Columnist Susan Snyder: A heavy burden for Southwest

Tuesday, June 25, 2002 | 8:16 a.m.

There's no one we should envy less than the poor Southwest Airlines ticket agents.

They endure the wrath of passengers whose baggage is overweight, or too big, or too numerous. They are the ones who have to select which passengers will be randomly searched and prodded.

And, they are the ones who have to find a polite way to say, "Um, you're too fat to fly with us unless you buy another ticket."

It is impossible to fathom how one would tactfully tell another person such a thing in order to place new emphasis on Southwest's long-standing policy of charging a second fare to those whose nether regions spill into a second seat.

It is impossible to fathom because it is impossible to do tactfully. It's like telling someone they're too ugly or too stupid to fly.

While I am all in favor of making the cattle-call of airline travel less so, I also am in favor of being consistent and seeing the true culprit.

The American Obesity Association has criticized Southwest, Continental, American and Northwest airlines for policies aimed at the more corpulent, saying it is the refusal to make adequate cabin accommodations that are at fault, if passengers are squished too close together.

This is true. What is the first, most obvious perk in the first-class cabin? Wider seats. Airline company officials know that seats fewer than 19 inches wide aren't the most comfortable.

And what is the very first thing most of us smaller, less-bulging passengers do when our flight isn't full and the seat next to us is empty? We push the arm rest up for a bit more room.

When the plane is full, most of us have to suppress the most juvenile of vacation complaints: "Mom! He's on my side."

Frankly, I find a larger person a far less annoying seatmate than a parent who thinks their lap-traveling toddler is cute and entertaining. Even a cooing, laughing infant is invasive when the flight is five hours long, and you're trying to catch a nap or read quietly.

And what are we going to charge the guy whose aftershave is gagging rows 13 through 25? The woman whose under-the-seat pup or cat is making you sneeze? The woman whose "carry-on" consists of a huge shopping bag of souvenirs that takes up her foot space, so she crowds yours?

Who's next? People who breathe too loudly? The list of could-be inconveniences is endless and completely subjective.

They pack us in like sardines, and we get anxious like too many rats in a cage.

Frankly, I think Southwest Airlines should give a discount to Las Vegas residents who have to hear the pilot's tired old, "Welcome to Lost Wages," every time we fly home. It wasn't funny the first time.

I think the people making ridiculous policies from their glass offices ought to be the first to hit the terminals and show their ticket-taking underlings just how this fat-tax is to be enforced.

And I think people of a wider girth ought to buy up a whole mess of tickets and give them a whole lot of practice.

I, for one, would rather share a seat with any one of them than some babbling, drunken suit who is passing off his trip to gamble and leer at waitresses as "business."