I gave up my seat one time so a granny could sit with her grandkid. I had a heck of a time getting another place. Would I do it again. Yes.
My 7 year old daughter and I were upgraded to 1st class just before general boarding, I was grateful to the guy that gave up his aisle seat so I could sit next to her.
I’ve done it a few times, especially when it appears that it would separate a mom and a young child. I don’t necessarily want to entertain someone else’s kids on a plane. I’ve also given up a few first-class upgrades to some older vets on some domestic flights. But, each and every time, it was my choice.
But the best time was when I refused to move out of my aisle seat when a, let’s say large woman (you can figure out the ethnicity/color and probably be right), demanded that I move over so that she could have the aisle seat. The attendant’s response was priceless, “Ma’am, he’s Global Services and with the exception of the pilot’s seats, he can sit anywhere he chooses; and you can choose to not sit on this flight.” Even if they would have offered to move up to first-class, I would have refused just to watch her squirm up against the window.
My wife were assigned seats across the aisle from each other. Mine was seat B hers was seat D on a plane with 2 seats on each side. When I took my seat the “lady” in seat A looked at us and asked, in a demanding way if I’d change places with my wife because she did not want to sit next to a man! Figuring she must have had major psychiatric issues, I looked at my wife and she said, well, OK!
We changed seats and for the next 2 hours I was glad I did but felt terrible for my wife who had to deal with the psychopath, borderline-personality disorder passenger next to her. She called the flight attendant every 10-15 minutes to complain about something. Demanded to speak with the Captain about her alleged mistreatment by the airline and harassing the flight attendants as they were trying to serve drinks and basically do their jobs. My wife did her best to just ignore her, refusing to participate in dialogue with her.
When the plane landed, she was met by airline employees in suits and some type of legal authority (should have been men in white coats!). So in this case, I was glad I changed seats! My wife, not so much !