'AITA for making a woman move because my kid was kicking her seat on the plane?'
"AITA for making a woman move because my kid was kicking her seat on the plane?"
I got on a 3 hr flight with my wife and 1 year old. He is in the window in his car seat and the row in front is empty. A few rows up there are four of the five seats available. This is for reference, the flight was only 70% full.
My child likes to reach out and touch his feet to the chair in front so we were relieved that we didn't have to spend the entire flight fighting his legs off the seat in front. There's nothing worse than sitting in front of someone smashing your seat from behind the whole time.
The doors close and a woman from the back of the plane decided to come up and take the window seat in front of my kid. Then starts the hour plus struggle of fighting legs off of the seat, intermixed with him being upset we were trying to pin his legs down. We were just hoping to get him to sleep so everyone could get some rest.
The woman started looking back huffing every time her seat was nudged even before take off. Right after take off she fully reclined putting the seat back into the lap of my kid and looks like she's trying to sleep.
After more looks and comments about controlling my kid I asked her if she'd be willing to move over to one of the other empty seats in the row where she could fully recline and I assured her she wouldn't be bothered. I explained how the airline dictated my kid had to be in the window seat due to his car seat otherwise I'd have moved him.
She escalated and eventually called the flight attendant. The flight attendant started lecturing me about getting my kid to stop touching her seat. Warranted, yes, but as any parent knows, no matter what you do, it's not enough.
Anyway finally I had enough and told the flight attendant that the woman wasn't in her assigned seat and that the situation would be resolved if she had to move back to her assigned seat. To diffuse the situation the flight attendant made her go back to her middle seat in the back of the plane, not only pissing her off but also the other two innocent people she was shoved between.
I was at my wits' end by the time it was all resolved because nothing I did was working to make it an amicable resolution. In the end as she huffed her way passed us I quipped 'have fun in the back'.
My friend who doesn't have kids said I was an a**hole by asking the flight attendant to put her back where she came from and for the comment at the end. I felt like I tried my best and gave her other options in the empty row and in the end her self entitlement lead to an uncomfy flight. AITA?
Here's what people had to say to OP:
crazymaan92 writes:
ESH. Why she thought it was a good idea to call the flight attendant not in her right seat is beyond me. This is like when a burglar gets robbed, lol. You can't call the cops for that lol. However, you have to keep your kid from kicking seats and the fact you thought it was cool to gloat when your kid likes to kick seats is just not the proper thing to do.
Kla1996 says:
INFO: what was your plan if the plane had been full? ESH but leaning towards YTA. She’s only partially the a**hole because she wasn’t in her assigned seat. But what if someone had been assigned to that seat?
BFOTmt OP responded:
We had already been on one flight and he was great. I think the second pushed him too far and the plane was smaller. My plan was to get up with him and walk him around if i could. He was showing signs of going to sleep so we thought we could get him out. Irony being he did sleep soon after the seat moving happened and he was out the rest of the flight.
Corpuscular_Ocelot says:
Your kid kicking a seat isn't OK, even if no one is in it. It is loud and annoying to other passengers. YTA all the way.
BFOTmt OP says:
He was putting his feet up on the seat not full blown kicking. I assure you no one else knew
1962Michael says:
ESH. She should have moved to another empty seat instead of involving the flight attendant. People can move to empty seats but if there's an issue your boarding pass with the seat assignment is the rule the FA is going to follow. She was unreasonable but your comment and your apparent glee at getting her moved makes you AH as well.
BFOTmt OP responded:
Ill accept my comment was being an a**hole. I wouldn't call it glee, more exasperation which was wrongly misdirected.
YTA, jesus. Your kid was f**$ing with her, and when you come to a resolution you taunt her for it? Ultimately, I was 100% with you until you taunted her.
BFOTmt OP responded:
I'll own that. It was a d*$@ move.
Writer-Amazing says:
I never had issues with my kid kicking people or causing issues. I would purposely exercise them before a flight and have plenty of distractions. The issues here are due to poor planning and poor parenting.
She CHOSE to sit there. She could've picked any one of the available seats but Nooooooo