Southwest Picks Wrong Fat Guy in Kevin Smith

You’re missing the point JR, and Bob, he WAS ABLE to lower the armrests, and the people in the row with him didn’t complain. Whats the use of having a policy if you don’t abide to both sides of it?

Oh come on. Most of us have experience how painfully long flights can be when squished next to an overweight person. There are lots of people defending him but how many of them would actually choose to fly next to him for a 4-5 hour flight?

@Trilon3: It was a 1 hour flight.

Come on tho, Kevin’s a husky dude but he’s not overflowing with male jelly here.
Southwest went way overboard.

Please spare us the outraage. Mr. Smith’s industry tells people to go home for being too heavy every day.

As I said before, I myself am an oversized person, But I can completely understand the policy. I am able to fit into the seat belt, but I still will sit next to my daughter (she’s tiny) so that I don’t overcrowd a stranger. I felt so bad for my Son-in-law the last time that we all flew together. I sat with my daughter and he sat in the row in front of us. The man who sat next to him was Considerably oversized and lifted the arm between them without even asking, then had the nerve to ask my son-in-law to move over. He then proceeded to complain the rest of the flight about not having enough room and being obviously irritated everytime my son-in-law would brush him. I had a hard time not speaking up, especially since seeing my son-in-law (6’2″) squeezed into the corner of his seat (dressed in his fatigues) while he was on his way back to base for re-deployment ceremony and celebrations. Please don’t make your weight issues someone elses problem. Have some respect people!

Kat, if you read the article you will see that he new of the policy. In fact other reports state that he actually had two ticket purchased for a later flight but switched to the earlier flight. As I stated before. The fault of the airline was in not standing by their policy when they made the flight change. Yes, airline seats are small, but that is the way it is. Airlines need to make money to stay business. If you know that you don’t fit in a regular seat then fly an airline that has 1st class or pay for both seats. Take some responsibility for yourself. If we start increasing the seat sizes to fit ‘oversized’ people then the average person will not be able to afford to fly.

I think Kevin Smith is sad about his weight. Plus it hurts to be told your heavy even if you know you are, you still don’t want to hear it. He is making fun of himself with all of his comments and twitters and needs to just let it go.

My family and I, combined, used to fly SouthWest about 20 times a year. After they kicked a woman off for breast feed, and kicked a couple women off for “provocative” clothing, we switched. And with this latest absurdity, I can see we will never switch back. Who the hell runs this airline, Daffy Duck?

Look people, here is the way it is. Southwest is, and has alway been, an economy airline. No perks, no frills, they don’t even have assigned seats. they do not offer 1st class because of this. As far as kicking a woman off for breast feeding I don’t know. If you hear witness account of the women who were kicked off for procative clothing you might find that was ‘their’ account. Other passengers say that they were being rude and disruptive. I know that I flew American Airlines once this year and way shocked at how rude the attendants were. When the man in front of us offered to help the pregenant lady next to him put her bag up the attendant tried to take it from him and told him that if she could not put it up herself then it should not be counted as a carry on and she would need to check. Didn’t shock me at all be they had the man arrested for disruptive behavior when all he did was ask for orange juice (according to fellow passengers) I know when I was on the flight I couln’t even get their attention to get a cup of water.

@trilon 3: I would pay handsomely to sit next to Kevin Smith on a flight, just for the conversation. And apparently neither passenger to his right or left had an issue with him. SW arbitrarily tried to apply an out-dated “policy” in an era where economy seat and aisle sized no longer accommodate most travelers. And it was arbitrary indeed: Mr. Smith has traveled SW countless times, yet never been asked to vacate a seat because of his size until this point. And it appears there was another passenger of even larger girth who was not questioned on the same flight. So either it’s a black-and-white, applies-to-all ‘violators’ policy or it isn’t. SW has definitely lost my business, and I don’t even have seat-size issues.

Airline seats are shrinking; Americans are getting bigger.
They need to post a size/weight limit so that you know ahead of time if you will be allowed to fly, or not. No one likes surprises, or humiliation.

Tough – Kevin Smith is an idiot who does nothing but send out stupid “tweets” all day…for most of us who have lives we really don’t care what you’re doing every 8 minutes of the day.

the director should apologize for creating a Twinkie shortage…

I’ve adopted a new policy to try to drive whenever humanly possible. On a flight from Newark to Las Vegas I began to vomit – I had a window seat (next to 2 women who were approaching 90 years old)-it happened so fast & I had forgotten about the paper bag that was tucked in the pocket. The 2 elderly women were sweet – they offered me a tissue; the flight attendant (Continental) only gave me a dirty look – water would have been nice. As for SW Airlines – I think of banjo music.

Stupid mindless twitts !!! Yea I am overweight but I also have diabeties to which I gain weight and cant loss it no matter how,when or what I eat and an airlines charging more for a person of weight while they make the seats smaller so there will be more profit for the stockholder.Then there is me who doesnt have a savings account who has been layed off because of this economy ..HOW AM I GONNA AFFORD 2 SEATS TO RIDE ON AN AIRLINE???Oh and the underweight do they get charged less because they throw up their meals after they eat. Why are we all being punished because of big buisiness.Aint it funny how big buisiness plots to get us fighting amoung our selves so we forget about who really started this with the smaller seats so they can make more money !!!

What transport system moves 500lbs of cargo for same price as 100lbs. If the passengers next to him did not complain about the spillage into their space it probably was because they were embarrassed to say something in front of him. So I say to Kevin and others of super sized proportions buy two seats.. if too cheap to buy 2 seats as needed check out another means of transportation or perhaps the cargo section.

The problem is that the “average” size in America is well on it’s way to being overweight/obese.Actually, statistically, the majority of American adults are considered overweight. So this is not something that’s just a rare problem, it’s becoming the norm. We can argue about why that’s happening (I think it’s a mix of person responsibility and factors beyond our immediate control) but the fact is that it’s the new reality. And airlines need to step up and respond to the changing demographic.
Additionally, what if they practice this policy in regard to someone who is heavy solely due to disease or some other physical malady? Isn’t that discrimination? They wouldn’t be allowed to refuse to let someone fly just for having cancer or MS or something. They accomodate passengers in wheelchairs. What would be the difference?
Also, what about very muscular individuals who take up more room? Would they be affected by this policy? Or is it soley reserved for the “fat”.

In regards to Kat’s comment that Kevin Smith is a victim, well, if he’s an American, the he’s a victim. We’re all victims and all deserve entitlements. We’re like little children and need someone to take care of us , change our diapers, and when we plump for whatever reason, WE MUST BE TAKEN CARE OF BY SOMEONE (mommy!!!). This will happen shortly as we’re well on our way to becoming a Socialist country. Listen, do you know anything about economics??? Airlines are barely making it and are trying to be more efficient so that they will not go bankrupt. Did you know that many cross-country flights, even when fully booked, lose money??? The fuel consumption is one thing (cost per pound of extra cargo weight), and there is also the opportunity lost if the overweight person requires two seats. If the large person pays for two seats, that may suffice. There’s also a safety issue is the plane has to be evacuated. Think about this: Your plane crash lands and the large person in front of you cannot move rapidly or maneuver through the wreckage. He traps you in the burning plane and you become part of the carnage. But we have to be fair to everyone! So Kat, the fat guy gets two seats instead of one, will you help pay for his seat along with the other passengers? The airlines won’t give it away for free.

Bottom line is if you need two seats you buy two seats. Don’t steal half of mine. He should have never been allowed to board when holding only one ticket.

If he put as much energy into losing weight as he has with whining and crying about this problem that he caused, then maybe he wouldn’t have to worry about fitting into one airline seat in the first place.
But a bigger question remains: how was he able to stuff his ego into such a small space like a Boeing 737?

Your obesity is not the airline’s
problem-it is yours.
The policy is there for a reason
and you are free to buy another
ticket or not fly on the airline.

Couldnt have happened to a better airline! Southwest is notorious for their staff living in power trips. Its like traveling in Communist Russia with the KGB watching. I remember several years ago, we were flying home on Southwest and my husband was carrying a cappuccino maker in a box. Upon checkin we asked if it was ok to take it on the plane and they assured us it was. We boarded the plane, and I was ahead of my husband. We knew it would fit in the bins because it had been tested in one of their metal examples. When I took my seat I realized my husband wasnt there anymore. I started getting worried when most of the plane was full and he still was not there. Then came the lovely page for me to come out of the plane. I exited to find the agents arguing with my husband that he could not bring the box in the plane because it wouldnt fit. We explained it did and got ok from the checkin people. They then called the state police in. YIKES – luckily for us the police agreed with us, but by that point, it was too late to take the flight and they had to put us on a later one, but it sure was scary. Unfortunately it wasnt the first bad experience we had with Southwest. I hope this current event will make their administration reconsider their aggressive customer “unfriendly” policies.

southwest is plain RUDE!!

Maybe Mr Smith should have taken Amtrak? Not as many hassles and the seats are oversized!

Why should I be put out because the guy next to me weighs more than 300 pounds? Don’t thin people have rights too? GO SOUTHWEST – way to stand by your policy and not bend the rules for some pompous fat#%*!!!

I know that being asked off a flight was embarrasing for him, but no overweight person should expect the person next to you to share the seat that they paid for. I have been on many flights where someone large has invaded my space and it has made my flight miserable! This is why Southwest has this policy…what about the rights of the person who is expected to share their seat?

My concerns about overweight people are related to safety. Does the extra weight predispose to an accident due to carrying too much weight? There was such a case when a Hispanic singer and her group were killed when their plane went down due too much weight. They had over-loaded it with musical equipment.