When you buy an airline ticket, one of the things you’re buying is the right to use your seat’s reclining function. If this passenger so badly wanted the passen

When you buy an airline ticket, one of the things you’re buying is the right to use your seat’s reclining function. If this passenger so badly wanted the passenger in front of him not to recline, he should have paid her to give up that right. That's a weak argument. If the recliner's ticket purchase granted the right to use the reclining function then wouldn't the Knee Defender purchaser also have been granted usage rights for his purchase that prevents reclining? He would have been better off going with the "first mover advantage", whichever object (seat back or knee defender) occupies the seat row DMZ wins.