Temper Tantrums in the Air May Be Good For All Of Us

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Three times makes it a trend!

Amy Fine wanted to nap on Delta flight 2370, from New York to Palm Beach, Fla., so she laid her head on the tray table. The passenger in front of her wanted to relax with some knitting. She reclined her seat — smacking Fine’s head and sparking an emotional explosion.

The resulting screaming match caused an unscheduled landing in Jacksonville, Fla., the third diversion in nine days caused by passenger fights over shrinking legroom.

My position is that the passengers getting into these fights are doing us all a favor. If this happens a few more times, nobody will ever recline their seat again for fear of causing a flight-diverting temper tantrum. Fear can be a wonderful motivator sometimes.

Of course, there are dynamic effects to be worried about here. If this continues, perhaps airlines will start disabling the recline mechanisms in their seats once and for all. Just not worth the trouble. And once they’ve done that, some bright spark will figure out that they can reduce legroom even more. And then we’ll all be worse off than before. No one will be able to recline and everybody will have their knees jammed into the seat in front of them. Something to look forward to.

Fact:

Mother Jones was founded as a nonprofit in 1976 because we knew corporations and billionaires wouldn't fund the type of hard-hitting journalism we set out to do.

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

Fact:

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate