Few things ignite a mid-air feud faster than the sound of a seatback clicking into recline. You’ve seen the viral videos: passengers punching headrests, drinks cascading onto laptops, strangers locked in whispered standoffs at 35,000 feet. People start filming. posts on X fly. Sides are chosen. The entire Internet becomes a jury.

The seat recline debate has become one of modern travel’s most polarizing etiquette questions. But what do the people who actually work the aisle think? We dug into interviews, op-eds, TikToks, and Reddit threads from current and former flight attendants to find out. 

One of the great things about America is that we have a relatively young culture, so many of the foods that we eat were brought over from other countries. That makes America a great place to try out all the different types of food from around the world.

However, we also like to put our own stamp on staples from around the globe that give the American version its own unique flair. Some foods that we claim originated overseas were actually first made right here in the U.S. of A. For example, chimichangas, which can be found in many Mexican restaurants, actually originated in the state of Arizona. Crab Rangoon, a popular “Chinese” dish, was actually invented in the San Francisco Bay area, and spaghetti and meatballs were never a thing in Italy.

A video from a California elementary school capturing a tense exchange between a principal and a woman over a Pride shirt has resurfaced online. In it, we see Laura Andrews, principal of Fred T. Korematsu Elementary School, guiding carpool lane traffic while wearing a shirt that says “All Are Welcome Here.”

The routine pick-up became a moment of contention when a woman pulled up and asked whether parents at the school supported such messaging. When Andrews quickly answered, “Yep!” and tried to move her along, the woman then claimed to have received complaints about the shirt.

“I had a mother send me a note saying she doesn’t want this at school,” said the woman. When Andrews replied, “Okay, you can send her my way,” the woman then asked, “What’s your name?”

How you treat people in the service industry is often used as a measure of what kind of person you are. Arguably, the same could be said for how you treat anyone in a customer-facing job, whether it be the sales associate at a department store, the cashier at McDonald’s, or the janitor in your office building.

While people may think that these jobs are not skilled positions, they do require an immense amount of skill that has to be learned. Sadly, though the skill itself is valuable, it usually isn’t as valued by society as a whole, and often leads to people treating those in customer-facing jobs poorly. But in 2023 when a woman went on a date with a potential partner, her poor behavior towards the waitstaff caused him to pause.