They're Both Jerks: How Twitter Judged the 'Knee Defender' Fight

By now you’ve certainly heard that United Airlines kicked a pair of passengers off a flight for fighting over space. One of the passengers had installed a “Knee Defender”—a device that prevented the seat in front of him from reclining. The passenger in the now-immovable seat threw a fit—and her cup of water—at the man behind her.

In the public debate that raged, opinions were passionate—and divided. Was the knee defender within his rights? Was the water thrower justified? We turned to social media intelligence company Brandwatch to help us allocate the blame. By measuring data from Twitter, we can see that the public sided with … neither of them. “The public deemed both as having selfish motivators and reactions,” said Dinah Alobeid, a spokesperson for Brandwatch.