US comedy actor admits 'responsibility' for 'rawdogging' travel trend

Patrick Warburton, best-known for his role of David Puddy in beloved US sitcom Seinfield, has revealed he feels partly responsible for the viral 'rawdogging' travel trend.

Popular on TikTok, the trend sees people sitting through long journeys without any form of entertainment.

The bizarre travel trend of simply sitting with your own thoughts even became so popular that ‘rawdogging’ became the American Dialect Society’s 2024 word of the year.

Taking it to greater extremes, some undergoing the trend will also claim to forgo food and drink for the duration of the journey.

And comedy actor Patrick believes the trend may have all started from a Seinfeld episode.

Taking to social media, the 60-year-old star shared a clip from the sitcom, in which Patrick's character David and on-off girlfriend Elaine, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus, are on a flight together.

In the much-loved scene, Patrick’s character admits he has zero intention of entertaining himself on the long flight journey but instead plans to simply ‘sit there staring at the back of the seat’.

The video was captioned: ‘The ultimate Puddy stare, try this trend at your own risk.’

Poking fun at the new viral trend, Patrick added he feels ‘a bit responsible’ for it ‘becoming a bit of a thing’.

He said: ‘My concern is that somebody’s gonna get hurt and if you go into this thing blindly, just not reading, watching something, you better be okay with what’s going on up here [pointing to his head].

‘I’m not, but it’s weird and entertaining at times. Just be careful, it’s not for novices.’

Since the 'rawdogging' trend first emerged, thousands of clips have surfaced on TikTok that show passengers trying to complete lengthy journeys by only staring at the back of the seat in front of you or looking at basic flight map data.

One social media creator @westwashere has uploaded several viral TikToks showing himself 'barebacking' flights and encourages his followers to follow suit.

In an overlaid caption, he wrote: 'Is someone gonna match my freak? (go the whole 10 hours flight, not moving from my chair, only watching the maps and airspeed.'

Then, in other TikToks, he reveals how he 'survived' long-haul flights only watching the map and windspeed.

Meanwhile, another social media creator, @cookestraveltok revealed in one of her TikToks how her mother was a particular fan of 'rawdogging' flights.

She explained in a caption accompanying a clip of her mum on a flight: 'My mum's beige flag is that she rawdogs every flight, no matter how long.

'This is her on a nine-hour flight. No iPad. No headphones. No book. At least she's comfy! Go Girl.'

The clip has since garnered more than eight million views from bemused TikTok viewers.

Dubbing ‘rawdogging’ a flight as ‘a silent meditation in the sky’, clinical psychologist Dr Ramani Durvasula, based in Los Angeles, previously told MailOnline that the viral TikTok trend is a form of 'aesthetic' flying.

She explained that someone who rawdogs could be a 'mental introspector' - a person who has been 'trained' to 'zone out' from a young age.

Remarking on what sort of person is likely to rawdog, she said: 'The why is actually quite unclear – once upon a time it is possible that lots of people rawdogged flights.

'There were no options for entertainment - just one movie that played from an overhead screen – like it or not, and if you fell asleep you missed it.

'You could bring a book or a magazine – but that was that (my mother, grandmother, and former mother-in-law were all world class rawdoggers I can now see – I didn't know there was a name for it).'

Believing that younger generations may possibly be doing it due to ‘poor preparation, exhaustion’ or ‘some other emotional reason’, she said she believes the viral TikTok trend has led to it becoming an ‘aesthetic’.

What are they thinking about during these prolonged periods? Well, according to Dr. Ramani, it could be a plethora of things.

The psychologist added: ‘They could be thinking about anything from absolutely nothing, to ruminating over stuff in their lives, to noticing what is going on in the flight.

‘It could be a sort of nifty built-in you got nothing else to do mindfulness mind clearing experience’.