Airplanes are weird for etiquette. You’re sharing a flying metal tube with dozens or hundreds of other people and you’re all crammed in tight. Yeah, you could be the “me, me, me” guy and nobody can really fault you for just wanting to care for you, your stuff, and nobody else, but most of the time people figure: we’re in a communal hell, let’s be chill.
And then you get the lunatics who delay flights, scream at the crew, and are otherwise monsters.
But this post isn’t about them.
This post is about your innocuous neighbor who pulled out a phone and started watching an R-rated movie.
Maybe a LITTLE odd on a public flight, but hey: we’ve all signed the social contract to avoid looking at other peoples’ phones long ago, so it should be fine, right?
Okay — add a little kid to the mix. NOW is this guy in the wrong?
That’s what u/rmovieplanethrowaway wanted to know when he posted to Reddit’s Am I The Asshole sub. Here’s his story:
I, 19m, was on a flight to visit my parents. I had a few movies downloaded on my phone, including the second Deadpool.
OP explains that he was on a flight and picked the second Deadpool movie to watch on the flight. Headphones were on.
I was watching it on my phone with headphones in, when the part where Deadpool gets ripped in half happens, and I can hear a (muffled) scream behind me.
When OP reaches a scary part, he hears a little scream behind him. He looks back and sees a kid crying.
I take out my headphones and there’s a little kid behind me, crying. He had positioned himself in a way that he could watch my screen and had watched him get torn.
The kid’s mom was furious that her child had seen something like that, but OP didn’t even know there was a kid behind him AND that kid had positioned himself really weirdly to get a look.
His mom got mad at me and yelled that I shouldn’t be watching that kind of thing, especially in front of children. But I wasn’t aware anyone was watching me, and that kid would have had to force himself into that weird position to see my phone screen. So, am I an asshole?
ETA: Thanks for the feedback, also, I have a few clarifications.
OP shares a few quick clarifications about the flight:
This was not a night flight. We left at 11.am and landed at 5pm. This kid could not have been more than 6 I honestly don’t know if the mom noticed and just let it slide until it backfired on her.
Yes, the reason I was on my phone with headphones in was so it would be harder for me to bother someone. The flight was over before I even posted, there is nothing I can do for extra revenge.
So — it sounds like he was definitely not in the wrong to watch movie on his own phone and it also sounds like he just didn’t know a kid was back there! Definitely not an asshole.
“NTA, she should’ve watched her own kid. She was happy he was occupied untill it backfired and decided to shift the blame,” commented one Redditor.
Another said, “NTA – the airlines have R rated movies in their entertainment wi-fi setup so they must expect folks to watch them. Even so, that poor kid!”
“NTA. If the mom doesn’t want her kid watching OTHER people’s devices, SHE should make sure it’s not happening,” wrote in a third.