But what can the airline do? They can’t tell him to go away, it’ll general bad press or possibly lawsuits. They can’t charge him extra, it’ll generate bad press or possibly lawsuits. They can’t make all the seats big enough for this guy, it’ll cut their seat count in half, and seatbelts don’t work that well when the seat is much larger than you, you start sliding around sideways and stuff. so they have, literally, NOTHING they can do about the situation. They CANNOT be at fault, because to be at fault there needs to be something you can actually do.
Let’s keep in mind that YOUR the one that wanted to bring blame into the conversation. I don’t really give a crap if the guy is fat, so long as his fat isn’t in my seat on an airplane. But because YOU asked if the fat guy or the airline was to blame, and the airline can’t be at fault that leaves the fat guy. That’s the answer to the question you asked, outside of that question it’s another matter entirely, outside of the strictures of your question we get to the real world answer: change things so the airline actually CAN do something.
Uh, you seem to have overlooked that fact that they solved the problem amicably so apparently there *is* something that they can do after all.
That picture was taken when the airplane was still on the ground and *not* during takeoff. The end result was that he was seated in two seats behind where the picture was taken (according to posts here on FR.)
All of this heat is being generated because an airlines service employee violated the privacy of the passenger and implied an insoluble problem existed where it didn't. If you wish to leave the word "blame" out of it we can still discuss responsibility and in this case all this brouhaha rests with that service employee who really had no business publishing pictures of private passengers.
You still seem steamed and that is unfortunate. It is precisely the emotional reaction to this situation that I am complaining about and why I chose to use the word "blame." If I could sum it up I'd say to everyone in general simply to relax and let things work themselves out. Seldom are we really victims and sometimes we can even accommodate others' failings without being much hurt ourselves. No hatred for others, no loss of rights, no victimhood and especially no PC garbage.