish person is another thing entirely.