When Do You Give Up Your Seat On The Subway? TheGloss

Liz Jones wants you to realize that all men under 40 are “rude arrogant pigs” who won’t help ladies with car trouble. Liz Jones hates the world, and that’s fine. In New York, the closest thing we have are men who won’t give up their seats on the subway.

But this really shouldn’t be a chivalry thing. This should be a human decency thing, where you rise and relinquish your seat to those who seem to need it most.

Though honestly? I almost never do.

Look, odds are, I got on the subway at rush hour and I elbowed my way into that seat so I could sit and read my book for fifteen minutes rather than doing the crotch-rubbing sexual harassment dance with the standing people. I hate that dance. That is my least favorite kind of dance, next to the fox-trot. I’m sorry the other standing people weren’t hardcore enough to literally fling their bodies across the train onto an available seat, but, well, I guess that’s because they’re weak and they didn’t want it badly enough. I don’t want a man to just give me that seat. I want to win it. If someone else wants to challenge me to a duel for that seat I will engage in one, but I will do so sitting down.

Really, whether or not I get to sit and read peacefully on the subway or have a homeless man bump his genitals against my behind determines whether I arrive at work in a good or bad mood. Incidentally, that picture? That’s of me on a particularly successful day when I got three seats. That day is going to be awesome.

As for other people? Well, mostly I just make an effort to ignore anyone else who might deserve the seat more. Children? Run free on that subway car, it’s like a roller coaster! Old people? Old people love to stand! It’s good for them! Pregnant ladies? Well, okay. I guess I’d give up my seat for someone if she was actually in the process of giving birth. Like, if the baby was coming out of her right then. But I’d probably shoot purposeful looks at other people in the vicinity and hope they did it first.

I’m assuming that no one else is this bad about it. When do you give up your seat on the subway? What’s proper? If you live in an area without subways, please pretend you live in New York, and take the subway from Grand Central at 9:30 every morning and are halfway through Stacy Schiff’s biography on Cleopatra, and then offer some insight.

Eileen

I don’t ride Metro during rush hour anymore, but when I did, there really wasn’t any reason to give up my seat – people who ride the orange or blue line through DC during rush hour are almost always young, healthy, and not pregnant. I could usually get a seat coming back (i.e. towards Vienna/Franconia Springfield) because I worked pretty far into the city, but coming in towards New Carrolton/Largo I always expected to stand…so I sort of figured I’d paid my dues.
- Lexie
  
  Ditto. Except there are a few more pregnant women/older ladies on the Red line, so I give up my seat…occasionally.
  
  Though I so rarely get a seat to begin with. I travel from one of the most crowded stations to home, and I’m usually crammed next to an Old Spice advertisement every time.
macalny

I always offer my seat to pregnant and elderly people (and HATE the a-holes who rush into the train before allowing people out just so they can sit their lazy ass down for, as you said, a mere 15 minutes. Get over yourself! Let people off and enter the train like an adult, not a barbarian on the warpath). Children will never be offered a seat. Perhaps I don’t get this because I don’t have children, but why the F does a kid have to take up a seat? They’re young, active, fidgety and wholly capable of standing on their own two feet (after about age 2, of course). They have the rest of their lives to get fat and lazy; they should stand now before arthritis and their “bad knees” kick in.
Maura

I ALWAYS give up my seat to the elderly (or gee-you-look-sorta-borderline-old), pregnant ladies AND kids under… I dunno, I’m bad with ages 8? Otherwise, their faces are CROTCH HIGH. Talk about a sexual harassment subway dance. Besides, the subway jerks around a lot and it’s safer for them to sit. I’m 31 and, guess what, the 15 minutes won’t kill me either.
Grace

Where I am you are not entitled to a seat unless you have paid an adult fair; there are actually signs up reminding young people and children (or rather, their parents) that they are required to surrender their seats for adults. So while I don’t stand for kids, I will stand for the elderly/pregnant/physically disabled or injured/those who obviously need the seat because they are ill or have some other good reason/etc. If I’m in a really good mood I may just offer it to someone who looks really tired.