Planes are weird spaces. Despite all the appearances of glamourous jet-settery given to you by the in-flight entertainment guides and the impeccably made-up cabin crew, they’re kind of smelly, cold and warm at the same time and you’re squished in with a bunch of strangers who feel just as entitled to the space as you do. And so, for what you get in speed (planes take you hurtling across the world and, most of the time, do so safely), you lose in personal serenity.
Because not only are you near other people’s bodily functions for hours on end, you’re near their human interactions. And that’s how a couple having a bit of a barney found themselves on the receiving end of a bit of stranger-shaming by a woman sat near them who thought it’d be LOL to live-tweet the whole thing.
The couple, who remain anonymous, but whose public outing is just a matter of time since going viral, were on the delayed flight just a few seats up from Kelly Keegs. We know this, because she took two photos of them and put it on her Twitter.
She also reported what happened, starting with, ‘This guy on the plane just broke up w his girlfriend and she’s SOBBING.’
And ending with the pair ordering, ‘SIX vodkas and Bloody Mary mix for the 50 minute flight and chugged them in silence between makeouts.’
The argument lasted 90 minutes, according to Kelly, who kept her growing number of followers (she has almost 9,000 now) updated and has now, via oodles of retweets, featured on a whole bunch of websites around the world.
Fair’s fair, if a couple are arguing loudly on a flight/train or, say, downing 25 pints of Stella with their haute cuisine two tables down from you at a restaurant, then it might seem pretty LOL to tweet about it. You’re bored, can’t entertain yourself and all you can do is rubberneck at whatever this couple is up to.
But including two photos, so these people can then be made internet famous for what sounds like a pretty terrible time, and then realise they were spied upon during that time?
Who does that benefit? All it does it make it seem like it’s OK for anyone with a cameraphone to make entertainment of someone else who isn’t acting according to their rules. Maybe next time Kelly could, you know, text a friend, read a book, scroll through strangers’ Instagrams, read every article on* The Debrief*, delete old photos from her phone, text her family to say how much she loves them, or even dare to ask the couple to quieten down a bit. With all that on offer, hopefully, hopefully, no other couple, no matter the nature of their argument, will ever again have to endure this sort of thoughtless behaviour.
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Stranger Shaming: How Being A Woman Eating On A Tube Got Me 12,000 Haters
Follow Sophie on Twitter @sophwilkinson
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.