‘This was in the mid-2000s before smartphones’: Woman demands to use a teen’s DVD player and earbuds during a flight, refusing to take no for an answer

Author image for Etai Eshet
Etai Eshet • Editor
Jan 28, 2026 8:00 PM EST

A random adult woman on a long flight tries to share a teenager's portable DVD player and earbuds, treating a stranger's entertainment like a public resource.

This story is kinda like the No phones in sight meme. Where people on a subway each bury their face into a newspaper. Like, I'm nostalgic just like the next person. But some human traits didn't evolve for the worse in the past 20 years. Or 50. Entitled trash didn't smell any better when you needed a portable DVD to watch stuff on flights or a CD player and probably a gramophone if were being honest.

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  • Young adults smiling in a group photo with a giant portable DVD player edited on top
    via BananaStock/Creatas

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • It’s the kind of moment that feels like a bad dream. No seat-back screens, no smartphones, just a group of teens trying to pass the time with a book and a movie. The woman next to one of them can’t sit still, bored and restless, until she decides the solution is to borrow the nearest source of entertainment. She taps the teen, asks to share the earbud, and when that’s politely refused, offers her own used pair like it’s a normal transaction. The entitlement is staggering. The assumption that someone else’s personal items are up for grabs, especially something as intimate as earbuds, turns the cabin into a weirdly invasive theater.

  • Random woman requesting to share stranger's earbuds and portable DVD player

    This was in the mid- 2000s before smartphones. I was in an international exchange program with fellow teenagers on a long flight with no seat- back entertainment.
    via godihatepeople
  • I was reading a book and my seat neighbor was a girl I knew from school, and on her other side was a random adult woman squirming around because she had no apparent way to entertain herself.
    via godihatepeople
  • photo of a portable DVD player
    via Creatas

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • My friend was watching some movie on a portable DVD player and earbuds. At some point, the adult woman tapped her on the shoulder and asked if my friend could set her DVD player on the tray tables between them and share an earbud with her!
    via godihatepeople
  • Of course it's disgusting to have a stranger put your earbud in their nasty ears, but this was before Airpods, so my friend would've had to lean in close to this adult stranger to share the earbud.
    via godihatepeople
  • All in all, it came across as very entitled and invasive. My friend, being glib, apologized and said. only one earbud was working and couldn't share.
    via godihatepeople
  • teenagers smiling in a group photo
    via BananaStock

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • The friend is polite, tries to deflect, but the woman doesn’t take the hint. She doubles down, offering her own earbuds as if that makes it any less awkward. The real power move comes when another friend jumps in, pretending to share the movie by stringing the earbud over her own ear, effectively shutting down the whole exchange. The look on the woman’s face says it all, confused, annoyed, defeated. The DVD player is reclaimed, the earbuds stay put, and the teens go back to their own devices.

  • This woman had the gall to say, "No worries, we can use mine!" and pulled out her own personal (USED) earbuds!!
    via godihatepeople
  • Disgusting! At this point, my teenaged friend was losing confidence in the face of adult audacity and likely would've just went along with it, so I put down my book and butt in, saying "OK I'm ready to share the movie with you now!" And proceeded to take an earbud and pretended to put it in by stringing it over my ear and started the movie back up.
    via godihatepeople
  • That completely shut up the strange woman and eventually I went back to reading my book, giving back my friend's earbud.
    via godihatepeople
  • The woman never called us out for sharing the allegedly broken earbuds. I haven't talked to that friend in about 20 years and don't remember her last name, but I still vividly recall in great detail the look on that woman's face when I poached the DVD player from her.
    via godihatepeople
  • FukmiMoore I have never understood people who don't plan a way to entertain themselves on long haul flights, train or bus trips. Prior to ebooksi always had a couple of magazines, at least three books and a puzzle book to occupy myself.
    via godihatepeople

  • The whole thing is a masterclass in boundary testing. Some people treat strangers like walking vending machines, expecting access to whatever they want. The real victory isn’t in the confrontation. It’s in the refusal to play along, in the quiet act of reclaiming what’s yours without making a scene. The flight eventually ends, but the memory lingers, a reminder that not every request deserves a yes.

  • godihatepeople Original Poster's Reply I remember that got all two weeks' worth of my missed schoolwork done on between all flights and layovers, including reading that book and writing out an essay by hand (gasp!) for English. It admittedly helped that the math teacher went with us because I could not have done new calculus material on my own
    via godihatepeople
  • Scared_Hand902 The audacity to pull out her own USED earbuds like that makes it better is absolutely sending me. Good on you for intervening
    via godihatepeople
  • godihatepeople Original Poster's Reply She already had her tray table down and everything. She had clearly been watching the movie out of her peripheral prior to speaking up, but this was before subtitles were customary so I imagine it only did so much for her attention span. I very pettily, and dare I say quite bitchfully, turned the DVD player away from her to angle more toward me when I commandeered it to make her view even worse. In the moment I told myself it was to minimize the chances of
    via godihatepeople
  • Wise_Thanks8086 mid 2000s flights were lawless but this was still not ok at all
    via godihatepeople
  • MoonlitCinderGrove Same here, I don't get how people just... sit there for hours with nothing. My anxiety could never.
    via godihatepeople
  • OpportunityMany5374 Are you... Me? $$700
    via godihatepeople
  • Interesting_Wing_461 I always plan my reading before a flight.
    via godihatepeople

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Tags

2000s teenagers early 2000s nostalgia DVD flight entitled people
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