There’s no doubt that flying has become worse in recent years. Less space, more fees, disruptive delays… the list goes on.
But one Edmonton woman sparked online debate about airplane etiquette after she was the victim of an annoying case where her two male seatmates refused to stick to their own personal space — in other words, two “manspreaders” were seriously encroaching on her already tight legroom.
Erin Rempel began to feel the pinch aboard a Flair Airlines flight from Winnipeg to Edmonton last month, when the two strangers on either side of her assigned middle seat chose to open their legs, leaving the lower half of her body tightly squeezed together.
She shared the video to TikTok, captioning the clip “Why would anyone EVER need that much room???”
In the 17-second video, Rempel is seen trying to uncomfortably reposition her legs with no success.
“I kept trying to push his legs lightly back to his side to hopefully have him catch my hints, with no prevail,” she told Global News via text message, referring to the man on her right, whose manspreading is the worse of the two.
It took her reaching down between her legs to retrieve something under her seat, which ultimately forced him to reposition his own legs, she said.
Rempel, a model who stands six-feet-two-inches tall, said the man to her right was actually shorter than her, making it possible for him to keep to his own space.
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“I’ve never had a problem fitting in the seats…and I have not much room but I can manage to keep to myself.”
Fortunately, it was only a short flight, but Rempel said if it had been longer she probably would have asked the attendants for some help.
She said she recorded the video and shared it to TikTok to “shed light on a very common situation” and suspects that a lot of women have also experienced this problem but might be too timid or scared of a man’s reaction to speak up.
“Putting yourself in a situation where you scream or yell can lead to some very dangerous situations, although staying silent can do the same.”
Posting the video online, however, led to some “pretty brutal” reactions, particularly from men who were trying to justify the manspreaders’ actions.
“As a man it’s just more comfortable to sit like that,” wrote one viewer.
“I do this cause i am tall and my legs dont fit really well,” shared another.
Hundreds of others, however, shared in Remple’s “female rage,” and many shared stories of how they’ve been in a similar scenario or that they would be too nervous to speak up.
“Me personally I’d just sit there and be uncomfortable cause I have social anxiety,” wrote one person.
“Personally I am that someone who can’t speak for herself. It’s like I can in certain situations, but majority I suffer in silence,” agreed another.
Others encouraged Rempel to push back harder, literally, or offered the ways they fight back against manspreading.
“I usually put my legs on top of theirs or move my legs a LOT wider than theirs to annoy them,” shared one supporter.
“Turn that into an opportunity for a glute med workout! use them like a workout machine if they are going to act like tools! start those reps baby,” joked another.
In an emailed statement to Fox News, Flair Airlines said, “We don’t think we should be stepping into this disagreement between two customers.”
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