Dad Chooses to Sit Separately From Wife and Young Kids on a Flight — and TikTok Wasn't Happy With Him

18.09.2023 - 13:57 / travelandleisure.com

It appears some people just get to start their vacations earlier than others, like the one dad TikTok is taking to task. 

In early September, TikTok user One Tough Mother posted to the platform with a quick snippet of a flight from Las Vegas to Vancouver, Canada, and a tale that had everyone up in arms.

«I was seated next to a mom who had a baby in her lap and a toddler beside her. It was a lot,» Kristine Sostar McLellan, the woman behind the account, wrote in a now-viral TikTok video. «I offered to switch seats with the dad, who was a few rows up, so he could be with his family. He says 'Great, thanks' AND SENDS OVER ANOTHER SMALL KID TO SIT WITH THE MOM. He enjoyed a kid-free flight.»

The post has garnered nearly 5 million views to date as well as thousands of comments questioning what the dad could possibly have been thinking during the exchange. 

“If my husband was like that, we would be divorced before landing,” one commenter wrote. “I’m a flight attendant, and I’ve seen soooo many mothers looking after the kids the whole flight while the father sits away or doesn’t help. it’s crazy,” another added.

But, despite already being a bad look, it gets worse. As McClellan explained to Today, “Not only did she have the kids, but she was also struggling with carry-on luggage … She didn’t have enough arms to deal with everything.” 

McClellan followed up with another video another addressing the thousands of comments on the original post. 

“This post went pretty bonkers,” McClellan said. “But what strikes me most of all is how differently it’s received by men and women in the comments.”

She added that many of her male-presenting commenters went through “mental gymnastics” to defend the father on her flight, and added plenty of additional detail about how it all went down.

As for how she believes the father should have reacted, McClellan noted she thinks he should have replied to her offer, “No thank you, I’m actually sitting here with my other child.” Thus saving him from viral shame.

“This is a scenario we should all be equally repulsed by,” she said to her detractors. “And the fact that you’re not says a lot about you.”