Valuetainment
"Paying For Butt Space?" - Plus Sized Passengers OUTRAGED Over Airline’s ‘Fat Shaming’ Policy
29 Aug 2025
Chapter 1: What changes did Southwest Airlines make to its 'customer of size' policy?
extremely important for those of you guys that travel, especially if you travel Southwest. I know how painful this is for some of you. Painful. And some of you guys, it's a warning because some people are going to think this is discriminating. But Southwest rolls out new conditions for plus-size passengers. Refunds.
Starting January 27th, when flights with assigned seating being taken off, plus-size passengers should proactively purchase the needed number of seats prior to travel to ensure the additional adjacent seat is available. As stated on Southwest Airlines' website, to advise potential customers, Southwest's website lists the seat width...
On the Boeing 737 models, it flies from 15.5 inches at the narrowest to 17.8 inches at the widest with the arms at the definite seat boundary. Jeff Jenkins, founder of Plus Size Travel Blog, Chubby Diaries, told USA Today. I just hope the consumers are aware of this change.
And I wonder if plus size people will skip out on flying with them at all because of them not knowing if the flight is sold out or not expressing concerns. Rob, do you want to play this clip? I think that this policy change risks increasing body shame. We already know that plus size passengers are verbally harassed, are videotaped, are sometimes even physically assaulted on flights.
Southwest Airlines is changing a longstanding policy for plus size travelers.
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Chapter 2: What are the new requirements for plus-size passengers when booking flights?
For years, quote, customers of size were encouraged to buy two seats, then apply for a refund after their trip, a process that had fewer restrictions on when refunds would be provided. But starting January 27th, refunds will only be granted if three conditions are met. The flight must depart with at least one open seat.
Both seats must be in the same fare class and refund requests must be filed within 90 days of travel. The refund policy is going to be so much more restricted to you only being able to get a refund for your second seat if the flight was not full, which many Southwest flights are This is not a policy that was bankrupting Southwest and therefore they've changed it.
It's part of their whole package of sort of nickeling and diming customers more. The updated policy goes into effect the same day the airline switches to assigned seating on all of its flights. The question always comes down to, do you believe that people who are traveling by plane are paying for passage from point A to point B? Or do you believe that they're paying for, like, butt space?
Southwest was the best thing that we had for somebody who either couldn't afford to pay for a second seat up front. Wait, what did she say? Go back again? Go back, Rob, again. From point A to point B. Are they paying to go from point A to point B or butt space? Or do you believe that they're paying for, like, butt space? Yeah, you're taking space.
Southwest was the best thing that we had for somebody who either couldn't afford to pay for a second seat. I don't understand this. Like, can you press pause right there? So if you live in a, if you got a family of five, can you fit in a one-bedroom apartment? Probably not. You probably need three bedrooms. Are you taking too much space? Is that fat shaming? So what do we call that?
Big family shaming? Procreating shaming? What do we call that thing? Is there shaming going there? No. Somebody wants to have more kids? You want to eat more. You know, one is not 300 pounds by accident. It just doesn't happen. Whenever I'm out of shape, it didn't accidentally happen, and I'm out of shape. I got out of shape, okay?
And if you put on weight or anything, so I kind of like what Southwest is doing here. I do think the problem is going to be the following. Say you don't buy the extra ticket, Vinny. Yeah. Just visually go with me. Okay. I'm not big. You're big. You're above the 17.9 inches. Let me get the character. Yeah. So you're big. That's right. And we're outside before you get on. Okay.
Everybody knows this is the new rule. Yeah. So you got 300 passengers in line.
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Chapter 3: What are the implications of body shaming in the airline industry?
They're all pointing at you. Yeah. And they're just waiting to see who's going to be sitting next to that person. And you go up and they notice you've only bought one ticket. Uh-oh.
you some of the most viral videos the next three to six months are gonna be those uh what do you call it the rage how dare you call me plus this is body shaming it's gonna happen oh a thousand percent and you know this is gonna be rough though well i'm visually you're gonna have to go there yeah okay you ready for this oh vinnie i promise you you're visually gonna go there okay
You know when you bring these things, the bags, and you say, no, it's going to fit in this thing. And you're pushing it in there. So you're going to have to push. People say, no, my hips fit. Are we going to have a measuring device at 17.8 inches? Honey, can you push? It's pushing me. Excuse me.
Chapter 4: How does the new refund policy for extra seats work?
If you can't fit in here, you can't get on. So now imagine that you jump in it, but the thing rolls up. Oh, man. You know what I'm saying? If it rolls up, they're like, no, I'm good. They're like, no, but this is going to fall on somebody. Yeah, I'm going to hold my hips.
I think this is going to be such negative blowback, whatever you want to call it, on Southwest with videos going viral, but it's going to be some of the most embarrassing. It may cause people to want to go on Southwest flights for no reason just to see people there. Can you imagine? You book a flight. You're like, oh, I want to see what's going to happen to this person. Record, record.
It's going to go viral. Get it. She's screaming. Throw a flip-flop. Good job. Right? Yep. As a matter of fact, we're going to fly Southwest to Orlando. That's what we're going to do. Let's do it. I just bring the camera crew with us. Go ahead, Tom. So Southwest did it to itself because what it did is it said, okay, plus-size passengers had to buy two tickets. This is a fact.
And I've known people that had to do this, nice people, people that were respectful, but, you know, were not – had arrived at a condition for whatever reason, and they buy two tickets. What Southwest would say previously, remember, there's no assigned seating on Southwest, so they just sit down. So they take the window in the middle, and they say, they show, I've paid for two. I've seen it.
Now, if the flight was not sold out, in other words, there was space, then Southwest would refund the second ticket because they say, well, we didn't sell out the flight. The seat would have been there anyway, and you got to use it. That, I think, was a mistake for Southwest. I agree. I'm with that.
If I'm doing it the right way and I'm being respectful and you don't give that back to me and you still take that money, I'm not okay with that. Yeah, and so everybody else, you know, nobody else gets to go on and says, wait a minute, my carry-on was only four pounds because it's just my laptop. Should you give me part of my ticket back because Vinny's got a backpack and a giant laptop?
You know, no. So that was the old way. The old way they buy two tickets on their call Southwest. Hey, there is open seats. And so can I get refunded? Now they're saying with assigned seating, this is more difficult. Now you need assigned seating. Makes sense.
So the flight attendants can't say, well, you could sit there and you could sit there and you can move here and you can move here because there's been situations you see people traveling with kids. Yeah. And someone's in Group C, a lady with a kid, and says, hey, I've got a six-year-old girl here. I don't want to put her in the middle seat between these two people she doesn't know.
And somebody says, hey, could you move? And they do it nicely. And so the flight attendants do it. Well, now you've got to sign seats. And you're going to have a business class and a regular class.
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Chapter 5: How does the public react to Southwest's new policy?
It is what it is. Get your ass in shape. By the way, when a kid... When you see a kid, Pat, when you see a 6-year-old, 7-year-old, that's child abuse. He's not... What are you feeding that kid? This is why RFK is so against what we're feeding kids. Speaking of RFK, do you remember the video you showed one time? Get the soda machines out of schools.
Of JFK and saying basically like, our kids have not used to go to the gym. Our kids are getting fat now, and we need kids who can do a push-up and a sit-up. We've gained so much weight as a country in the last 50 years that this is sort of the ramifications of those decisions. I don't want to spend this much time on these stories. I want to go through it faster.
But the point is, this is happening. It's real. Causing Southwest Airlines to... expose it because it's costing them money. They need to make money. But at the same time, unfortunately, it's also the reason why so many people are using GLP-1s. It's also why Ozempic is on fire right now. I see some people I haven't seen for a year. I see them. I'm like, I don't even recognize you.
What happened to you? And I'm like, just like, babe, did you see that? Yeah. Is that her sister or is that her? No, that's her. Wow. They split in half. And I know it's not because they're 24-7 working at 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning training. The shortcut system is also there. So you want me to not body shame? I'll take the pill, but I'm not going to the gym.
There's never been more of a time to have data to help you be healthier than today. Never. This is the best time ever to be healthy. The data's out there. Once a year we get together, I can't wait to see everybody this year. This is going to be the biggest one by a mile. Record-breaking attendance coming to this event here from all over the world.
Three-and-a-half-day strategy session, business, all the stuff that we'll be doing. It's a very unique experience if you haven't been to it. Orlando Gaylord, if you want to get registered, go to the vaultconference.com. This year's sponsor, the title sponsor of this entire event is Goliath Ventures. Founder Chris Delgado. We've spent a lot of time with these guys.
They've come to Yankees games with us. They've been coming to vault conferences for the last God knows how many years. Goliath was founded in 2019, a private global equity firm focused on blockchain and decentralized finance built on three pillars, technology, opportunity, and community core belief. Blockchain is the foundation of a generational wealth shift.
You can go search them, Goliath Ventures, Inc.com to learn more about them. They'll be at the Vol Conference all over the place. But tonight... Those of you that bought the ticket that are coming here, I told you it's going to be special. I'm going to whisper you for the last time.
If you're around the Florida area and want to come to the networking event tonight on the campus, do you know we're going to have Ferrari SP3s here? I don't know if you know what an SP3 is. Rob, can you pull up what an SP3 is, Ferrari SP3? You're talking about Ferrari SP3. It's a modern homage to a classic shape. Finding this car, Vinny, it's a $5 million car. It'll be on the lot.
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