OT: overweight-man-kicked-off-southwest-flight

mgaggie wrote:I believe its the norm in Europe for overweight people to have to purchase two seats

How is that determined? Does the suspect overweight person have to get on a scale? Or do they take measurements when the person is seated in the airline?

Sorry, I don't mean to sound snarky but it just seems like this is a very slippery slope as far as discrimination. I say this as a 5 ft. 2 inch person who is just a few pounds overweight and who feels smothered when someone who is huge sits next to me on a bus. But just because I feel that way, I don't think I have a right to insist on a practice that feels discriminatory to me.

I agree with Chris D about the plane seats being small for alot of people. It just seems like in their attempt to get as many people as possible on the plane, the airlines are using that as justification to practice discrimination.

49er

As with all consumer products, people have to learn to vote with their billfolds, I do! I will no longer fly in a cigar tube. In the past I've flown over 38, 000 miles, no more I'll stay home. Jim

If I can't drive, I stay home.

Goofproof wrote:As with all consumer products, people have to learn to vote with their billfolds, I do! I will no longer fly in a cigar tube. In the past I've flown over 38, 000 miles, no more I'll stay home. Jim

If I can't drive, I stay home.

I can't stand giving up my 4th amendment right if I have any choice in the matter so I don't fly. I stay home or drive ... I've chosen to never leave the western hemisphere.

Recently on an airplane, I sat next to a man who I think was at least 6'7". His weight distribution looked appropriate for his size. He spilled over his seat into mine. I was next to the window so could brace myself fairly well against the window. Fortunately the flight was less than 2 hrs so I didn't need to go to the washroom and attempt to crawl over the fellow to get there. The fellow wasn't fat just very large. The seats I think are designed to get the most # of a standard size passengers in so that the airline can rake in the bucks. There is no practical accommodation for people who don't fit the standards. Makes you wonder who designated the 'standard' sizes. It's a mess for sure!

chunkyfrog wrote:...sometimes I bring a step over from hardware,
(and leave it there) or knock it down with a broom. I

Good thing I can zoom!

This is bullying.... would they kick off a person in a wheel chair, how about a person of color, or someone that doesn't "look" or "sound" normal in their opinion....the subject
Quite frankly, I think discussing the subject in public is also BULLYING! does not anyone think that the person being ridiculed doesn't know and is already embarrassed by their problem.... they really don't need it pointed out to a plane full of people or in the newspaper.

LSAT wrote:I thought I read something a month ago that a Foreign Airline was charging by weight. ....(Found it)
http://www.foxnews.com/travel/2013/04/0 ... ir-weight/

In the early days of air travel until the 1950s, passengers were weighed before boarding, just like baggage. There seems to be a move toward going back to that practice:

http://www.airspacemag.com/history-of-f ... atter.html

This whole subject thread is just stupid. The OP link is in reference to a guy who felt humiliated because he was told he was too fat for the airline seats. He could of just responded that the airline seats were too small for him. Whatever happened to "the customer is always right"? The customers became sheeple terrorized by authoritarian corporate fascists. People have just forgot what it was like to live in a "FREE" society.

Why was he not humiliated when the TSA assumed him to be a terrorist and put him through an x-ray machine to look at his nakid body or worse yet fondled his privates with the threat to do a body cavity search? Losing your 4th amendment right without probably cause is what is HUMILIATING!!

Fuel is calculated based on weight. 100 passengers weighing what was considered average for human beings all over the world up until America got fat. However if you then take those passengers and multiply by 2 OR MORE the weight you end up running out of fuel. So I at 150 lbs am paying to fly someone 200-300 lbs. THAT is discrimination! Why should I pay to fly you? Flying is a privilege not a right. I don't have to pay for you to fly. You want a bigger seat? Fly first class and pay for it. I am perfectly comfortable in my seat.

Just this month was a news story that an airline (Southwest I think) was going to make their bathrooms smaller (HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE) so they can add an extra row of seats.

BlackSpinner wrote:Fuel is calculated based on weight. 100 passengers weighing what was considered average for human beings all over the world up until America got fat. However if you then take those passengers and multiply by 2 OR MORE the weight you end up running out of fuel. So I at 150 lbs am paying to fly someone 200-300 lbs. THAT is discrimination! Why should I pay to fly you? Flying is a privilege not a right. I don't have to pay for you to fly. You want a bigger seat? Fly first class and pay for it. I am perfectly comfortable in my seat.

But Black Spinner, where do you draw the line? Should the 6ft 7" inch guy who is oversized but normal weight have to pay for an extra seat since he was infringing on the space of the person beside him?

Should the person in the wheelchair that Nan rightfully pointed out have to pay for an extra seat since it adds weight?

What about the blind person who has a seeing eye dog?

You see, the issue of weight transcends beyond people who are overweight whom I feel are targets because they are just a bunch of undisciplined slobs.

49er

Kenwood wrote:Just this month was a news story that an airline (Southwest I think) was going to make their bathrooms smaller (HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE) so they can add an extra row of seats.

Great, now they will have a test for fitting into their bathroom. And if you flunk, you will have to pay an additional charge.

49er

I haven't stood in a cart for several years; I no longer shop when the store is deserted, and usually there is
a kindly, tall or regular height person to reach for me; or I shop with son or husband, who are normal height.
The other evening, though, I was forced to stand on the front apron of the cooler in the dairy section when
all the good flavors of no sugar-added yogurt were way out of reach.
I probably should have called the main switchboard, and request assistance, like I've done in the restroom,
when I discovered the paper was out.

BlackSpinner wrote:Fuel is calculated based on weight. 100 passengers weighing what was considered average for human beings all over the world up until America got fat. However if you then take those passengers and multiply by 2 OR MORE the weight you end up running out of fuel. So I at 150 lbs am paying to fly someone 200-300 lbs. THAT is discrimination! Why should I pay to fly you? Flying is a privilege not a right. I don't have to pay for you to fly. You want a bigger seat? Fly first class and pay for it. I am perfectly comfortable in my seat.

Funny thing: my husband is 5' 11" and weighs about 150 pounds. The airline seats are too narrow for him. His shoulders are over the armrests. There is also not enough room for his legs.

Moreover, even at my current weight, I used to fit into the seats just FINE. Until, instead the airlines started trying to squeeze more seats into the same space.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/05/30/travel/airline-seats

But the American rear end isn't really the important statistic here, Robinette says.

Nor are the male hips, which the industry mistakenly used to determine seat width sometime around the 1960s, she says.

"It's the wrong dimension. The widest part of your body is your shoulders and arms. And that's much, much bigger than your hips. Several inches wider." Furthermore, she says, women actually have larger hip width on average than men.

The industry used the male hip as a seat measuring stick "thinking that it would accommodate the women too, but in fact they don't accommodate the larger women."

The result: Airline seats are approximately 5 inches too narrow, she says. And that's for passengers in the 1960s, let alone the supersized U.S. travelers of today.

And she's right: despite the fact that most of my weight is in my hips and thighs, my shoulders are wider than the rest of me.

So why do I have to take flack for the width of someone else's shoulders? And airline greed?

49er wrote:But Black Spinner, where do you draw the line? Should the 6ft 7" inch guy who is oversized but normal weight have to pay for an extra seat since he was infringing on the space of the person beside him?

Should the person in the wheelchair that Nan rightfully pointed out have to pay for an extra seat since it adds weight?

What about the blind person who has a seeing eye dog?

You see, the issue of weight transcends beyond people who are overweight whom I feel are targets because they are just a bunch of undisciplined slobs.

49er,

You made some good points. I sincerely hope your last statement was sarcastic. 'Cause you know what? My normal weight husband eats 6000 calories a day on a desk job to maintain his 33" waist. (His legs are 33" inseam, too... all his height is in his legs!) I, on the other hand, keep a food diary, and consume about 1650 calories, the amount a female person my size, who was a normal weight, would need just to maintain their metabolic processes. (10-11 calories per pound of optimum weight for females, 15-16 calories per pound of optimum weight for males.)

My husband eats when he's hungry. I have to figure out if I can "afford" it.