Galley Gossip: Middle Seat Etiquette {Gadling}

Oct 20th 2008 8:12PM It's stories like these that fill me with air rage - and I've experienced the gamut of rude behavior on planes. I care much more about having legroom on a 9 hour flight than I do about having personal TV entertainment in the seatback - yet the electronics for said entertainment take up all the underseat legroom in so many seats these days. The only time the middle seat seems bearable is when I'm sitting next to a family member on one or both sides.

My worst middle story: middle seat, both armrests commandeered by the requisite self-important businessmen, and the seat in front of me reclined. I had nowhere to go but back, so I reclined my seat, slowly and carefully. The woman behind me PUNCHED my seatback so hard that I flew forward and hit my head on the seat in front of me, whose occupant turned around and glared at me as if I were to blame. I fly well over 100,000 miles a year and am overly courteous (I'm Canadian) but it does absolutely no good at all. I am loathe to fly any airline on which I haven't earned elite status for this reason. Where do people get the idea that they're entitled to everyone else's space as well as their own?