Originally Posted by
rbwpi
Observed and overheard the following on a flight. A parent with a lap child was seated in the window seat and a passenger in the same row in the aisle seat while the middle seat was empty. Shortly after take off the parent asked the other passenger, who was sprawled out taking up part of the middle seat, to move so that the child could be placed in the middle seat. The aisle seat passenger declined stating to the effect that the empty middle seat was a community/common area and that the parent didn't have the right to sole use of it and should have bought a ticket for the child if it was important for the child to have their own seat. The parent didn't pursue the matter after the response.
What's your thoughts on how the aisle seat passenger handled this?
Aisle pax was wrong on several levels. If there is any empty seat on a plane, it doesn't become "community/common area" just because someone wants it. By that logic, if the seat in front of me was empty, I could dump my coat, bag, etc. in it because it was fair game.
There's also the issue that airlines often deliberately seat pax w/ lap children next to empty seats
as a courtesy to the parent and often tell parents with lap children that they will be able to use the empty seat for their child. Did anybody tell that to the aisle pax? "Dear Aisle Pax, we've left this seat empty for your comfort today."
So what if aisle pax spent weeks staring at the online seating charts just to nab a row with an empty middle? Doesn't belong to him/her, and may have been offered to the parent by an authorized employee of the airline.
Would be curious to know the age of such an entitled pax.