A teenager has been labelled "fat phobic" after complaining about sitting next to an "obese man" on a recent flight.
The holidaymaker was travelling to his home country at the time and claims he himself is "not a small guy".
When he spotted a larger man in the seat next to him, he complained to the flight attendant, who told him he could not switch to a different row.
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He then went on a rant which saw the cabin crew label him as "rude" and eventually remove him from the flight, while fellow holidaymakers even labelled him a "fat phobic sh*t".
Posting on Reddit, the 18-year-old said: "On my second connecting flight, which is also by far my longest one being over 12 hours long, I had the delightful sight of an obese man that was taking up a good chunk of my seat.
"I am not a small guy myself. I have quite broad shoulders and am around 190 cm, so a full seat would already have been uncomfortable.
"I told the flight attendant about this issue and she told me that the seat was paid for by this obese person and the flight was full."
He said that he then complained that the seat should not have been listed "as available if it was being used for someone’s literal rolls", before claiming his comments prompted cabin crew to call him rude, and look to get him removed from the flight.
He added that the passenger he was supposed to sit beside then called him "a fatphobic sh*t" and that "other people around gave me the stink eye".
He added: "I know they think I’m a bad person for this, but on the other hand I’m having to pay for the lack of discipline of another person as well as this airline’s booking system."
Following the incident, he claims that the airline staff sent a letter of complaint giving him a temporary ban from the company’s planes, but the ban was lifted when he appealed the decision.
The teenager said: "In the letter of complaint it said I was being rude to other passengers and the staff. Since it got appealed so quick, and I got to travel the next day anyway, I’m really not sure if I’m [the a**hole]."
The man asked fellow Reddit users whether he was in the wrong and thousands of people replied.
Most decided that he was, in fact, the bad guy in the situation.
One person noted: "Often it's not what we say, it's how we say it. It probably would've been handled very differently if you had handled it differently. I know air travel can make people turn into idiots, so please everyone, don't be that idiot."
One plus sized person added: "No matter the reason someone is fat (which they never owe anyone a justification for their existence. No one does) they deserve respect.
"Are airplane seats too small? Yes. Does [he] think that us fat folks don’t know and DREAD sitting on a plane? I’m a size 18 and I was just on a plane.
"The skinny old lady in the seat next to me was complaining about her armrests the entire time because I SWEAR those seats are getting smaller.
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"OP just wanted to cash in on the whole 'YEAH! Fat people are gross and lazy and how DARE this person need to fly on a plane while having a body!'"
Another said: "I'm a fat person who does try to be a small as possible on a plane and I'm very phobic of flying due to this, it isn't always discipline that makes people fat, there are other issues at hand, this reeks of I'm big but chiseled and why are you so fat when you could just eat less and exercise more."
"Flight attendant can't really do much unless there is an empty seat they could have sat him in," reasoned a poster. "They don't make airline policy."
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