Kevin Smith Unleashes Twitter Storm on Southwest Airlines

[HaemishM]

Fuck Southwest Airlines in the earhole.

Look, I understand the "safety" concerns of too much weight on the plane. But, if you are going to start fucking people over for an extra seat charge without any concrete sets of measurement then you can go fuck yourself. If it's the armrest test, stick to it. Or better yet, why not start weighing EVERY PASSENGER before they get on the plane? Oh wait, would that embarrass some people? Fuck them, right, they shouldn't weigh more than they are comfortable admitting to the world. Or have one of those "You must be this wide to sit in our seats" mascots as you board the plane.

The company is there to provide a service to the public for a price. That comes with the burden that yes, Virginia, some people are fucking fat and your one size fits no one shitty too small seats for even a goddamn beanpole like me are not really comfortable for anyone, much less the morbidly obese. Either say that "Fat people don't fly Southwest"  and deny anyone over 190 lbs. entrance or shut the fuck up and let the fatties fly the rest of the goddamn world.

[Teleku]

Except of course that every airline has this policy.

[Arnold]

...

[LK]

Jesus fucking christ. Why is there such a media shit storm over this? A story of drama involving a fattie and the airplane that refused to fly him! Larry King Reports.

This is really, really, really fucking amazingly sad that so much attention is being put on this. I like Kevin Smith but god fucking damn, take the outrage down several thousand notches and maybe rally the base around something that actually matters for something.

Edit: Oh fuck. I get it now. He's doing this to help promote his movie. We just fell for the trap!

[Oban]

<insert rant about why I never fly coach because my knees do not belong in someone's back and/or slammed in to a piece of metal here>

[tazelbain]

And what's the deal with airline food?
</seinfeld>

[Riggswolfe]

I love Kevin Smith but in this case I have no sympathy. Suck it up fatty!

[Trippy]

Jesus fucking christ. Why is there such a media shit storm over this? A story of drama involving a fattie and the airplane that refused to fly him! Larry King Reports.

Things are more news-worthy in this country if they happen to celebrities or pretty white girls.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Also the country is getting fatter so more people will care. I still think it's just a blatant money grab though.

[Khaldun]

I don't like sitting to old ladies who talk to me a lot. Or assholes, I don't like sitting next to assholes. Tall guys with big elbows, that's bad too. I assume all of you except for the talkative old ladies, assholes and tall guys with big elbows are in favor of making them buy two seats or not flying as well.

[naum]

Jesus fucking christ. Why is there such a media shit storm over this? A story of drama involving a fattie and the airplane that refused to fly him! Larry King Reports.

Things are more news-worthy in this country if they happen to celebrities or pretty white girls.

/yes, inconceivable such a storm would brew for random dork #318692 and his list of 150 spam bot twitter followers…

[Rasix]

I don't like sitting to old ladies who talk to me a lot. Or assholes, I don't like sitting next to assholes. Tall guys with big elbows, that's bad too. I assume all of you except for the talkative old ladies, assholes and tall guys with big elbows are in favor of making them buy two seats or not flying as well.

Their belly fat doesn't run the risk of smothering me.  You can tell an asshole to shut up or put on some headphones.  As far as I can tell, hacking off Kevin Smith's protruding fatsack with a meat cleaver might be against airline policy.

[Signe]

There's something to be said for going everywhere you can by any means other than planes.  I don't know what I'd do in a plane full of judgmental F13 people!  I think it would kill me.  Next time I have to go anywhere across an ocean, it'll be by ship.  You can pretty much avoid everyone that way.  I don't care who I sit next to on a plane.  I'm too busy worrying.

[NiX]

I went to An Evening with Kevin Smith last week and he was looking a lot larger now than he was a year ago, so I can see why this happened. It's sad and unfortunate, but if it means 1 more variable that can cause something to go wrong, I'm ok with him being outraged and at the boarding kiosk.

[Lakov_Sanite]

I went to An Evening with Kevin Smith last week and he was looking a lot larger now than he was a year ago, so I can see why this happened. It's sad and unfortunate, but if it means 1 more variable that can cause something to go wrong, I'm ok with him being outraged and at the boarding kiosk.

This had nothing to do with airline safety,

[01101010]

I went to An Evening with Kevin Smith last week and he was looking a lot larger now than he was a year ago, so I can see why this happened. It's sad and unfortunate, but if it means 1 more variable that can cause something to go wrong, I'm ok with him being outraged and at the boarding kiosk.

This had nothing to do with airline safety,

So we should go with his reason: because someone at Southwest didn't like his movies? This is beyond dumb now and has ventured into the realm of publicity stunt.

[Arnold]

Fattie alert!

I don't like sitting to old ladies who talk to me a lot. Or assholes, I don't like sitting next to assholes. Tall guys with big elbows, that's bad too. I assume all of you except for the talkative old ladies, assholes and tall guys with big elbows are in favor of making them buy two seats or not flying as well.

[Trippy]

http://silentbobspeaks.com/?p=393

[schild]

Lots of folks still telling me to stop crying and lose weight - as if that’s what this was all about.

Well, yea, Kevin. It is.

Edit: Looks like he knows it too:

So I swore to Linda, up and down “Get me a document to sign, and I’ll swear on my child’s life and penalty of all I own that I’ll never sue your Airlines. But just PUT THE FUCKING TRUTH OUT THERE THAT I’M NOT TOO FAT TO FLY, AND THAT THIS WAS ALL AN UNFORTUNATE ERROR ON SOUTHWESTERN’S PART.”

I thought Kevin Smith would be better at Internet Fat Aggression.

[Righ]

As somebody who is only five feet eight inches tall and of slight build, I'd just like to say this - aircraft seats are too fucking small for me, let alone most of the rest of the planet. I don't know how you hormone grown American giants (slender or obese) cope. Kevin Smith is huge, I'm not sure that even I would want to sit next to him in economy. In those pairs of facing business class seats, sure. People jokingly call economy 'cattle class', but I've flown on African transport planes with cattle - a Dakota with bench seats, hand straps and a cargo net over the door beats economy on any modern airline.

[Morat20]

As somebody who is only five feet eight inches tall and of slight build, I'd just like to say this - aircraft seats are too fucking small for me, let alone most of the rest of the planet. I don't know how you hormone grown American giants (slender or obese) cope. Kevin Smith is huge, I'm not sure that even I would want to sit next to him in economy. In those pairs of facing business class seats, sure. People jokingly call economy 'cattle class', but I've flown on African transport planes with cattle - a Dakota with bench seats, hand straps and a cargo net over the door beats economy on any modern airline.

I'm 6'1", and even when I was in good shape -- airplane seats were too fucking small for me. Back when I was 18 and high-school skinny (no muscle, no real fat either) they were too damn small. Bang into the person in front of me, bang into the person beside of me, and those fucking armrests? Two people use those damn things, and they're apparenly sized for a single child's arm.

I was broad enough from shoulder to shouilder to have to sort of fold up anyways.

Now Kevin Smith may be huge and may need to buy two seats even if they were sized for human beings, but let's be honest: The average fucking human isn't 5'4" and 120 pounds, which appears to be what the seats are designed for.

[WindupAtheist]

I heard the in-flight movie was Jersey Girl and they threw him off for putting a bomb on the plane.

 

[Ratman_tf]

I heard the in-flight movie was Jersey Girl and they threw him off for putting a bomb on the plane.

 

So, did he get bumped for being too fat, or did they bump him because the plane was overbooked and his humongus gut is the first thing they noticed when they needed to shove someone off the plane?

[dusematic]

yeah this obesity entitlement thing isn't going to last. 

If I know anything about society, and I think do, the obesity entitlement thing will only get worse.  Eventually they'll have lobbyists and start pushing for anti-fat discrimination legislation and fat pride day.  It's probably happening already. 

[dusematic]

Fuck Southwest Airlines in the earhole.

Look, I understand the "safety" concerns of too much weight on the plane. But, if you are going to start fucking people over for an extra seat charge without any concrete sets of measurement then you can go fuck yourself. If it's the armrest test, stick to it. Or better yet, why not start weighing EVERY PASSENGER before they get on the plane? Oh wait, would that embarrass some people? Fuck them, right, they shouldn't weigh more than they are comfortable admitting to the world. Or have one of those "You must be this wide to sit in our seats" mascots as you board the plane.

The company is there to provide a service to the public for a price. That comes with the burden that yes, Virginia, some people are fucking fat and your one size fits no one shitty too small seats for even a goddamn beanpole like me are not really comfortable for anyone, much less the morbidly obese. Either say that "Fat people don't fly Southwest"  and deny anyone over 190 lbs. entrance or shut the fuck up and let the fatties fly the rest of the goddamn world.

http://cache-03.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/1/2008/11/Rogen_Kevin_Fat_Guys.flv.jpg

[Numtini]

I honestly don't get it. Something else had to be going on.

The rule is simple and it makes sense. if you can't fit in the seat, put down the armrests and put on a seat belt, then you need to buy another seat because you're going to bump someone off the plane. It's a simple revenue equation. If he can fit in the seat then that is that and if he can't fit in the seat then that is that.

And this is not Cape Air flying to Nantucket in a Cessna turboprop where there are loading issues, Southwest flies 737s. That excuse is silly.

Seating is torturous, particularly since you can no longer get up, but there's limits to what you can do. The airlines can screw people by adding a few extra rows and giving you less legroom, but they can't do much about width. If you pull a seat out of each row in anything but a widebody, it's a huge loss in revenue and people in coach buy based on price not on comfort. If they were willing to pay for more room they'd be in business. It's something that really needs to be done by Boeing and Airbus in future designs and there's no sign of that happening.

[Polysorbate80]

and fat pride day

On the bright side, the parade will only last about 15 seconds before everyone is too tired to continue.

[Comstar]

The weight IS important- there was a US passenger jet that fell out of the sky after take off because the weight was incorrectly worked out (Air Crash Investigation is surprisingly interesting television).

[01101010]

I honestly don't get it. Something else had to be going on.

The rule is simple and it makes sense. if you can't fit in the seat, put down the armrests and put on a seat belt, then you need to buy another seat because you're going to bump someone off the plane. It's a simple revenue equation. If he can fit in the seat then that is that and if he can't fit in the seat then that is that.

Could have sworn this was a case of switching flights to which Big Boy Smith had two seats on the original flight and moved to a different flight which only had one open seat available. If Southwest bumped Big Boy to the other flight, they fucked up and need to account for the storm. If Smith volunteered to get bumped then he should have mentioned his special needs and has no ground to stand on.

And he can not be that destitute that he can't fork up the coin to grab a 1st class seat anyhow, which begs the question why the hell iis he flying Southwest to begin with.

[Righ]

It's something that really needs to be done by Boeing and Airbus in future designs and there's no sign of that happening.

What do they need to do about it? All civil airliners have seat configurations that can be specified and modified by the individual airlines buying the aircraft. The average width of a seat in economy class these days is between 17-18 inches. Back in the 1970s, the average width of seats in economy was around 22 inches. On the whole, aircraft got wider and more fuel efficient. Seats should have got wider, but what happened was airlines became inefficient and top-heavy in management and wanted to squeeze more profit out of their flights to pay their bloated executive staffing and drop some bling on their shareholders. The wider jets were ordered with even narrower seats. I was in a 777 a few months back that had 10 seats and two aisles in every row.

If Boeing were to make a plane that's twice as wide as a 777, the airlines would just put 22 seats and four aisles in and award themselves larger bonuses.

[naum]

A big part of the problem is that flights, crews and support staffing have been whittled away too over the years. While I fly on an infrequent basis now, I used to live in airports/hotels, flying 2-3X or more a week…

√ …public flies more than ever, but flights and staff are cut so flights are more packed. Airports used to be busy with passenger activity 24x7 but most airports go to sleep in the wee hours now. Used to be that planes were generally only 2/3 full, giving people room to space out if cramped.

√ …cost cutting measures means most have skeleton crews and disgruntled pilots and crews are less than eager to be on call when schedule disruptions occur. 2 years ago, I got stuck in Pittsburgh for a few days because of thunderstorm in NYC — plane was delayed and eventually arrived but crew work allotted hours eclipsed and were barred from continuing on. Worse, this sets up a vicious chain of complaining customers, with bare bones staff ill equipped to handle (counter rep expressed to me that they just don't have the ability to accommodate paying passengers stuck like this and simply hand you a 1-800 number… …for which you'll talk to an offshore CSR after you sit on hold for 3 hours and fret that your cell phone battery/connection is going to give out…). From what I understand, backup crews were kept on standby in previous times, but cutbacks along with pilot/staff disgruntlement with management in recent years has contributed to a rather unpleasant condition for travelers.

√ …flying first class is nice, and I used to use my miles to upgrade (instead of using for trips) but often, even if you want it and willing to pay, it's unavailable, given the above and that there are just a few seats sequestered off.

If prognostications about the inevitability of fuel prices rising again are accurate, I don't think it's a far fetched to see the entire airline industry completely imploding.

[Nebu]

If prognostications about the inevitability of fuel prices rising again are accurate, I don't think it's a far fetched to see the entire airline industry completely imploding.

Your entire quote (not just the part I included) could be easily adapted and used to describe healthcare in the US as well.  Funny that.  

I don't get what the big deal is with this story.  If you require more than one seat, you buy more than one seat... which he did.  Trying to fit him into one seat was the fault of the airline, especially since he had paid for two.  The whining and grandstanding is all a distraction.  

[schild]

A big part of the problem is that flights, crews and support staffing have been whittled away too over the years. While I fly on an infrequent basis now, I used to live in airports/hotels, flying 2-3X or more a week…

√ …public flies more than ever, but flights and staff are cut so flights are more packed. Airports used to be busy with passenger activity 24x7 but most airports go to sleep in the wee hours now. Used to be that planes were generally only 2/3 full, giving people room to space out if cramped.

√ …cost cutting measures means most have skeleton crews and disgruntled pilots and crews are less than eager to be on call when schedule disruptions occur. 2 years ago, I got stuck in Pittsburgh for a few days because of thunderstorm in NYC — plane was delayed and eventually arrived but crew work allotted hours eclipsed and were barred from continuing on. Worse, this sets up a vicious chain of complaining customers, with bare bones staff ill equipped to handle (counter rep expressed to me that they just don't have the ability to accommodate paying passengers stuck like this and simply hand you a 1-800 number… …for which you'll talk to an offshore CSR after you sit on hold for 3 hours and fret that your cell phone battery/connection is going to give out…). From what I understand, backup crews were kept on standby in previous times, but cutbacks along with pilot/staff disgruntlement with management in recent years has contributed to a rather unpleasant condition for travelers.

√ …flying first class is nice, and I used to use my miles to upgrade (instead of using for trips) but often, even if you want it and willing to pay, it's unavailable, given the above and that there are just a few seats sequestered off.

If prognostications about the inevitability of fuel prices rising again are accurate, I don't think it's a far fetched to see the entire airline industry completely imploding.

The checkmarks you use are starting to annoy. Is there a reason you use them other than to shorten the first sentences of paragraphs?

[naum]

A big part of the problem is that flights, crews and support staffing have been whittled away too over the years. While I fly on an infrequent basis now, I used to live in airports/hotels, flying 2-3X or more a week…

√ …public flies more than ever, but flights and staff are cut so flights are more packed. Airports used to be busy with passenger activity 24x7 but most airports go to sleep in the wee hours now. Used to be that planes were generally only 2/3 full, giving people room to space out if cramped.

√ …cost cutting measures means most have skeleton crews and disgruntled pilots and crews are less than eager to be on call when schedule disruptions occur. 2 years ago, I got stuck in Pittsburgh for a few days because of thunderstorm in NYC — plane was delayed and eventually arrived but crew work allotted hours eclipsed and were barred from continuing on. Worse, this sets up a vicious chain of complaining customers, with bare bones staff ill equipped to handle (counter rep expressed to me that they just don't have the ability to accommodate paying passengers stuck like this and simply hand you a 1-800 number… …for which you'll talk to an offshore CSR after you sit on hold for 3 hours and fret that your cell phone battery/connection is going to give out…). From what I understand, backup crews were kept on standby in previous times, but cutbacks along with pilot/staff disgruntlement with management in recent years has contributed to a rather unpleasant condition for travelers.

√ …flying first class is nice, and I used to use my miles to upgrade (instead of using for trips) but often, even if you want it and willing to pay, it's unavailable, given the above and that there are just a few seats sequestered off.

If prognostications about the inevitability of fuel prices rising again are accurate, I don't think it's a far fetched to see the entire airline industry completely imploding.

The checkmarks you use are starting to annoy. Is there a reason you use them other than to shorten the first sentences of paragraphs?

Yoi, you are the quite the choleric.

Your recommendation for a less peevish bullet marker?

Maybe smileys, little hearts, dashes, spades, diamonds instead?

[schild]

Or, you know, words?