Hooniverse Asks- Should We Just Quit Pretending That Anyone Wants to Sit In the Middle Seat?

When it comes to the typical sedan, unless it is really small – like 30-clown small – it more than likely has belts for three in the back seat. Again, if it’s even a mid-sizer, that middle perch is pretty much a penalty box when it comes to anything other than a trip next door. The middle – or, to be totally politically incorrect the ‘bitch‘ seat – is offered by manufacturers as a throwaway feature that the makers can tout, or perhaps a nod to the insurance industry. It would seem that a five-passenger car must necessarily be better than one that only seats four. As a matter of fact, when Volkswagen couldn’t move the 4-place Passat CC here in the States, they shipped a slew of them back to Germany where they were retrofitted with back seats that could take 5 in a pinch. It seems that for most cars – and a lot of pickup trucks as well – that pinch is exactly how that middle seat occupant will feel as cars today just don’t offer the width necessary for three-across seating. I don’t know about you, but I don’t like to condemn my friends to center seat purgatory on  even the shortest of runs. What with even FWD cars having sizable tunnels these days, and the aforementioned skinny minnie-ness of most cars, it just seems cruel. What do you think, shall we just all agree that the middle seat is not a real thing and eliminate that extra belt that lives back there? Image: Mummy Of 3 Diaries