Airlines to start weighing passengers..

Freefaller said:
Heavy != fat/overweight :)
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And that kind of proves my point and not yours (well more his)! ;)

How can it be then discriminatory?

Bear said:
Probably because it hasn't been tested. Obesity is self inflicted but beyond a certain point, it is pretty much a disability due to health complications, joint problems etc is it not? I'm not saying being fat is a disability in itself.
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It has been test in law several times and it can't be demonstrated as such bar in a few individual cases. That is unless you want to apply the characteristics from a member of a group onto the whole group! And that would be ...
 
Bear said:
You'd get a bad reaction because it would be discriminatory. Besides, if such a system was put in place, all it would mean would be my wife would bring more stuff she doesn't need and has trouble carrying. :D
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what do you mean by discriminatory?

unfair discrimination? nope it isn't necessarily unfair

simply discriminating between passengers based on some criteria - well yes... but why is that a bad thing - in that sense we're already 'discriminatory' towards people who bring extra luggage above their weight limit

this would just be making things a bit fairer by incorporating the weight of the passenger too
 
dowie said:
what do you mean by discriminatory?

unfair discrimination? nope it isn't necessarily unfair

simply discriminating between passengers based on some criteria - well yes... but why is that a bad thing - in that sense we're already 'discriminatory' towards people who bring extra luggage above their weight limit

this would just be making things a bit fairer by incorporating the weight of the passenger too
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It would generally penalise men over women for a start
 
dowie said:
BMI is fine as a rough indicator... just not so good for elite athletes, dedicated bodybuilders who apparently make up a large portion of online computer enthusiast forums

perhaps a better rough indicator which also works for bodybuilders is the height/waist ratio

you start getting into 'unhealthy' territory when your waist equals half your height... so if you're say 6ft and you get a 36 inch waist then you need to cut down on the pies a bit/stop dodging salads... if you're shorter than 6 ft well you'd best start taking action when the 34 inch jeans get a bit tight
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That's just as useful as BMI to be blunt about it.
 
Personally I think Amp34 is a **** and should be kicked in the head ... but that's just me.

Nobody is subsidizing anyone else the airline makes a decision on how much they are going to charge based on their costs and what profit they want to make. It isn't as if you get charge less if the flight is full of skinny little per-pubescent manlet computer gamers or more if it full of people are heavier than your arbitrary figure for what constitutes being overweight. The next thing he'll be suggesting is that if you are under the defined average you should get a refund.

Ah well more GD ***** to add to my ignore list ...

I think you need to read the rules on personal attacks.
 
You have to keep in mind that 32kg is the max an airport staff member is supposed to lift.

A 32kg bag is only 12kg more than the average limit of 20kg, but times that by the number of seats on a 737-800 (189) and you have an additional 2268kg (2.2 tonnes) of weight to carry. A 32kg bag is also likely to be larger than a 20kg one and whilst most aircraft could cope with that, not all will.
 
Look at how little room this lass has in her luggage and let's face it she probably lives on toilet roll and lettuce - if we stopped the obesity enabling she could get a proper rig.

 
Considering fuel costs are one of the highest operating costs of airlines, i dont see why that cost cant be transferred to a per specific passenger basis rather than recovered on an average basis. Enforcing it in practise would be difficult. Pay ticket on basis of x weight one year before flight... Turn up for flight twice the weight...get your wallet out and get ready for an argument if you are pregnant :)! I agree with posts above though, treating the customer and their luggage as the measurement is far better.
 
Freefaller said:
Surely it is easier/fairer to impose a luggage weight limit as they have now as the weight of people is so variable?
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In which case it would be fairer/easier if the airlines just said 1 seat and 1 bag (up to the HSE limit of 32kg), then pay per bag extra, with weight having no relevance at all.
 
GAC said:
5'9 Oo seems we are a race of manlets.
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I can only assume there are a lot of short OAPs bringing down the average height. I don't know many men below 5'11!:p

Bear said:
If you believe discrimination is fair, then it says far more about you as a person. It would be political suicide because last time I looked, discrimination is frowned upon in this country. As it is perfectly reasonable to discriminate on baggage weight then it is the most sensible option, with the further option to purchase a higher limit.
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Why is it discrimination? You are being charged for how much fuel you use.
 
memyselfandi said:
Personally I think Amp34 is a **** and should be kicked in the head ... but that's just me.

Nobody is subsidizing anyone else the airline makes a decision on how much they are going to charge based on their costs and what profit they want to make. It isn't as if you get charge less if the flight is full of skinny little per-pubescent manlet computer gamers or more if it full of people are heavier than your arbitrary figure for what constitutes being overweight. The next thing he'll be suggesting is that if you are under the defined average you should get a refund.

Ah well more GD ***** to add to my ignore list ...
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Any particular reason you disagree? Present a logical argument and I'll listen. I've presented mine, present yours.

You'll note my "figure" is not an arbitrary weight, it's the average weight of the British person... It's nothing to do with being overweight, however by your assertion of skinny manlets I assume you're probably what many would consider overweight (another point to note, about two thirds of British men are either overweight or obese, we have a severe problem in the UK with this).

Finally you'll also note I have a already said my suggested change would not benefit me in the slightest. A change would mean I would lose much of my current weight allowance...
 
Xordium said:
And that kind of proves my point and not yours (well more his)! ;)

How can it be then discriminatory?



It has been test in law several times and it can't be demonstrated as such bar in a few individual cases. That is unless you want to apply the characteristics from a member of a group onto the whole group! And that would be ...
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I think what he means or at least how I interpreted it is, that you're discriminating people on their physicality which may be out of your control, I.e. Height, width, size etc...

Whereas discriminating against luggage means that people know what to expect and how to control their packing to ensure it suits with the guidelines.

I understand the fuel argument thing and I understand the weight distribution thing, but you cannot charge for things that one cannot control. You can control luggage and charge for breaches of that, however you cannot control people shapes and sizes nor can you penalise for that.

Again you and others are far more intelligent than me and probably understand the logic far more clearly than I do, but that's how I see it.
 
I know what he means but we all discriminate every day based on a variety of incorrect and correct factors. Legally speaking discrimination only matters in a few areas if it is shown to be done without reason. This can be shown to be done for a reason therefore the point is moot.

The only way you could say people were being discriminated against here legally is if you were to say that they were disabled by their weight as you rightly say heavier weight does not necessarily mean obesity. And I would argue and indeed the law courts (even in Europe) have found that the obesity is not in itself a disability but may well lead to causing one.

There is an argument that people who are not heavier are being unfairly burdened (no pun intended) with unfair costs and that is in itself discriminatory if we apply the above rather broad definition.

I would also respectfully point out that if a chronically obese person boards a plane with minimal luggage they don't pay a premium. If a child boards a plane with a load of dialysis fluid to keep them alive whilst they are abroad they often (because some airlines are nice and waive costs) have to pay the surplus for that all that weight (and it will be substantial but equivalent for a few day stay to a rather large adult). Now that is discrimination against a proven disability. That's why the fluid is sourced abroad.

I doubt I am more intelligent than you or most on here tbh. Plenty would agree I with me on this one whereas they wouldn't elsewhere. And it matters not whether someone is intelligent or not to the point as that would be a very fallacy laden argument. I am just saying the discrimination argument is very very easy to poke holes into.

What we've got here is as Fox correctly pointed out a situation where the airlines haven't got the bottle to implement something that actually makes sense.
 
spoffle said:
That's just as useful as BMI to be blunt about it.
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nah it is a bit more useful in some cases - i.e. people who would be overweight by BMI standards but are actually just quite muscular/not fat

muscular athletes will tend to have a good waist to height ratio but could have a bad BMI

fatties who are kidding themselves that they're healthy and BMI is flawed on the other hand....
 
I'm 6foot6 and already cringe when im given the middle seat, so much, that ill sit in the aisle or window and just look "scary" enough to make other people just sit in the middle.. :P #bemoredog

For every Above average person there is 1 below average person - It all "averages out"

Maybe if you fly weekly or for a living you should get the right to complain if you're stuck next to someone horrible but i suspect most people don't... so.. get over it and carry on.

This is one of those 1st world problems that simply doesn't happen too much in reality, enough to warrant meaningful action. I've flown 200 times in my life and I've always the biggest person I've seen. (i've i've i've)

Still if in the future for some bizarre reason it becomes regulation for god sake have the information on the bio-metric data chip. **** checking in and waiting even longer to weigh every freaking thing that comes on board the plane down to the last gram, would make me a sad panda.
 
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