Seating on the priority seat

     It was last Saturday, after a 12-hour-trip in Hongdae including cooking, shopping, and so many other things. The time was 10:30 PM in a subway bounded to home, and I had to stay at the subway for one hour and thirty minutes more. I was extremely exhausted and my knee disease had started an hour ago. I was barely standing at the subway.

     I was standing in front of the priority seat, that has been empty for the last thirty minutes. For the first fifteen minutes, I did not think of sitting on it because it was culturally tabooed even it was legal to sit on if it is empty. However, the painful situation made me think of the legitimacy of sitting there. I once had a debate with the motion 'Is it okay to sit on the priority seat' when I was a child. I was at the okay side, arguing for the conditional responsibility which means I had a duty to give up my seat only when there is elderly in transportation.

     I soon realized that I had no problem even if I sit in there. I thought it was foolish to leave the seat empty in spite of my broken knees' pain. Keeping the seat empty was not rejecting a courtesy but fulfilling the main purpose of the seat appropriately. I sat on, then I could feel my knee being relieved immediately. Eventually, I could allow my body to have a rest for an hour. I open up my phone and started to play brawl stars. It was a precious time that came out after ending up a long trip of a day. But something happened suddenly, and it made me fall in deep speculation.

     One couple came in front of me and a man seat beside me. Then his girlfriend was frightened and said, "I've never seen someone sitting on the priority seat, so stand up quickly." She was saying to her boyfriend but also saying to me also. I felt offended. Did she ever think of my situation? Did she ever think of the legitimacy of seating on the priority seat? She made it uncomfortable for me to sit here, and it brought me to think of who in the world would be able to define what morality is.

     Unknown women defined me as an immoral person for sitting on the priority seat but I thought there's no problem with me. Rather, she was a problematic person in my perspective because she thought as if she was right in every situation and offended my morality. Who was right? Or, can someone be right?

     This incident made me think of what morality is. I faced many problems in the ethics book but it was first to have real-world experience. I still don't have doubt about my decision that it is not morally wrong, however, the question still remains, who the arbiter of morality is.