Familiar with the Mile High Club? 
We’re implicitly assuming that the middle seat is undesirable, and considered so by almost everyone, correct? And we’re also assuming that couples want to sit together, right? So the couple who had first choice chose seats that were together and didn’t include an undesirable middle seat. That’s not a “hack”, a “trick”, or a “dick move”; that’s just the person who has first choice making a good choice, just like anyone with first choice would. The only thing remotely unusual about this is that they’ve decided in advance that if someone else takes that middle seat, they’ll offer to trade, and that’s not a dick move either: That’s a nice move.
It’s not dickish enough for me to vote dickish, but it is slightly dickish.
Almost no one would prefer the middle seat, especially being between strangers. It could cause someone to look for a seat on another flight and pay more (A LOT of people have some level of claustrophobia), or just be really bummed that they have to fly while seated in a middle seat (not exactly the end of the world). If one takes that into account and still decides “screw what it may do to someone else, I want the two of us to have a chance at having a row to ourselves”, then they’re being at the least, slightly selfish (dickish).
LOL, what? It’s not a nice move, it’s a fallback position. Clearly tbe strategy here is intended for the couple to sit together with a chance at extra leg room. When the leg room goal is unrealized they have the bargaining power to still sit together.
How does that differ from what I said?
Again, what do you care? You end up with a choice of aisle, middle, or window.
Thinking about it some more, I really don’t understand how in any way this is dickish. I’m voting based on the hypothetical of whether I would find it dickish if I were the middle passenger and found out the husband-wife team strategized this way, and I just can’t see any reason that would make me peeved or angry at all. How does it matter? If anything, now I have the “power” choice here that if they want to be together, I get to choose window or aisle to my preference, whereas before, if they had booked “honestly,” I would only be allotted whatever their preference is. It doesn’t make a lick of difference.
I personally would never book this way because every damned flight is full and I’d prefer selecting me and my traveling partner’s seats. I don’t ever expect the middle seat to remain empty and then, if I want to sit next to my traveling companion, I’m going to have to let middle seat pick their choice of window or aisle.
Two people paying for and picking two seats where buying the seat comes with the right to choose it first come, first served: can’t see any ‘dickisheness’ whatsoever in that by itself. Those are the rules, unless the airline says ‘we kindly request those travelling together seek contiguous seats where possible’.
Asking somebody to move though is conceivably an imposition. Let’s even assume nobody in the world would actually prefer a middle seat to the choice of window or aisle. But how about if the person is shy by nature, also unsure and embarrassed about their limited English (or whatever other language it was assumed they should speak) and nervous about flying and just doesn’t want to interact with other passengers, at all. You can’t say it would never be an imposition on anyone, even very nicely and immediately taking no for an answer.
Seat ends up empty, zero Kelvin on the absolute ‘dicknishness’ scale. Seat ends up occupied and you ask the person to move: like liquid Helium temperature.
Back when I’d travel for business and had a travel agent book my flights, and I would fly with my wife (I’d pick up the fare for my wife), the agent would employ this tactic and tell me the logic behind it. I don’t see that it’s dickish in the least and is just one of the perks from planning ahead. It worked more often than not (that is, nobody say in the middle seat) and when we did have someone in the middle seat, they were more than happy to swap for the isle seat.
Of course, that was a few years ago, when empty seats on a flight were not all that rare. Back then, getting paid to take a later flight was somewhat rare.
But if the couple were two individuals booking separately, the two individuals would certainly each take a window or an aisle seat before a middle seat. I don’t see why it’s dickish for a couple booking together to reserve exactly the same number of window and aisle seats as two people booking separately.
Curious to know what rule it is bending?
If the two were booking separately, they’d be booking those seats with the intent of sitting in them. But the couple doesn’t exist as two booking separately, so the third person doesn’t have to consider purchasing a middle seat due to them. The existing couple is booking with the intent of not sitting in those seats, and with the intent of driving people away from their row, and possibly to an area of the plane one finds less desirable or on a more expensive flight. Knowing that you are driving others away on purpose, when in reality one of you wants the middle seat if it’s sold to another, makes it dickish.
If they were two booking separately, they wouldn’t plan on interacting with the person in the middle at all. The couple is hoping there is no one to interact with, but if there is, on asking (or “offering”) the person to switch seats. Yes, most wouldn’t mind, but if I was offered, I wouldn’t like it very much and I might find it a little uncomfortable that I am being asked because these two were trying to drive me away from their row. Two people that are travelling together are more likely to be talking to one another and offer less peace. You at least have a better chance of some quiet in a middle seat.
If it is United, one in the overhead bin.
Whoops, only applies to dogs.
Absolutely not dickish. If I were the guy stuck in the middle seat, I’d think this was my lucky day.
The only exception would be if the middle seat person booked first and for some weird reason liked middle seats, and the couple booked seats on either side. But I don’t think I’ve ever seen a booked middle seat by itself on any seating chart I’ve ever looked at.
My wife and I get aisle seats across from each other now, but when we were younger we got window and aisle seats just out of preference. We never asked anyone to move - neither likes middle seats, and we get to talk to each other plenty, so we don’t need to do it over the head of someone stuck in the middle.
So you are saying that you “wouldn’t like it very much” if someone offered you the choice of any of the 3 seats in the row?
Mmm
Context, please. Did you miss this part?:
“…that I am being asked because these two were trying to drive me away from their row.”
The point keeps being made that “if I was the third person, i’d be so thrilled that I was being given a chance to move out of the middle seat.” If the two people that wanted to sit next to each other just booked seats directly next to each other, there already would have been a more attractive seat for another to book. They didn’t create one by trying to implement their plan.
Right, but only if I end up choosing their row. What they really want is for me to choose another row altogether instead–and I might do that. I might choose an aisle in another row, when what I’d like is the window–or vice versa–because I don’t know that they have this game going on.
So, under certain circumstances, it could be a little bit like the guy on the subway spreading his legs so wide that he spans two seats. Yeah, if you insist, he’ll move and let you sit in either one (oh, how nice of him giving me a choice), but what he really wants is for no one to ask at all. Often they don’t, not wanting to bother, and they end up just standing.
Yes, the plane situation is a little different, and they’re almost always full, so I think it rarely matters that people do this.
Wait a minute. If you had the choice of a window or aisle in another row, why would you take middle in that row? Unless you really, really wanted that row - in which case you’d stay there and still get a better seat.
I doubt anyone would expect you to change rows since that is really tough to do when the flight begins. I’d guess that a premium seat might possibly be open, but I doubt the flight attendants would let you switch to a more expensive seat.
So I don’t get your objection.
The reason they don’t is obvious. When they booked the seats, the middle is open, and they are hoping it would stay open which would give them an empty seat in the middle. If not, it is okay, and one would take the middle seat assuming the current occupant agrees.
I was just on four consecutive SW flights and had an empty middle seat next to me on each, so it does happen.
So you would become aggressive and turn down admittedly better seats (window or aisle) to prevent a couple from sitting together.
Are you familiar with the phrase ‘cutting off your nose to spite your face’?
mmm