Pick the Middle Seat

This article was featured in our weekly newsletter, the Liberator Online. To receive it in your inbox, sign up here. If we’ve not met, you may be unaware that I am a big guy. I also travel a lot. For my comfort, that means making sure I sit by the window or on the aisle on a plane. Coming back from Las Vegas last month, I didn’t check in early enough for my flight to get a low boarding number on the airline that uses “cattle call boarding.” That meant a middle seat for four hours. While kicking myself for not checking in sooner, the realization of the opportunity this presented hadn’t hit me yet. This was an AMAZING opportunity for outreach. Most of the time, sharing such close quarters with complete strangers makes them great friends by the time we get to our destination. I know about their job, family, pets, etc., and they know a lot of the same stuff about me. There is typically a seed for Liberty planted somewhere in our interaction. By sitting in my preferred seat next to the window, I limit my opportunity to the person sitting in the middle, unlikely to hold any real conversation with the person sitting on the aisle. On the flight home, the three of us discussed politics, freedom, and the upcoming election in a very honest and civil manner. Both now have a different view of libertarian thought and are actively considering how much more often freedom is the answer. Since, I’ve had at least one conversation with them both, as they had further questions about libertarianism and asked about resources for learning more. Obviously, I offered the Liberator Online, this column, and our online store. What might happen if we all picked the middle seat and seized the opportunity to double our outreach efforts?