If airlines are going to force wider passengers to pay an upgrade fee because of safety or passenger comfort or whatever, why aren’t we asking excessively tall people to do the same thing?

On my flight home last week, the guy sitting next to me was thin and very, very tall. He had no respect for my personal space or the safety of the passengers. He didn’t stop moving around the whole ride, crossing the line between our seats and at one point even leaning his back against my arm and I had to say something. He was also sticking his bare feet into the aisle.

Setting aside this guy was a total jerk, can we talk about the fact that he was probably legit uncomfortable and the space was too small for him? He was impacting the safety and comfort of other passengers by leaning on me and invading the narrow aisle space with his legs.

He was also related to the man who was sitting behind me, a man who was also too tall, and kept sticking his legs all the way through the bottom of my seat and kicking me.

And no one thinks about that or asks tall people to pay for extra space? But we do it to wide people?

Thin privilege is being too big for the airplane seat but not being asked to pay an upgrade fee because you’re too big in the acceptable way.