We have all seen horror stories by now showing unruly, typically drunk passengers on airplanes who are refusing to comply with the flight crew’s requests. The pilot gets involved and begins issuing commands, the person becomes increasingly agitated, and if the plane is in the air, it may even make an unscheduled detour to disembark the problem passenger before proceeding.

This gets amplified by social media 1,000 fold and that person will make or break themselves in how they respond.

What I feel isn’t up for debate is the behavior itself taking place at all. I understand that traveling is stressful, and to have rules and regulations imposed upon you is an additional strain, but those rules and regulations are in place to protect the rest of us from your bad day turning into our last one. We all know these rules by now and they are just a fact of life. If you want to travel anywhere interesting that requires a flight, just suck it up and you’ll be there in no time, no incident required.

If you’re one of the unintentional witnesses to this kind of behavior, try and have just a little bit of compassion. For the sake of basic decency, don’t record it and put the person on blast, because you don’t have the first clue about what that person may be going through. The relevant authorities will handle the situation and you can get back to your travels, hopefully without distractions. Feel free to tell the story as a lighthearted anecdote but that’s all the more reach it needs.