I am in favor of removing the seatbacks entirely and making all the seats stools. :p

I agree! Take all the seats out and give everyone balance balls so you can work on your abs while you fly. :D

or make everyone stand the whole flight,

I always put my seat back, but I try to do so in a pleasant and courteous manner. (read: slowly)

I figure, if whomever is behind me really doesn't want my seat back, they can pickup a pair of Knee Defenders for 15 bucks and I'll be thwarted in my evil plan to destroy peoples knees.

I'll also fully endorse the stool options as proposed by BNA_flyer with a slight exception: If you whine about your stool, the FA gets to take the seat-top off and you must spend the remainder of your flight sitting on the pole.

-SF

Every (wo)man for himself/herself.

Rows on the left, no recline; rows on the right, recline. Everyone's almost happy. (Maybe switch every month for sunrise/sunset purposes)

it has been while since I have flown in Y so I really do not care about what happens back there :p

I concur. Excluding F & J, of course.

Have you ever been in Y on the domestic tail-end of a long int'l set of flights and wanted to sleep? If yes, did you really want to sit completely upright?

I'm going to recline my seat if I so choose, regardless of what anyone else on that flight does.

If you don't like it, tough. You should have purchased a seat in F or J if the seat recline in Y is just too overwhelming for you.

In fact, there are some good shrinks who might be able to help you with your problem as well. :D

How about stationary bikes connected to an auxiliary propeller in back to help save fuel.

What the "no recline" crowd has never understood is the seats are designed to be reclined. The upright position is basically designed as a brace position to give you the best chance of surviving a crash. Somehow, that position doesn't exactly bring comfort to mind, which is why the recline feature was designed into the seat.

I always thought it was so you can get out in case of an emergency. When all the seats are reclined it makes me a contortionist to get out of my row.

...counting the minutes for the ne- I mean, first "kids annoy me" thread...:p

Yeah, that's a large part of the survivability requirements (called "crashworthiness"). Basically the seats have to be designed in such a way to not only allow you to survive impact, but also be able to evacuate quickly. Comfort is not part of the "upright and locked" position.

the seats may be made to recline, but the space inbetween them wasn't designed as adequate