It's Not a Shelf

Posted by Gennao Sabbat.

I was in class yesterday, one of those classes where there are barely enough chairs for everyone, and although class attendance is expected to dwindle over the course of the term, today was as crowded as could be. I got there early to get a good seat, and I noticed most of the people there had their backpacks on the seat next to them. I assumed they were saving seats for friends, and turned to my own business.

A few minutes after class started, late-comers started to trickle in, and, being a crowded class, they had to hunt a little for seats. Watching some of them search optimistically for a seat before the nose-bleed section, I noticed there were still a number of people who had their backpacks on the seat next to them. In normal circumstances, I assume that when a backpack is left on a seat, it means the owner went to the bathroom and wanted to save their seat, which is perfectly fair to me. But then I realized as the late-comers asked if anyone was occupying that seat, that the owners hadn't left the room briefly, they just wanted somewhere to put their bag.

And I'm thinking, "MOVE YOUR FUCKING BACKPACK OFF THE SEAT." It would be nice if there were enough spare chairs that your stuff didn't have to be left on the floor, but chairs are for people, and this particular class can't afford for people to take up two seats: one for them and one for their stuff. How selfish do you have to be to think that's okay? How do you sit there in your seat, with your pencil case on the seat next to you -- one of the only empty seats in the whole classroom -- and not move it when someone who needs that seat walks in?

And as if by luck, it happened again on the bus later that day. I was sitting on a crowded bus with my backpack on my lap, and sitting across from me was a girl with her backpack taking up the seat next to her. Now, I've been known to let my things sit in an empty seat, but only when there's clearly no demand for that seat. Yet here people were still getting on, forced to stand, and even forced to invade each other's personal space to fit, and this girl sits with her headphones on, eyes open to all of this, and acts as if she's doing nothing wrong by pillaging an extra much-needed seat all to herself.

Why can't more people have a little common courtesy and decency for the needs of people immediately around them? The moral of the story: don't be obtusely rude.