[el penguino]

Quote

Kevin Smith vs. Southwest Airlines: Bloggers on director's 'too fat to fly' battle

By Kelly Heyboer/ The Star-Ledger

When a Southwest Airlines flight attendant asked filmmaker Kevin Smith to get off a flight over the weekend, the New Jersey native said he went quietly.

But that was the end of his silence.

Smith — the Red Bank-born director known for his "Silent Bob" character in "Clerks" — unleashed a barrage of more than 200 Twitter posts and produced a lengthy podcast slamming Southwest for kicking him off the plane for being too obese to fit in his seat.

"I’m way fat, but I’m not there just yet," Smith twittered.

Smith says he purchased two seats for comfort for himself on the Oakland-Burbank flight. But he arrived at the airport early and got the last standby seat on an earlier flight. Once he was seated, he says a flight attendant told him the pilot had determined him a safety risk and asked him to leave— even though he fit in the seat with the armrests down.

Southwest officials apologized to Smith and offered him a $100 voucher. But they also used their own blog and Twitter account to defend their "Customer of Size" policy, which requires overweight passengers to buy two seats or risk getting ejected from the plane if the flight crew feels they are too big.

Bloggers immediately took sides in the Silent Bob-Southwest fight, debating when and if airlines have the right to single out passengers based on their weight. Some also questioned whether Smith, a celebrity with 1.6 million Twitter followers, abused the power of social media by turning the issue into a public relations war.

I think a lot of this comes down to one's opinion of Kevin Smith. He has a huge cult following and it's undeniable that there are a lot of people who love the guy and will take sympathy toward him.

I think he's a talentless neckbeard so I might be a bit biased in siding with Southwest. However, I have been the victim of having my space violated while flying and it really wasn't fun. I've always been a supporter of the "buy two seats" policy. Airlines could even compromise and offer the second seat at a considerably discounted rate if the flight isn't full.

These kinds of incidents probably happen on a weekly basis in this country. I guess people only give a damn when a celebrity starts running his mouth off. Certainly he is exploiting this incident as a way to build publicity for his new movie.

[Mets_bs]

yeah, sounds like someone's pride is hurt more than anything. Southwest handled this pretty well if you ask me, up until getting into a blog/twitter war with Kevin Smith.

[Hotcorner]

el penguino, on February 17, 2010 - 05:17 PM, said:

I think he's a talentless neckbeard so I might be a bit biased in siding with Southwest.

seconded!

[Dodge]

I'm a big fan of Smith's films, but I think he is being pretty ridiculous here.

[Benched]

I've been on planes where people are forced to buy two seats. It happens all the time. He probably refused. The pathetic thing here is that he thinks he's better than the normal overweight person.

[Everlong204]

Yea, when someone buys a $300 dollar ticket to sit in a seat on an airplane, they should be able to sit in the whole seat and not have there seat violated by someone else and suffer . Not bashing someone because there fat, but you have to think of the other passengers as well. If your going to take up two seats, then you have to buy two seats.

[el penguino]

I don't have a Twitter account so I didn't read Smith's posts but CNN talked about it last night. Apparently the problem wasn't that he refused to buy two seats, it's that he was given stand-by on an earlier flight and there was only one seat left on the aircraft.

A friend of mine flew from Philadelphia to Paris last year and told me that he had to deal with significant spill-over from the passenger next to him. If it were me, and I had paid $300-$400 for the one-way portion of the flight, I would have demanded to be upgraded to first class or get some kind of money back.

And I'm not even one of those people. By this I mean, the people at restaurants (or similar) who cause a big fuss whenever something minor is screwed up. I'm willing to let things fly, but if I paid that much for a ticket and had to be that uncomfortable for 7-8 hours, I'm going to lose my patience.

And it's not so much the invasion of the arm-rests that's the problem, it's the leg room. I'm fairly tall so I have enough of a problem as is, but if someone's thigh is protruding into my space, I would be incredibly uncomfortable.

[mystikol87]

Did he pass or fail the "[armchair] test"? If this is Southwest's written rule, and he didn't violate it, then I think that's a problem. I agree that very large people should purchase two seats; however, I think the airline should lay out ground rules ahead of time and stick to them. If they abandon preset (or not preset) rules, then I think a customer has a right to complain. Airlines need to have a policy. Or, if there policy is "we'll do what we want", then that should be known as well.

[el penguino]

I don't know if they pre-screen before boarding. I've seen them do that with carry-on luggage but not people.

If Southwest mishandled anything, it's the fact that they let him board the plane in the first place.

[Spike]

mystikol87, on February 17, 2010 - 10:56 PM, said:

Did he pass or fail the "[armchair] test"? If this is Southwest's written rule, and he didn't violate it, then I think that's a problem. I agree that very large people should purchase two seats; however, I think the airline should lay out ground rules ahead of time and stick to them. If they abandon preset (or not preset) rules, then I think a customer has a right to complain. Airlines need to have a policy. Or, if there policy is "we'll do what we want", then that should be known as well.

According to the radio, he did pass the test.

[fluxuation]

He says that he passed the armrest test and the two ladies who he was sitting between even told the flight attendant that they had no problem with him and that he wasnt making them uncomfortable. He also stated that he regularly buys 2 seats or even 3 seats when he goes on airplanes not because of his weight but simply because he would prefer to sit alone on a flight. Also claims there was a man who looked even heavier than him on the flight that was allowed to stay.

[Hotcorner]

I'd have kicked him off the flight just for Clerks 2.