Is the behaviour of passengers on airplanes getting more demanding?

[SailingOnAWave]

Hello. I fly several times a year and one thing I've noticed in recent years is that the behaviour of other passengers on the planes seems to be getting worse and more entitled.

On one flight a passenger started to demand that one of the three toilets was for her use only.

In another a passenger demanded that she is given a seat in the emergency exit rows for more leg space (they were already filled and she said she had not paid for this, but was expecting her wishes to be fulfilled).

On another a passenger wanted the pilot to read out to the whole plane a personal message.

I could go on and on.

I would be really interested to hear other stories!

I find the clapping weird! We were delayed, sat on the runway for nearly two hours. It was because a member of staff hadn't turned up and they couldn't get hold of her.
Someone called 'Audrey' stepped in and arrived to loads of clapping. I'm sorry I am not clapping Easyjet when a member of cabin crew oversleeps and the plane is delayed two hours, until they can find someone else.

I think the current seat booking system is creating conflict (on tbe one hand telling families they will be seated together... ut alliwing random seats to be booked at a cost. The system shluld allocate seats to families eith young children on purchase.

I fly to Seville and Jerez frequently.
I've never had anything remotely interesting happen.

The seat thing is really shit IMO. Even BA are doing it now and it really pisses me off when you're spending thousands on flights to be hit up for an extra £100pp per leg to sit next to your own kids! That's an additional £800 on top of the ticket price, just to sit with your family. Fucks me off royally!

Problem is these days all the airlines are battling the algorithms used by some sales sites and to some extent human nature where it's cheapest fare that counts...

Russians do it too... which when you consider their national aviation safety record, you can see why!

As someone who works with the public….. this!! Since covid i feel many people are more entitled, sometimes more aggressive too. Often more rude/short.

passenger started to demand that one of the three toilets was for her use only
that's not demanding, that's just being deranged 😂

I agree, it's people expecting to sit with their kids that are horrendous, but I haven't noticed any behaviour worst now than in the past.

Very interesting replies, thank you!

Also a whole family got out of their seats as the plane was at the end of the runway and we had to wait for them to gentle parent their child to be "ready" in their own time to agree to sit back in their seat.

Not sure this is my experience .

Perhaps they are worse in America!

I don't know if I'm particularly lucky or if bad behaviour sticks in the mind of those who experience it because it's unusual but I've never experienced anything like the op.
Neither have I experienced loud, drunk passengers, obnoxious children (I don't count crying babies/toddlers who are over tired or distressed by the air pressure changes during take off/landing as they can't help it) or people making a fuss about changing seats.

I did get very irritated on a long haul flight a couple of weeks ago by the selfish man in front of me who decided to recline his seat as soon as we were in the air but I knew that I just had to suck that up so waited for my meal to arrive (I book special meals so they always arrive before the trolley meal service) to ask a member of cabin crew to ask him to put his seat upright. That's genuinely the worst thing that I've experienced.

re clapping, when DP and I started going on holiday together about 30 years ago, we always flew Aeroflot because, at the time, they were the cheapest airline for long haul flights to the kind of places we wanted to go to. Almost all of the passengers would clap when the plane landed. Not surprising considering some of the stories about Aeroflot.

I always read about these crazy things happening and never once have I experienced anything like it what is described.

Are you in America, OP?

Because in the UK it is 'aircraft'.

<trots back off to pedants' corner>

That was a joke on Jeenieweenies channel last week
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/J1YbIO01XyM

@bruffin - that’s exactly what happened! They were incredulous they would be off last at which point the man became a modern-day Lazarus…

Only encountered two issues over about 20 yrs, one a child a girl kicking my seat, I asked politely if she would stop, when asked again, said I had picked my nose the whole time I hadn’t!
Another time need special assistance, airbus before my easyJet flight, landed 45 min wait, with very entitled older claiming how important they were, as if choose Parkinson’s

Exactly

I also fly several times a year and can’t really think of any stand out incidents of other passengers being entitled.

My incident with people in our booked seats was in 2019. (Thats adults in mine, my 5yo and my 7yos seats, at 11pm)

Ive been flying since the 1960s when a flight was something you dressed up for. There were no reserved seats - you just chose your own as you boarded. Airports were then exciting places to me. Now I detest them and the way you are treated by minimum wage staff.

My worst experience on a plane (1990s) was when I had to sit in the middle seat due to two flights being amalgamated. Man in aisle seat begins to feel my leg shortly after takeoff. I thumped him in the chest, and yelled at him for being a pervert. He shot out of the seat which I would not allow him back in. Cabin crew found him another seat near the toilet! Asked me if I wanted to complain but I was worried it would delay a connecting flight. Every time I passed him to go to the loo I called him a pervert and made sure the people he was now sitting with knew about his activities. He did not have a comfortable flight but I enjoyed the power trip.

The wheelchair thing is standard. If you have special assistance you are first on the pane but last off. This is so the wheelchair does not impede the departing passengers. There is no hurry to be off first as special assistance passengers have their own bays at airports and evade most of the queues. Last time I travelled I was met by a young man with a buggy who whisked me around Frankfurt airport. I could not have managed it myself with my mobility issues.

I fly around 14/16 times a year (there and back ) and the biggest notable difference I’ve noticed is kids poor behaviour and parents inability to manage it. X

I'm not sure why "airplane" is a hill to die on for some but it's come up before.

For info it's often used in the aviation industry in the UK when working with US equipment and US documentation..switching to the English spelling can cause legal complications so it's a case of being flexible/pragmatic.

..and on the Wheelchair side of things, and people making sudden recoveries or OTOH suddenly becoming unable to walk there are some routes in the Longhaul arena to/from the UK where it was, and probably still is, endemic.

Seen some racism on a flight. Sadly.

Monthly, flight to alicate- very very drunk men