I get it. Planes are uncomfortable for the most part. I mean, sure, you get to your destination fast(er), but you gotta sacrifice your comfort to some degree. But even that has its limits.
You can accept being all up in everyone’s personal space because that is just how commercial flights—even more so economy and standard class—work. What you can’t, however, accept is someone using your seat’s backrest as a support to get up, which creates a slingshot effect for the poor soul sitting in said seat.
Cue Looney Toons’ wacky sound effects. Oh, and petty revenge.
More Info: Reddit
More often than not, commercial flight is going to be a pain in the rump, but there are some ways to avoid it
Image credits: Oleksandr Pidvalnyi (not the actual image)
This one Redditor shared their piece of petty revenge on everyone who dares to abuse their seat's backrest by pulling on it to get up
Image credits: u/ColdHardPocketChange
The problem with pulling on the backrest of the seat in front of you is that it creates a potential slingshot effect that might shock the person resting their back on it
Image credits: Daniel Frese (not the actual image)
Reddit user and owner of a very Reddit nickname, u/ColdHardPocketChange, has shared a post that’s both a petty revenge story as well as a pro life tip.
In their story, they explain a surprisingly recurring phenomenon. If OP is sitting in a seat that has someone sitting behind them, and for whatever reason that person needs to leave their seat, they will often default to using OP’s seat—the back of it in particular—for leverage getting up.
Now, all seems fine and dandy, right? Not quite. Whenever someone starts pulling on the back part of the chair, it starts to bend backwards. The more flexible the seat is, or old, or poorly built, or [insert your own speculations for why airplane seats are bendy], the more force you get once you let go. And the more force you get, the more the person sitting in the seat gets flung forward. And, at the very least, that is annoying.
But OP has a solution. Whenever someone pulls this slingshot maneuver of sorts, and then walks away like nothing happened, OP makes use of the chair’s capabilities to unlock the reclining mechanism and just leave it wobbly. So, when the other passenger returns to take their seat, they expect the back to still be in their very static state. It’s not. They plummet into their seat like a sack of potatoes affected by rag-doll physics.
“Hearing that sweet shocked gasp as [they] fall hard into their seat has been one of the new pleasures I've found in flying,” concluded OP.
But the trick is to be petty and to release the back adjustment mechanism once the person comes back so they plummet into their seat like a sack of potatoes
Image credits: Alexander Schimmeck (not the actual image)
The post soon got some traction and took off. For the most part, people loved the story and approved of OP’s very satisfying way of dealing with rude folk on the plane. Especially if they happen to also grab a chunk of your hair during takeoff or landing.
But there was also the elephant in the room as well. This isn’t a black-and-white case as there might be many reasons why people default to standing up this way, like if the arm rests might be broken, or their elbows don’t bend that way or they have medical or physiological conditions.
In light of this, OP did add an edit, clarifying that they don’t mind the back bending if it’s civil—you know, if they ask before reaching for the back to stand up, thus giving a heads up, or if it does happen and the chair flings the seated person forward like it’s Crush the Castle.
Bored Panda also got in touch with OP for a chat about the situation. OP is understanding of why people default to using the seat back to stand up instead of the arm rests, but the main issue here is the rudeness that follows the slingshot moment.
“If you're not thinking about the impact jostling the seat in front of you will have, then [using the back seat] becomes the best choice,” elaborated OP. “It's much easier and almost instinctive to pull yourself up than to push yourself up off the arm rests. The seat back is available on your whole way up whereas the armrest becomes awkward to push off of as you're near the top of standing up.”
Now, OP mentioned that the seats tend to bend around 3 to 4 inches (7.6 to 10.2 centimeters for all you metric people), so it begs the question how come the chairs are so bendy. OP speculated that it’s probably a combo of seat quality, people’s weight, and their leverage.
“I imagine the seat materials are made to be light for the sake of reducing the weight of the plane, but there is likely some strength trade-off in some of the parts as a result. I'm no safety engineer, but that flexibility may even be a safety feature that helps accommodate shock in some way.”
Now, this is in case the back puller doesn't apologize or warn the person beforehand—there is ample justification to do this the right way
Image credits: Keith Chan (not the actual image)
So, what happens when folks get caught in the seat trap? OP explained that people never say anything after they fall. The guess is their initial thoughts are that they broke the seat, or somehow overcame the locking mechanism. But since OP never acknowledges that anything really happened, which in turn helps hide their involvement, you can guess that those who have taken the fall also probably kinda sorta try to be nonchalant about it.
“I think people understand that airlines have made it a bit more of a chore to get in and out of seats by shrinking the space between rows. People also understand it's pretty likely that you're going to get bumped from time to time due to that tight space. Neither of these things should be used as an excuse to be impolite or inconsiderate. A simple 'sorry' goes a really long way to improving the situation, just as a lack of that 'sorry' goes a long way to building feelings of contempt,” concluded OP.
OP’s post got 5,500 upvotes (96% positive) and a handful of Reddit awards. You can check out the post in all of its context here, or you can have a Russian roulette of petty revenge posts here, here, or here. But before you go, why not let us know some of your tactics on how to make flight less of a pain in the comment section below!
And folks, both in the comments and OP themselves have pointed out this right way, but this never stopped the appreciate for a good piece of petty revenge
