Because I Said So – Dad Edition – Too Fat To Fly

For this week’s Because I Said So, MommaDJane and I are going to discuss: Should people of size have to buy an extra seat on airplanes.

Unless you are living under a rock, you probably heard about Kevin Smith‘s (director of Clerks, Mallrats, and Cop Out) and his problems of being Too Fat To Fly by Southwest airlines.  It is being referred to as FatGate, or ChubbtGate.  Huffington Post has a good review of who was right and wrong.  If you want to decide for yourself you can review Kevin Smith’s tweets, Southwest first response and second response and Smith’s responses to all that.

You may be wondering why we picked this topic for Because I Said So.  Well, MommaDJane is normal sized person or as I like to call them, small.  As you may or may not know, I am 6’5″ and about 300 lbs.  I don’t fit on planes.  Heck, I don’t fit in most cars.  The first thing people say when I get in the passenger seat of their car is, “I think that goes back some.” It usually doesn’t.  It is even worse on planes.

I only fly when it is a necessity.  I almost opted at my last job to drive from Memphis to Tulsa because it was only 8 hours but it was cheaper to fly.  When I do fly, I take precautions.  I book early and I sit on the emergency exit or the bulkhead seat.  Sometimes no matter what I do, I have to fly and sit in a regular seat.  Let me tell you it is not fun for anyone near me.  The person in front of me can’t put their seat back.  The person next to me has my legs spilling over into their foot space (I have long legs) and help us all if I sit in a window seat and have to pee during the flight.

With all that said, I do however fit in a regular seat.  I would but upset if I had to buy an additional seat to fly.  Also I would be really mad if I was already in my seat and they kicked me off and sited that I didn’t fit and needed to buy a second seat but there were no seats available to buy.  The problem, in my opinion, is the airlines are trying to squeeze as many people on to one plane as possible.  To top that all off, the airlines have started the practice of over selling the flights.  This practice was thought up because an empty seat is wasted money.

Do I think bigger people should have to buy an extra seat? Should you be kicked off a flight because you are bigger? NO!  I think the airlines should be a smaller number of seats and larger seats on the plane.  I don’t have to buy a second seat, yet.  To me it is a slippery slope and only a matter of time before they tell me I am too tall to fly.

What do you think of the whole Kevin Smith/Southwest fight?  Should larger people be required to buy additional seats?

I think that MommaDJane might have a different opinion on it all because she is normal sized and probably dreads seeing me lumber down the aisle about to sit down next to her on a plane.  I am heading over to MommaDJane to check hers out but it might take me a minute because I am so large.  Why don’t you join me?

Have a topic or question you would like to hear our views on? Have you always wanted to hear both sides of a topic or answers to a question, unbiased? You can submit topics or questions via comments or even anonymously to buckrogers79@gmail.com. We will pick questions at random and blog on one topic per week.

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