Husband's touching gesture on a plane sparks Twitter debate

A man’s so-called romantic gesture on a plane has ignited a debate on social media.

Last week, Courtney Lee Johnson, an entrepreneur, shared a picture on Twitter of a man standing up during a flight so his wife could lie across three seats.

The image indeed shows a man looking on while his wife reclines, in an apparently resting state, across the three chairs in the middle of the plane.

“This guy stood up the whole six hours so his wife could sleep. Now that is love,” Johnson captioned the image.

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The post has proved popular on Twitter, with 16,000 likes at time of writing – and some seemed to agree with the romantic nature of the scene.

However, many others took issue with the portrayal of romance, calling the wife selfish.

Of course, it’s not clear what the full story was – and others suggested the man’s wife might be in poor health.

Others expressed their doubt that a flight attendant would have allowed a passenger to stand for six hours.

Flight policies usually dictate that passengers are allowed to stand and move around the cabin when the seatbelt signs are switched off – but generally passengers stay in their seats.

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Earlier this year, a picture of a plane passenger using his toes to browse the inflight TV caused controversy.

Instead of using their hands to navigate the inflight television (or the remote for that matter), an anonymous flyer was filmed using his bare feet to swipe through the film options.

A fellow passenger filmed the unusual method and sent it to their friend, Alafair Burke, who posted the clip on Twitter alongside the caption: “My friend who doesn’t have twitter sent this from her flight. It belongs on Twitter.”