Weight, What? Southwest Revamps Plus-Size Passenger Policy

Customers of size, meet customers of limited patience, numb legs, and quiet rage.

The airline once known for free bags, funny flight attendants, and open seating just changed yet another popular policy—this one affecting “customers of size.” Starting in January, plus-size passengers will have to buy two seats up front if they don’t fit in one. (No word on who determines this, BTW. If it’s the honor system, expect an explosion of TikTok terminal brawls.) On flights that aren’t full, passengers can request a refund after the trip—but only if both tickets were in the same fare class, and only if they file within 90 days.

If the flight is sold out? No refund. No exceptions.

The current Southwest policy—at least through the end of the year—states that passengers who need extra room can purchase a second seat—which the airline will then refund quickly and automatically after the fact—even if the flight is oversold. I’m sure every parent snuggling a squirmy toddler across three time zones finds this incredibly fair.

This image—or one like it—makes the rounds a lot, but to be fair, the baggage weight limit is mostly about the handlers’ backs, not the plane’s payload.

I want to be kind here. Truly, I do. After all, weight is a super sensitive topic—up there with fertility, fillers, and why the baby doesn’t look like mom or dad—and air travel is already stressful, undignified, and expensive. To some, Southwest’s new policy probably feels like one more shove on an already crowded staircase.

Unfortunately, no amount of empathy is going to add any extra inches to those sky coffins they call seats.

(Also, can we please talk about “customers of size”? So, XXL is the only size now? What’s wrong with plus-size? Where’s the outrage from the supermodel contingency? Can you imagine airlines offering special privileges for “customers of chiseled features and exceptionally long limbs”? “Please enjoy the extra legroom we carved out of coach by making everyone else pay to check their bags!”)

Tubby travelers are outraged. Fitter fliers are celebrating. You probably know where I’m going to land on this one.

I like to think I’m a kind person. I believe human dignity matters. Compassion is what separates us from feral hyenas. Nobody deserves to feel less than in a cramped aluminum tube hurtling through the sky at 500 miles an hour.

That said, I also don’t think I should have to serve as the load-bearing wall of Row 23.

I’m five-foot-seven and weigh roughly as much as a mid-sized Rottweiler. Which is to say: I take up my allotted 17 inches of space, buckle in, and spend most flights silently debating whether to die of kidney failure or ask the guy next to me to let me crawl past him when I don’t get my beloved aisle position. If I pay for one seat, I expect… one seat. Not slightly more than half of one plus the privilege of wearing my neighbor like an unsolicited weighted blanket.

Seriously, this is not okay.

We’ve all been on flights where we are sandwiched next to someone who clearly needed more room. And look, I don’t blame them. Airline seats have gotten progressively smaller, ironically at exactly the same time as humans have gotten exponentially larger. We were not consulted on this redesign. We didn’t make air travel into a game of high-altitude sardines. But when your shoulder, spleen, and SuperSized Mountain Dew are spilling into my lap, it starts to feel like I should be getting reimbursed for the portion of my seat being borrowed from me without my consent.

As unpopular as it might sound, I think Southwest (and pretty much every single other major airline) is right: if you need two seats, you buy two seats. Not because I hate you, not because I want to make your life harder, but because otherwise everyone else is paying for your second seat in comfort, circulation, and emotional stability.

(I think that section is called First Class.)

This is not about cruelty. It’s about physics. Airplanes are not churches, where “sharing a pew” is considered holy. They’re not overstuffed sofas, where sprawling is encouraged. They are seats designed by a sadist with a ruler and a vendetta. And if your body doesn’t fit in that seat, you are no longer one passenger, one seat. You’re a group project. And I’m not going to lie, I don’t do well with group projects.

Unique Gibson, the Atlanta-based founder of the SuperSize Your Life Expo that celebrates plus-size communities, told the Washington Post that she had planned to honor Southwest for its “heart” and commitment to inclusivity at her event in October, but because of the new policy, she’s revoking the nod. “The things that aligned me with Southwest are gone,” she said.

Imagine you have six kids and you go to rent a car. The minivan is twice as expensive as the compact—but your family of eight won’t fit in the Hyundai Accent. Is that somehow Avis’s fault? Should they be expected (read: forced) to upgrade you to the pricier Toyota Sienna hybrid with built-in entertainment screens and snack fridge because you happen to have an aversion to latex? In customer service terms, I believe that’s called Not Our Problem.

The article is more than a decade old, but Condé Nast Traveler reported back in 2012 that Alaska Airlines had found an interesting unofficial compromise to the size conundrum: Approach the most waifish (adult) passengers and ask if they’d be willing to be seated next to a curvier commuter in exchange for free sky miles, in-flight cocktails, or other perks. “A handful of miles is certainly less costly for the airline than a lawsuit,” the piece correctly stated—and yes, this was around the same time an “influencer” (OF COURSE) deemed “too fat to fly” sued Southwest for discrimination. At least Alaska was asking—and offering some form of compensation. (Although, let’s be honest, it also creates a brand-new category of trauma: Too Average to Bribe.)

To ample adventurers I say this: I want you to have dignity, comfort, and fair treatment in the skies. But I also want my half of the armrest and to not be unwittingly enrolled in the Shared Seating Initiative™. And as far as I can see, that means you’re forking over for a second seat.

Airplanes don’t care about feelings. They care about inches. And if your body requires more inches than one seat provides, it’s on you to cover them. That’s not unkind—it’s just how responsibility works at 30,000 feet.

Is there a middle option I’m missing? LMK in the comments!

P.S. Meanwhile, in unrelated news, a British Airways flight out of Florence recently had to kick about 20 passengers off the plane because it was “too heavy” to take off in 95-degree heat. (No word on whether the uninvited passengers were chosen based on their size.) I don’t know about you, but I find it mildly terrifying that we’re apparently flying this close to the edge. Good to know the difference between a safe takeoff and a nosedive into the Tuscan hillside could boil down to who skipped lunch at the airport café.

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