Kevin Smith denied by Southwest Airlines

Does Kevin Smith have too much baggage?

Southwest Airlines has declared director, Kevin Smith, too wide for a wide body.   They claimed his weight was a safety concern.  That's preposterous.  If a terrorist popped up on the plane, they would have been thankful to have Smith fall on him.

A long time ago, there was a huge fooforah about stewardesses being fired for being overweight.  That policy got overturned, and yet, the paying customers can't fly unless they look like they can stop themselves from devouring the entire peanut cart on their own. What is Southwest saying here?  In order to fly you must weigh less than a flight attendant?

I took a peek at the Southwest Airlines website.  Perusing the FAQ's produced no evidence that they are concerned about passenger weight restrictions.  Clearly, they're not being frequently asked if someone is too fat to fly. It's such a preposterous concept that people don't feel a need to wonder if they can squeeze their personal padding into a plane seat.  After a bit more searching, and many clicks, under the company policy section and further clicking into a section called "Customers of Size", I found a notice that they consider anyone who can't squeeze themselves into the 17" space between the arm rests to be overly round and in need of an extra ticket and a special booking procedure.  Your baggage can be 62", but you can't be 18". 


Really?  Shouldn't that be more easily accessible information?   Anyone just cruising around their site wouldn't have a clue that this happy little policy was going to incur a fat boot planted in your delicate posterior after you'd bought your tickets, gone through security, boarded the plane, and finally settled into your seat.  There's no obvious heads up that your round trip ticket will only get you a round trip back to the passenger lounge.

Sure, Southwest apologized their fool heads off to Smith with blazing speed, but not until after he'd tweeted it across the planet.  A sincere apology would have occurred before he'd ratted them out. 

Airlines are complaining about gas prices, lower passenger counts, and the fact that they've been "forced" to raise their ticket prices.  People aren't flying as often because they can't afford it, they don't want to wait around all day for Homeland Security to scrutinize toes before deciding whether they can or can't board the plane, and the fear of being blown out the the sky by a radical is a genuine concern.  And yet, Southwest is merrily asking people to get off the plane if they can't thread the seat needle.  I guess they have money to burn and they're one of the few corporations that actually believes any press is good press.

Southwest will never get the Panda transport contract this way.

Lily Robertson, who weighs less than your average suitcase, can be reached at canopicjargon@gmail.com or on Facebook.