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Comment by crazypyro | Hacker News Reader

The reclining feature doesn't go "into" your lap. No need for a ridiculous hyperbole. Either way, the person paid for that seat and if the airlines choose to put in a reclining feature, your anger should be directed at them and not attempting to harass the person merely trying to use the seat they paid for.

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> The reclining feature doesn't go into your lap.

As a tall person, especially on regional jets: yes, yes it does.

Okay, if that's how you feel, there are plenty of options. Choose a different airline, take your chances that someone reclines in their seat, sit in the front row, check in earlier or pay more money. Those are all valid options.

The idea that you somehow control the right of the person in front of you to recline (a right which they actually paid money to use) is rather selfish and not a valid option.

The idea that someone gets to invade my personal space is rather selfish and not a valid option. If I don't want you imposing on me, then I will make sure that damn well doesn't happen.

Sorry, it's not your personal space. The airline you purchased a ticket on sold that space to the passenger in front of you. Don't like it? There are plenty of other options in which you can expend your energy/time/money to get a seat that suits your comfort. You don't have the right to take away what the person in front of you bought from the airline. It is stealing, plain and simple. They may choose to donate it to you if you persist, but it's their prerogative.

If you are in my fucking lap, it is my personal space. They don't have a fucking right to sit in my space and cause me suffering for a price tag. It is not stealing you fucking dense jackass.

There's stealing involved, but it's the airline that committed it. They sold the right to recline to the person in front of 67726e, and the right to be in the same space to 67726e. The right to occupy the same space was sold twice to different people, and at least one was a fraudulent sale.

You seem to be too quick to label the person in front of you 'selfish' when it is you who expects him to give up his comfort he paid for so that you can enjoy one that you did not pay for. He has no such obligations. I think someone else is being a selfish freeloader here.

Inside an aircraft, space is for sale, if you need more, pay for it, or rail against airlines to provide you better service. The person in front of you is simply collecting what he/she paid for.

To add, I'm personally not bothered by it. I find it impossible to work or sleep on flights and have chalked off time spent on airliners as a (relatively) short period of being mildly uncomfortable for the purpose of getting somewhere quickly.

> The reclining feature doesn't go "into" your lap.

No, it tends to go into my patellar tendon. I can move my knee out of the way with just a little bit of warning, but slamming back your seat into my knees is not exactly a friendly thing to do.

Actually, I'm pretty tall. It is at the least awkward, if not very uncomfortable for someone to recline. It depends on the plane, but those interstate mosquitoes you get on flights between small cities are the absolute worst.

I know it's en vogue to treat everything as an economic exercise to show off that business course you took for your undergrad, but some things are really a matter of being a decent person. I've asked people to please not recline when it's a problem. Usually people are cool with it on the short flights where it really is a problem. Of course you sometimes get an indignant person who needs their 30 minutes of "relaxation" and that's when I push them up. If they prioritize their comfort over mine, why shouldn't I do the same.

Okay, in the same vein, maybe that person isn't a decent person. You still don't have the right to force them to not recline and calling them "indignant" shows the same kind of attitude, albeit a lesser scale, that caused the Newerk-Denver incident.

If I politely ask you to not cause me discomfort and you do not comply, that is a problem. If you think you get to cause other people suffering for a dollar, you are a fucked person.

Your anger is completely misguided. You should be either mad at the airline for selling you something that didn't suit your needs or mad at yourself for purchasing a product that didn't suit your needs. It's like purchasing the wrong size suit and going to the store and bitching at them to give you some more fabric so you can be comfortable in your too small suit. It's utterly inane.

Because you have no right to do so, you're just being a jerk. If it's such a problem for you, buy 2 seats on every flight so you can ensure the seat in front of you is empty.

They'll fill the seat anyway once you haven't checked in.

So sometimes you get a person who won't let you prioritize your comfort over theirs, and in those cases you push them up forcing them to accommodate you. You don't outline anytime where it is not a problem for you, or any time you let the other person recline.

Now maybe you just omitted these cases, but the way you are explaining it you sound like the unreasonable person who always has to have their way.

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