Obese have right to 2 airline seats - court rules

sweet adeline

http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssAirlines/idUSN2039776920081120

Obese have right to 2 airline seats --Canada court
Thu Nov 20, 2008 10:17am EST OTTAWA, Nov 20 (Reuters) - Obese people have the right to two seats for the price of one on flights within Canada, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled on Thursday.

The high court declined to hear an appeal by Canadian airlines of a decision by the Canadian Transportation Agency that people who are "functionally disabled by obesity" deserve to have two seats for one fare.

The airlines had lost an appeal at the Federal Court of Appeal in May and had sought to launch a fresh appeal at the Supreme Court. The court's decision not to hear a new appeal means the one-person-one-fare policy stands.

The appeal had been launched by Air Canada (ACa.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Air Canada Jazz (JAZ_u.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and WestJet (WJA.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz). (Reporting by Randall Palmer)

Kel Varnsen

Remind me to wear a fat suit the next time I board a plane. That way I get two seats!

_Crazy_Mary_

Kel Varnsen wrote:

Remind me to wear a fat suit the next time I board a plane. That way I get two seats!

Good thinkin!
But, I wonder how they determine if someone is obese. What is obesity? I weigh 116 lbs. At my heaviest I was 144 lbs. Was that obese? Should I have had two seats? When I was pregnant I weighed 170! Should I have had two seats then?

Kel Varnsen

_Crazy_Mary_ wrote:

Good thinkin!
But, I wonder how they determine if someone is obese. What is obesity? I weigh 116 lbs. At my heaviest I was 144 lbs. Was that obese? Should I have had two seats? When I was pregnant I weighed 170! Should I have had two seats then?

Plus if someone is wearing a fat suit, unless it is totally obvious how is anyone going to stop them from getting two seats? It is not like any air line employee is going to expose them and the company to a gigantic lawsuit by feeling someone's belly to make sure it is real and not a pillow stuffed under their shirt.

Plus how are they going to deal with this on busy flights? I mean I, like probably most people book most of my flights online, between online and phone tickets are sold without seeing the person. So unless there is going to be a new section where they ask for your measurements, what happens if you buy only one seat and the plane is full?

_Crazy_Mary_

OK. I just looked it up and obesity is a BMI of 30 or higher. Maybe this means people will have to punch in their height and weight when they buy their tickets. If that's the case I will always punch in a gigantic weight. I can't imagine they would make you 'weigh-in' at the airport! :eek: Nobody would go for that!

Lizard

sweet adeline wrote:

http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssAirlines/idUSN2039776920081120

Obese have right to 2 airline seats --Canada court
Thu Nov 20, 2008 10:17am EST OTTAWA, Nov 20 (Reuters) - Obese people have the right to two seats for the price of one on flights within Canada, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled on Thursday.

The high court declined to hear an appeal by Canadian airlines of a decision by the Canadian Transportation Agency that people who are "functionally disabled by obesity" deserve to have two seats for one fare.

The airlines had lost an appeal at the Federal Court of Appeal in May and had sought to launch a fresh appeal at the Supreme Court. The court's decision not to hear a new appeal means the one-person-one-fare policy stands.

The appeal had been launched by Air Canada (ACa.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), Air Canada Jazz (JAZ_u.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and WestJet (WJA.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz). (Reporting by Randall Palmer)

Awesome.

stop discrimination.

sweet adeline

Lizard wrote:

Awesome.

stop discrimination.

gonna have to disagree with you on this one.

Lizard

sweet adeline wrote:

gonna have to disagree with you on this one.

how many seats do you think that guy that weighs half a ton would need?

angryyoungman

Lizard wrote:

how many seats do you think that guy that weighs half a ton would need?

he gets his own airplane

_Crazy_Mary_

Lizard wrote:

Awesome.

stop discrimination.

No, because now I'm being discriminated against because I'm skinny. I want two seats, too!

sweet adeline

Lizard wrote:

how many seats do you think that guy that weighs half a ton would need?

he shouldn't be flying.

RolandTD20Kdrummer

Every pound in the air directly relates to fuel costs which is then passed on to consumers.

Flying is a socialist endeavor.

I was thinking just the other day that if they weigh people's luggage, and charge for going over on that, why not weigh people too?

Discrimination....can of worms, or just being realistic?

hmm...

mammasan

This is ridiculous. If you occupy two seats then you pay for two seats. I had to pay for my youngest when he was 2 years old for a seat, it was their policy that children 2 years and up had to have their own seats, and he sat on my lap the whole flight.

Speakers

I think they should make people sit in a box, like the luggage thing. If they overflow they have to go underneath or pay for two seats.

anotherclone

I can imagine what a cluster this is going to be. If they need two seats, they will be pissed off that they have to PAY for two seats, because, you know...that'll be discrimination. There will be another law suit that allows them to have two seats for the price of one. And we'll all end up paying more.

NoK

Speakers wrote:

I think they should make people sit in a box, like the luggage thing. If they overflow they have to go underneath or pay for two seats.

Hahaha or ask them to remove items?

NoK

anotherclone wrote:

I can imagine what a cluster this is going to be. If they need two seats, they will be pissed off that they have to PAY for two seats, because, you know...that'll be discrimination. There will be another law suit that allows them to have two seats for the price of one. And we'll all end up paying more.

I think what the article is saying is that they can already get two seats for the price of one on internal Canadian flights.

Uncle Leo

I don't know if Canada has some sort of a law that makes this the right decision, but either way...

I have a real problem with a law like this. I am a liberal who believes in more government regulation than most people (I would not even dump OSHA standards, dag nabbit). But this does not protect anyone's safety. It simply tells the airlines that they have to give a second seat free to people of girth. It's not the government's role to do that. Charging someone for two seats when they use two seats is not discrimination--would it be discriminatory if I wanted a compact car, but my since my size would require I get a full-size that the auto dealer would not still charge me for a compact? Should the government make that regulation?

If an airline wants to do this on their own, that's fine. It's their business. Even if the airline made the decision, though, it would bug me (though it would be my role only to voice my opinion with/without my patronage). Would my price go up a bit because an airline is giving away the occasional free seat to someone who needs two seats because they live a shitty lifestyle? That would piss me off. I suppose if they could discern who has a glandular issue and is not at fault for their size and they got the free seat, I'd be OK with that. But most people are as they are through their own doing. These are not equal rights, but special rights.

Uncle Leo

_Crazy_Mary_ wrote:

OK. I just looked it up and obesity is a BMI of 30 or higher. Maybe this means people will have to punch in their height and weight when they buy their tickets. If that's the case I will always punch in a gigantic weight. I can't imagine they would make you 'weigh-in' at the airport! :eek: Nobody would go for that!

Until a successful new years resolution for 2003, I was at the lower-edge of obese, clinically-speaking. I don't know what my BMI was, but I was 5'8" 210. I could have gained 50 more pounds and not needed another seat. To most, I was just a fat guy, as people don't use "obese" except for the particularly large individuals. But technically, I was obese. No way they'd have given me a seat under this law. It just makes no sense. I fit in the seat fine. So it's going to be for the super-obese (not clinical term, my made-up term). So you are right. Big, big mess. It's going to be case-by-case. And if someone comes to the airport and is determined to need 2 seats on a full flight, what happens?

BTW, as someone who struggled with weight his entire life until making conscious decision to change my lifestyle, I fully believe that 99% of all obese people are such because of they way they live. Nothing else, including "bad genes" or "big bones" is at fault. It was when I accepted it that I was able to change it permanently. Maybe the "fault" factor is not relevant to this case, but it just leads to my lack of sympathy, except for the small number with a medical condition or whatever.

anotherclone

NoK wrote:

I think what the article is saying is that they can already get two seats for the price of one on internal Canadian flights.

You are quite right. I did miss that for some reason.

I wonder what "functionally disabled by obesity" means? That almost sounds like a medical term that really has some definition attached to it.

Anon

Uncle Leo wrote:

If an airline wants to do this on their own, that's fine. It's their business.

I agree with this. As long as it doesn't cost me anymore for my seat because of their new rulings, then i don't care and i have no issue with what the airline wants to do.
It's silly to say just because i'm not obese that i would want two seats too. I don't need two seats and i'm comfortable enough (well as comfortable as you can be on an airline), so there's no point me demanding i get two just because someone else has one.

I'd be a little annoyed if i was a parent like mammasan, with a 2 year old sitting on my lap for the whole trip, and i had to still pay for a seat for them though.

know1

What an idiotic ruling.

(less surprising, though, that it's Canada)

Anon

know1 wrote:

What an idiotic ruling.

(less surprising, though, that it's Canada)

I wouldn't be poking fun at what Canadian Airlines do....

Weren't some of our airlines charging U.S. soldiers extra baggage fees to take their military kits with them as they set off for war....

Awesome.

know1

Pj_Gurl wrote:

I wouldn't be poking fun at what Canadian Airlines do....

Weren't some of our airlines charging U.S. soldiers extra baggage fees to take their military kits with them as they set off for war....

Awesome.

I was making fun of Canada in general.

But also in this case it was the court ruling that was idiotic, not the airlines.

Commy

know1 wrote:

I was making fun of Canada in general.

But also in this case it was the court ruling that was idiotic, not the airlines.

If a company charges x amount for 1 person, the ruling seems to make sense.

Lesbelges

Speakers wrote:

I think they should make people sit in a box, like the luggage thing. If they overflow they have to go underneath or pay for two seats.

Awesome! Would be really humiliating to not pass the box test. But really hilarious too!

Lesbelges

know1 wrote:

What an idiotic ruling.

(less surprising, though, that it's Canada)

Yeah cause this other country we know is not reputed to have idiotic lawsuits and rulings....Ahem!

Lesbelges

Commy wrote:

If a company charges x amount for 1 person, the ruling seems to make sense.

Companies charge x amount per seats. Maybe based on this ruling, if I can get 3 skinny people to fit in 2 seats, we should only pay for 2 and not 3!

Songburst

know1 wrote:

I was making fun of Canada in general.

But also in this case it was the court ruling that was idiotic, not the airlines.

You do realize that any American who ever did anything note-worthy was Canadian right?

Sweet Emotion

So the fat folks out there are now entitled to 2 seats on the plane according to Canadian courts. If I was an airline I would reserve the right to not serve the fat bastards. What if 50 overeaters board a flight with 100 seats? Why should the airline have to take the hit? The other part of it is they don;t know if someone is fat until they board and require the extra seat. So does that mean that someone gets bumped?
I say fuck em. Limit 2 fatties per flight and they sit in the back of the plane near the toilets.

Lesbelges

Sweet Emotion wrote:

So the fat folks out there are now entitled to 2 seats on the plane according to Canadian courts. If I was an airline I would reserve the right to not serve the fat bastards. What if 50 overeaters board a flight with 100 seats? Why should the airline have to take the hit? The other part of it is they don;t know if someone is fat until they board and require the extra seat. So does that mean that someone gets bumped?
I say fuck em. Limit 2 fatties per flight and they sit in the back of the plane near the toilets.

Need one if the front and one in the back for balance!


Maybe Orbitz should have a box you tick if you're so fat you take 2 seats