Please Put the Stick In Your Asses in the Fully Upright and Locked Position

I used to be one of those people who hated kids on planes.  If I can close my eyes I can still feel the back of my seat being kicked, the ear-piercing screams as take offs, and the occasional Lego projectile puncturing my eyeball.  All I could think about was how shitty the parents must be to let rowdy or cranky kids on my plane in the first place, let alone allow them to turn the aisle next to my seat into their personal sandbox.  Didn't these people have station wagons?  I don't care if you're going from Boston to San Diego...if you have kids you should drive!

Now I totally sympathize with parents and kids on an airplane.  How many kids do you know enjoy sitting still and staring forward for five hours straight?  How many adults do you know who enjoy that?  When I hear the whines and screams of kids on a flight it still sets my hair on end, but I simultaneously picture a vomit-stained parent, hair tousled and glasses akimbo, desperately trying to soothe or calm them so they wouldn't have parachutes thrust on their backs and be kicked out the door.  It's painful enough knowing you're going to be trapped in a small space with your kids for hours, but to have the judging eyes of your fellow travelers upon you is enough to drive the bravest soul to hermitdom.

But it looks like AirTran airlines has a solution.  Faced with a 15 minute delay, they kicked a girl and her family off the plane when she refused to take her seat.   She was three years old.  The parents claim that--had the flight crew given them a few minutes--they would have calmed her down and got her into the seat they paid for, but apparently the highly-trained and conscientious staff, eager to get airborne so they could absent-mindedly chuck pretzels at the other passengers, didn't have the patience.  I mean...fifteen minutes?  Planes NEVER leave fifteen minutes late...it might blemish their reputation as a luxurious means of travel! 

So what message is AirTran trying to send?  Are families not welcome on their flights anymore?  They might as well cancel those routes to Orlando, then.  I'm not saying that parents don't have a responsibility to help their children behave on a plane (that's what Benadryl is for) but ejecting them because they're having a hard time sitting still is an extreme and unnecessary measure.   

Here's hoping the next time those flight attendants are on a transatlantic flight they've got the Collicy Baby Club taking up the three rows behind them.

Besides, what if she knew what no one else did...that there were motherfucking snakes on the motherfucking plane!

(Sorry, I think the statute of limitations for Snakes on a Plane jokes is over, but I've never been a good closer)