A video of a toddler terrorizing airplane passengers sparked an intense online response. Some viewers went so far as to say, “This is why I hate kids.” However, it wasn’t just the little girl’s behavior that appalled some viewers. Her parents were also slammed for their conduct on the flight.
What’s been described as a “wild video,” featuring a tiny tyke in pigtails, quickly went viral after it was posted to Reddit’s popular “Public Freakout” section with the title “letting children run wild during an 8-hour flight.” In the footage, which racked up millions of views, a toddler is seen “terrorizing a plane full of passengers,” according to the NY Post.
The child’s behavior was so bad that viewers flooded the post with brutal comments, including, “This should be an ad for condoms,” and, “This is why I hate kids, especially this toddler age,” the Post reported. However, it wasn’t just the little girl and her behavior that social media users didn’t like. Her parents also drew the ire of online critics. But, first, have a look at the video in question:
Letting children run wild during an 8 hour flight
byu/readysetgorilla inPublicFreakout
As can be seen in the clip, the child stands on the seat’s tray table, energetically jumping up and down in her bare feet. Her wild bouncing causes the seat directly in front of her—along with the male passenger in it—to be jostled, jarred, and shaken, but the man displays the patience of a saint, sitting quietly as the “pig-tailed hellion” does as she wishes.
The video caused condemnation to be launched toward the child, whom some even called a “brat” in their comments, but the parents and their actions drew additional criticism from viewers. In fact, it only took those 9 seconds of footage to spark a heated debate about how the parents should have handled the situation. One person suggested, “My parents would have thrown me off the plane mid-flight.”
Obviously, no one wants to seriously see a child physically ejected from the plane, but the fact that her parents seemed to just “chill out” while their young toddler was allowed to run wild on the 8-hour flight rubbed many people the wrong way. Unsurprisingly, this resulted in outraged viewers dishing out heaps of parenting advice as the parents were slammed over their inability or unwillingness to control their “little brat.”
“I might be awful, but never have I wanted a tray table to catastrophically fail as I did watching that,” one annoyed commenter quipped. “The poor guy in front.”
“I would NEVER allow one of my kids to disrupt someone this way,” another Reddit rabble rouser chimed in. “Talking a little loud is one thing. Having your toddler jumping on plane seats while holding onto another person’s (strangers) chair is completely WRONG. I hope that man was reimbursed in some way. The parents probably saw nothing wrong with this. UNACCEPTABLE!!!”
“I would feel like a failed parent if my kids were doing this and I was just straight up allowing it,” another wrote while others questioned the in-flight sanitation standards, commenting, “The bouncing is obviously infuriating but also the bare feet on the tray table … Always wipe down your stations folks.”
Others attempted to blame the airplane’s flight crew for not getting the ruckus under control, suggesting that the flight attendants should have intervened. While I agree that the parents should address the behavior, it’s hard to draw a firm conclusion from just 9 seconds of video. Did the parents try to redirect the child? Did a flight attendant address the issue at some point? Did the man in front of the little girl suggest letting her jump to avoid a more distracting and annoying tantrum? Was this clip only 9 seconds because the child was stopped from what she was doing? We don’t know.
What I do know is that an airline attendant went viral the same week as this video when she revealed who she and her colleagues consider the “most hated passengers” on flights. Shockingly, it wasn’t the disruptive kids on airlines who irritated the cabin crew the most. Instead, Kat Kalamanishe, a six-year veteran of the friendly skies, claimed it was the frustrated folks who complain about the misbehaving kids and crying babies that “put the ‘ass’ in ‘passenger,” according to the Post.
“I promise you, there’s nothing that irritates us more as a flight attendant [than] when people complain about babies crying,” Kalamani admitted in a video with accompanying footage that showed an angry-looking “Karen” on an undisclosed flight shushing a baby who was throwing a tantrum off-screen.
@katkamalani THIS 😡 i promise you, you wont win… just be a kind human and dont dont this @Dylan
“While these passengers may see themselves as heroes of the flight, they’re actually annoying both staff and fellow travelers,” the Post wrote in their coverage of the two viral clips, reminding me of something my husband always says: Don’t get offended on someone else’s behalf. While Reddit users who weren’t on the flight seemed to get up in arms, writing things like, “The parents of that brat need a good *ss whooping,” and even suggesting that the man should recline “vigorously” to cause the child to fall, did you notice what the fellow passengers were doing?
They seemed as unbothered by the child as her parents were. Everyone captured in the clip was seemingly ignoring the behavior. Perhaps the former flight attendant was on to something when she gave some useful advice. Instead of complaining, easily perturbed passengers could prepare for potential annoyances on their flight by bringing “noise-canceling headphones,” or they could be polite and “ask the parents if they need help.” Or, in this case, they could whip out a camera and shame a toddler online. But, how did that make this flight any better for anyone? It didn’t.
