It was revealed last month that at least one airline is going to experiment with having a children-free zone on an airplane.
This is not a good look for the airlines.
I can see the reasons why. Young children can be loud, unruly and impatient, among other things. When you pay good money for an airline seat, do you really want to sit near a screaming baby? You probably don’t. And that’s an understandable situation.
But my take is simple.
An airplane ride is to get you from point A to point B, safely and soundly. There should be no guarantee about the level of distraction or the noise. Children are passengers, too. Frankly, I have seen some adults on a flight who were inebriated and acted worse and were louder than kids. Yet we don’t make assumptions about the level of their intoxication and put them in special seating.
We are going down a slippery slope here.
What next? Do we ban children under a certain age entirely from taking a flight?
This lends itself to something I have written about in the past. Whether they have knowingly done it, or it was just a fluke, the airlines have created a caste system in the air. Between things like economy, basic economy, business class and first class, you can tell immediately the level of income a passenger makes.
And that can sometimes lead to prejudicial judgments.
Do we now cast aspersions on some people and make the conclusion that they are bad parents because they have a child who needs to sit in his own zone?
An airplane seat should have no such strings attached. When you book a flight, you get what you get. Maybe you end up sitting near a drunk passenger or a belligerent passenger. Should we then sequester them to their own section because they might act up and cause problems?
Children are people as well. Maybe sometimes they need somebody to speak for them, but flying in an airplane is a whole new experience for them. They shouldn’t be penalized because their emotions and self-discipline aren’t fully developed yet.
But that’s exactly what would happen if the airlines follow through on this.
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