Southwest Will Eat Itself

Wow; What a judgemental, non compassionate and unacceptable attitude towards this man.

that's just horrifying.

Some of the comments were just as sickening; one by FLConsumer and one by Keter in particular. FLConsumer said, "I'm getting tired of the world catering to the problems created by obesity rather than working to solve it...I certainly can sympathize with those of larger size. At no other point in humanity has fattening/unhealthy food been cheaper and more available than it is now...BUT, in many (most) cases of obesity, it *is* a case of willpower, or "instant gratification" to be more precise..." Keter said, "I agree that people who CHOOSE to be the size of two normal people should have to pay proportionally... At this point, I'm speechless, except to say that is bullsh*t!!!!

I just came here to see if you'd posted about this as soon as I read it. Wow is right. I want to know what Southwest plans to do about this. If their blatant discrimination against larger people wasn't enough to get in an uproar about before, I truly hope that this makes people want to protest. It shouldn't matter that the hep-c is what made him gain the weight, he was deathly ill and needed to fly to be treated. If this had been a sick thin person, do you think they would have gone at least a little bit out of their way to accommodate them? I bet they would have.

Momto6, I could not agree more. The man DIED. He died because his medical problem made his body swell up past the point where he could fit in one seat. I suppose now that they know he had hepatitis C, they will say it's his fault because of excessive alcohol consumption? Doubt it. Usually the people who complain the most about fat are two-fisted drunks themselves, albeit thin ones.

Oops, sorry, he didn't die, he "almost" died. I hope he sues them all.

WTF! That's disgusting. I cannot believe someone would make the choice to be responsible for someone's death to get an extra ticket sale! There is no conceivable consequence for the agent allowing the man on. This is hate. God bless Becky/agent who paid for the ticket.

They of course need to be sued silly. One way to take out discrimination at Southwest would be to to pass the San Francisco nondiscrimination law in a town they fly into. I really think Oakland would be the next target for that, so much of the bay area fat community already lives there anyway. Or maybe Portland.

Holy crap! Paging Sondra Solvay. He should sue Southwest and if he absolutely has to, he could make it about his medical condition, rather than his weight. (Though that would be unfortunate, I think Southwest needs sent a message and if my own preferred message has to take a back seat to legal strategy, then I can understand). I am incensed at some of the comments made in the article.

What a cold world we live in. This story is extremely upsetting. I appreciated reading all the great comments above.

This is just crazy. nycfembbw, I do believe you're right about living in a cold world. Americans are getting colder and colder. Makes me sad.

OK I bet I'm going to take some heat for this but ... does anyone else find the reporting of this a bit over the top? Points with which I completely agree: # Southwest policy on seat purchases and determining who needs to purchase an extra seat is ridiculous, discriminatory, insulting, and downright unfair. # Come on, give a man who's deathly ill a break. Especially if he's already got a seat booked and the flight isn't full. I mean, seriously. There was absolutely no need to be so cut and dried about it, if that's how it happened. # Ultimately, the situation as it's described is, if I may be so blunt, just sh*tty all around. But here's the stuff that makes me go "Hmmm....." # Brandi's commentary, and its usage. OK, yes, if MY father were on his deathbed and treated so poorly, I'd be angry and loud as well. I just feel like it was coached, or she's hiding a career as a B-rate romance novelist in the closet somewhere. "Scraping by on the pennies we call California Disability pay," and "The agent content to let him die in the boarding area." just struck me as obviously melodramatic statements designed to invoke .... oh, precisely the reaction they have invoked. It seems a bit irresponsible of the journalist at hand to print this without a bit more warning than "We asked some followup questions of the daughter". # This is the only mention I can find in the news on google searches. Do you mean to tell me something this terrible happened and no major news source was alerted? I know Scottsdale isn't that big, but come on .... The Consumerist? I'd be on the phone with NBC or Fox or SOMEBODY over something this major. You can't tell me a local network outlet wouldn't pick that up. # And the skeptic in me wants to know why the hospital wouldn't help with transportation? This could be my ignorance of medical procedure, but it would seem that if a man is truly on his death bed and there is an available liver transplant, either he'd be given emergency transport to the hospital, or the liver would be given emergency transport to him. Is this not the case? Something about this doesn't sit right with me, and I keep re-reading it to find myself in the wrong.

Good point Craftygirl. I told some co-workers this story than realized I'd only read about it on a blog. I tried googling too and only found this: http://www.blogsouthwest.com/2007/01/25/an-unfortunate-event/ no info there

I agree with craftygirl that there are some suspicious features of this, though I think I disagree about what they are. I don't think it would be normal for the Mayo clinic to transport him to San Francisco, for example, or for a liver to be shipped if he wasn't already approved for a transplant. It also doesn't shock me that a new network wouldn't have picked this up yet: even if it really happened as described, it only happened a few days ago and newsrooms are going to hesitate before coming down hard on a company like Southwest. What I actually found more suspicious is that this guy couldn't find ANYONE except a Southwest ticket agent to lend money for his ticket (including his caregiver), and couldn't use the same Amex card he used for the initial ticket. (Though again, these things are possible -- it's a rough world.) I'd like to know how long he was actually waiting in the boarding area. (If, as I suspect, it wasn't all THAT long, this would explain why a news organization wouldn't pursue the story.) But in a way all this is beside the point. The Southwest policy is unfair, bigoted, and arbitrarily enforced. In fact, Southwest has pretty much let it be known that they enforce the policy arbitrarily. They have, I believe, made a point of discouraging fat people from flying Southwest so as to cater to the apparently large number of airline passengers who find something especially offensive about sitting next to a fat person. In a way, it's a brilliant move: make the seats smaller, pressure customers who don't fit the seats to go elsewhere, and exploit the widespread view that fat people are the reason why flying is uncomfortable. That any company could profitably pursue such a business practice is outrageous, but there we are.

AWFUL. Pure and complete prejudice!!! This may or may not be on topic, but it seems to me that people will agree more that a fat customer being asked to pay for two seats if they want to get on a plane, and if not, then, boo-hoo, they shouldn't be fat (SW) rather than asking a wailing, bawling misbehaving child and his or her parents to deboard a plane (AirTran.

Erggg....I re-read that paragraph after I posted, so I am re-posting for clarification: More people would more than likely agree with the tactics that a fat customer should be asked to pay for two seats if they want to get on a plane (Southwest) rather than having a wailing, bawling, misbehaving child and his or her parents to deboard a plane.

Southwest's handling of this incident is unconscionable. I would suggest going to SW's blog on this incident http://www.blogsouthwest.com/2007/01/25/an-unfortunate-event/ and expressing and leaving the same comments as above. I also plan to communicate to SW via their blog that I will NEVER fly their airline. Boycotts work. I also suggest reading their "customer of size" policy which is available on the blog. Interestingly, someone with broad shoulders whose shoulders extend into the adjacent seatis NOT required to purchase an extra seat because according to SW policy he/she can "adjust their upper body". Huh? How? As such, SW's policy is clearly aimed at fat people not "customers of size".

Southwest's handling of this incident is unconscionable. I would suggest going to SW's blog on this incident http://www.blogsouthwest.com/2007/01/25/an-unfortunate-event/ and expressing and leaving the same comments as above. I also plan to communicate to SW via their blog that I will NEVER fly their airline. Boycotts work. I also suggest reading their "customer of size" policy which is available on the blog. Interestingly, someone with broad shoulders whose shoulders extend into the adjacent seatis NOT required to purchase an extra seat because according to SW policy he/she can "adjust their upper body". Huh? How? As such, SW's policy is clearly aimed at fat people not "customers of size".

oh man, this pisses me off SO MUCH! i will never fly southwest, no matter what. they deserve none of my money. even if i were 100 pounds, i still would never fly SW

USF is not a medical hospital UCSF is.

So this entire story is a hoax? What, did some Beavis-and-Butthead types sit there and go, "Oooh, let's make up a story that will get all the fatties mad!"

I've seen nothing to indicate that it's a hoax; Southwest acknowledged that they apologized on their blog. Did you find differently?

I think that 'hoax' is not quite the accurate word to describe this. The problem is that our information is extreme and fishy on one end, and a little more than vague on the other. Something happened. But little else to know beyond. One blog entry uses histrionics and offers information that cannot be verified (or, rather, I should say, has not been verified). The Southwest blog is not verification of the story we've heard. 'An unfortunate event' suggests that they went about their usual strategy of treating a fat person like crap and then were surprised by certain repercussions but really, in the end, says little at all. They acknowledged that they apologized, but for exactly what? Makes me hope someone here has the time to dig beyond the blog posting (and its reposting) to the actual story so we can get a decent and full picture. That all said, I think the reason this resonates so much is that even if it is not factually true, it is true in the way that this treatment and malign is a basic part of a fat person's life. We respond to this because we've seen enough and experienced enough to know it could happen.

Semantique, that's pretty much what I was thinking. What bothers me about the whole issue is that even if it didn't actually happen, it's very possible for something like it to happen. Southwest's policy practically invites it.

Questionable as the reporting of this story may be, it does point out the biggest problem with SWA's policy -- allowing people to get to their destination in one seat, then suddenly deeming them too fat to get home without forking over more money. It's almost as if they revel in getting people in a position where they have no options, they will pay up or be stranded. And of course, though they will take your money right there at the airport, getting the refund if they force a second seat purchase and the flight isn't full requires jumping through hoops and contacting customer service and blah, blah, blah complicatedcakes. I recently flew to and from Dallas on USAirways/America West, on Embraer jets that are two by two seating, rather than three by three, with seats that are 1.25 times the size of those in a Boeing 737. My flights were fine, despite my presence as a supersized woman trying to fly next to a stranger, until I got onto my last flight, where my seatmate got very upset and found the only other empty seat and moved as soon as we were airborne. What was the problem? My legs, within the boundaries of my seat, were preventing him from flinging his legs out as far as he wanted. He moved next to a tiny, petite little woman, and in short order she was pressed into the wall and had her legs crossed to get out of his way), and his other leg was out into the aisle. Can we please have a "policy" to deal with people like that? If my body is subject to rules, why isn't his behavior?

I've known about Southwest's policy for years, and consequently have never flown with them (regardless of the price difference) and have told everyone I know about it, too.

I'm with you on both points, Dreama. :) Fortunately or unfortunately, we haven't figured out how to regulate "inconsiderate"

I have ofter wondered what would happen if these situation occurred at the Southwest Airlines gate.. A group of fat ticket holders (maybe 4 or more) showed up for a flight, none of which had pre-purchased more than one seat. This would be a flight that is consistenly overbooked, such as Houston to Tampa. Would it be safe to say that if one of the fat ticket holders did have to buy a second seat, then another ticket holder could share that second seat and therefore not be made to purchase a second seat? Additionally, if this flight is overbooked, then would it be correct to assume the fat ticket holder, who is at the mercy of a ticket agent at the gate, would then not be required to purchase a second ticket? What I mean is, how can the agent force a fat flyer to buy a second ticket when there are no seats to be purchased? What I am getting at is, SouthWest Airlines has a ten-minute rule before boarding. If a fat person waited until the last 10-15 minutes before checking in and obtaining a boarding pass, isn't it likely the plane would be full at that point and therefore no "extra" seats would remain? Sometimes I wonder if the fat flying public couldn't just create a "flying newsletter" that allows us fat travelers to join others of the same situation on those flights, thus allowing that unexpected additional seat cost to be defrayed by these scenarios. For example, the NAAFA convention in July. Just some hypothetical thinking this morning.