‘This man took manspreading to another level on my flight’
He joined the mile wide club.
A female passenger filmed the moment that a fellow flyer allegedly encroached on her space by doing some epic “manspreading,” comfortably separating his legs in the middle of the flight.
The incriminating footage amassed 3.5 million views and sparked a raging debate over whether it was acceptable to take up so much space on an airplane.
“The way this man took manspreading to another level on my flight,” wrote TikTokker Claire in the caption to the clip of the incident, which appeared to occur on a plane traveling from the US to South America.
Accompanying footage shows the unnamed man with his legs splayed out such that one of his legs is stretched across the aisle into the space in front of Claire’s seat.
The space invader’s antics kicked off a firestorm of criticism online.
“He’s about to give birth,” quipped one aghast viewer, while another wrote, “Across the aisle is crazyy.”
A third joked, “Dude is an absolute manspreading champion, we all should look up to him.”
“All of a sudden I’d have to get up to go the bathroom an awful lot!” said another.
One alleged crewmember also piled on, writing, “As a flight attendant I’d be announcing a reminder to keep the aisle clear.”
Interestingly, some commenters took the manspreader’s side with many citing his height as an understandable reason for his space violation.
“6ft4 man here, can confirm this needs to happen on flights,” argued one defender, while another wrote, “Look how long his legs are tho i understand that.”
When stuck next to a manspreader, flight blog A View From The Wing advises flyers to first look for an empty seat and then discreetly ask the flight attendant if they can move.
If that’s not an option, the flyer must ask themselves why their seatmate is encroaching on their space. If it’s because the person is larger than the seat, there might not be a whole lot one can do to remedy the situation, per the blog.
However, if the person could easily take up less space, flyers should broach the subject them and politely ask them to move.
Informing a flight attendant should be a “last resort,” per the blog.
“A flight attendant isn’t going to stay by your seat through the flight to monitor your seatmate’s behavior,” they write. “But if the person is clearly abusive, getting it on record with the crew can be a prophylactic measure.”
Unfortunately, mid-flight manspreading incidents could potentially skyrocket in the future if the recent AI prediction is correct and “sardine can” seating becomes the norm aboard airplanes.
On its face, the idea of “manspreading” — a term that first started circulating online circa 2008 — may seem like a man-bashing neologism, however, the phenomenon apparently has a basis in science.
In fact, a 2016 study out of Hunter College showed that men stretch out their legs while seated on the subway five times more often than their female counterparts.
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