Parents Backed for Upgrading Their Seats on Flight, but Not Activist Teen's

A mother and father have been defended by the internet after they upgraded their seats on a flight, but not their daughter's.

Published to Reddit's r/AmITheA**hole forum, a mother under the anonymous username u/TA62901 shared her story to receive feedback from the "AITA" community.

The original poster (OP) began her story by explaining that her 18-year-old daughter, "Meg," is an activist and regularly attends marches and helps non-governmental organizations and homeless people. The OP and her husband come from wealthy backgrounds and understand their privilege.

However, Meg tends to criticize her parents when they spend money on expensive things and complains that the money could have gone to charities or people in need. The OP understands where she's coming from but gets annoyed when she complains a lot.

The Redditor explains that "the little of their excess capital is theirs" and she has the freedom to be an activist and money isn't stopping her. Her parents pay for her phone, car and money to spend. They have agreed to help Meg as she planned on taking a gap year to "delve into" causes she's passionate about.

The OP and her family decided to take an international vacation as they weren't able to travel during the pandemic. Meg convinced her parents not to fly business class and instead, fly economy. Once they arrived at the airport, she told her husband to go to the gate while she went around to get stuff for the flight.

"Meg butted in and started the same rant again," the OP wrote, "I was already pretty annoyed about it despite giving her a warning to stop, but I saw that she was going to be on this the whole trip. At check-in, the attendant asked if we'd like an upgrade to executive, and when Meg threatened to start over, I accepted and asked for two seats.

"She was quiet, asking if we weren't going to do it for her and I was very honest saying that I wasn't willing to spend 10 hours listening to it and I want to enjoy too. She started to say we should all stay in economy and I said no, she got annoyed about it. On the trip, she didn't enjoy anything and stayed on her cell phone. On the way back, I offered to pay hers and she refused," she continued.

Once they got home, the OP wrote that Meg complained that her parents knew that she was financially dependent on them and that she couldn't take the upgraded seat so her parents could "prove their point." She called her parents "vindictive" for being "fed up" with hearing the truth.

Newsweek reached out to u/TA62901 for comment.

What you can donate to charity

Do you have a variety of items that you wish to get rid of? Why not donate them to charity? Whether its clothes or baby toys, there could always be someone or an organization in need.

According to gogreendrop.com, here are some of the products that can be donated to charity:

• Financial donations
• Clothes
• Shoes and bags (purses, backpacks, etc.)
• Kitchenware
• Toys
• Books
• Games
• Hygiene essentials (shampoo, conditioner, body wash, toothpaste, toothbrushes, etc.)
• Furniture

According to charitynavigator.org, the most followed charities include Doctors Without Borders, the American Red Cross, ALSAC - St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, The Nature Conservancy, Natural Resources Defense Council, World Wildlife Fund and UNICEF.

Redditor reactions

U/Meriadoxm wrote, receiving the top comment of over 9,000 upvotes, "[Not the a**hole] Meg is though. If I was you I'd just do malice compliance. Let her know that you support her in her causes! She doesn't want you to spend money that you could donate, no problem! She wants a new phone? Perfect, she can get the lowest cost flip phone and the rest (that you would've spent on a new iPhone will be donated as will her old phone). Having a car is a luxury, time to sell it! She can get a transit pass and just think of how many people you could buy a transit pass for with all the money you save on not paying gas and insurance and from the sale of the car!"

"Meg needs to get a job so she can get some perspective. She is acting spoiled, entitled and not understanding her privilege and quite honestly being a hypocrite, she's mad that you upgraded, but then mad that she didn't get an upgrade," the commenter continued.

"[Not the a**hole]. Your daughter is a major hypocrite. She doesn't want you flying first class but is upset that you didn't upgrade her to first class. It's honestly time for you to set the record straight with her. She is well aware that she is financially dependent on you and yet she criticizes your every financial move. Tell her that the money your spending on her would be better off being donated so she should stop with the hypocritical rants unless she can actually survive financially being on her own. She thinks that she is so righteous and woke, but any poor person would get annoyed with the bs she's pulling. She is all talk and no act," u/potatotomato1002 commented.

"[Not the a**hole], and absolutely hilarious response. She's 18, she can get a job and donate as much of HER money to good causes as she wants to, but she has no right to dictate how anyone else spends their money, even her parents. You could have doubled down on the point by donating the cost of her business upgrade to charity - if you wanted to," u/EternalCharax said.