I got into a seat (one of the few times I flew coach) and found that the seat wouldn’t go back. I got up to look and saw those insipid things in the tray table arms. I asked the dude to remove them and got a big diatribe about his rights and his legroom and me being inconsiderate and violation his rights that I wearied of quickly and took my seat, with the offended person continuing his speech—knowing that pasting this guy in the mouth wouldn’t go over well.
Once we leveled off at 30-thousand whatever feet, I braced my feet on the chair mounting in front of me, pressed the button, and gave a good hard push. The knee defenders creaked, creaked, one split and very quickly the other one gave way as well. So much for “unbreakable”.
The offended guy was absolutely furious, called the FA, demanded that I be arrested and was told by the flight crew to sit down and be quiet or HE would be the one arrested—they are an unauthorized seat modification that he was neither trained to install (asked if he had an A&P ticket—he didn’t) nor given permission by the airline to install them.
After 3-1/2 hours Houston to Las Vegas he started his verbal beratement all the way until we were parked and the rows in front of us cleared. An FA pulled me aside, told the other guy to continue on his way, and once was out of earshot, asked how I got enough force to break those. I explained, showed how simple it was and the FA had a good laugh and thanked me for showing me how it worked. Seems he’s had several of those incidents and now knew how to advise pax how to fight back without a word. And yes, that really is an unauthorized modification.
Good for you.
A few things to virtually everyone else on this thread cheering on the poor oppressed in the back:
First and foremost for all the passive-aggressive jerks with their little tricks to stop the seat from reclining, why don’t you act like a human being and simply ask the person in front if you (nicely) to not recline their seat. If you’re civil about it they might just agree. But if that simply too much, if it’s too much to act like a human being instead of like an animal defending his territory...(and I’m going to assume the latter is the case for anyone who argues with the points below)..
If one is too tall for coach seat space, buy an upgrade. Your boss won’t do it because you’re on a business trip? Tough, do it yourself. Or get another job.
All the people on this thread who are complaining about the lack of legroom, exactly how does the distance of 2 inches of recline damage your legs/knees so unbearably? (and that’s 2 inches from the top of the seat, not the bottom where your knees are, thus even less distance is being taken from “your” space really). You’re really so large the loss of an INCH of legroom causes knee damage? Wow. You should be in the NFL (or really in business class)
Finally what’s to stop you from reclining your own seat? Nothing but your own perceived (not real) invasion of space. Because yeah, the reclining function is part of the seat I bought, and nothing prevents you from reclining your own seat. Unless you’re one of those poor shlubs in the seats up against the bathrooms (in that instance I don’t recline my seat if I’m in front of such people.). Thus, since I paid for a reclining seat I have every right to that function. And you loose no space if you don’t think like a selfish jerk and simply recline yours.