The Harland Highway - 861 - UNITED AIRLINES attack. Air travel nightmares. Angry PILOT calls in

Episode Date: April 17, 2017

Customer attacked on United Airlines. Phone calls from listeners. An angry PILOT calls the show. Obesity in the air. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What a show we have today, ladies and gurgleblaggans. This is Harlan Williams. You are listening to the Harland Highway podcast, and I am the guy. I'm him. I'm Harlem Williams. This is not an imposter. This is me. Great show today.

I'm going to tell you about a harrowing airplane ride I took, where I had to deal with something very, very uncomfortable in the sky. and it was something I did not want to deal with, but I had to deal with it. So I'll be telling that story towards the end of the show. Also up front, we'll be talking about the United Airlines fiasco, the paid passenger who was ripped out of his seat and dragged off the plane violently. We're going to talk about that and the ramifications and the justifications, if there are any. And we're also going to be interviewing a pilot. it from another airline is calling in to tell us that he doesn't care if someone got dragged

off the plane. He feels that he's the captain of the ship and what he says goes. And so he's going to give us the other side of, you know, the airplane set of customer rules. Also, a lot of phone calls from you pavement pounters. Today we're going to be playing a bunch of your messages and hearing what you have to say. So hold on, buckle in. This is the Harlan Highway

Sit down, strap in, and tighten your diaper. Come here, baby. You're about to go down the Harlan Highway. No! I didn't bargain for this. Oh, yes, you did it. Chick-chic-chac-cha, chick-chic-a-ch-chall.

Oh, Maine, baby. And the creature from all this, baby. Please don't stop. I got to feed it. A great nice. Magnificent performance. This is the Harland Highway.

I hate you. Well, that's the way it goes. What do you say? We get down to business. Hello. Hello. Raspberry eyes, they're watching you. They see your every move.

Raspberry eyes, they're watching you, watching you, watching you, watching you, watching you. All right. Okay. Hello, everybody. Let's kick off the show. I think we've got to talk about this, this United Airlines incident that happened just a few days ago You all saw it on the news

where the doctor was on a United Airlines flight He paid for a seat He boarded the plane He got his seat And then United Airlines was like You know what? The flight sold out

We have four employees That we want to get from point A to point B So let's randomly select four passengers And just kick them off Yeah, we'll pull them off the plane And even though they've paid, and even though they're already seated and we're ready to go, let's just pick four losers and randomly pluck them off the flight, regardless of what their needs are. And we'll put our employees in there and get them to where they need to go.

So we can keep the money rolling in for our airline, which, by the way, doesn't work unless you have customers, idiots. So, they selected four random people, according to the news story, and three of them left the plane. I don't know how disgruntled they were, but they obliged and they left the plane. And the fourth guy was like, you know what, screw you, guys. Why should I leave? I boarded. I paid for my ticket. Why are you picking me out of all the people?

Why am I having to leave the plane? Also, I'm a doctor, and I also have some patients I have to attend to, regardless if you're a doctor, I don't care if you've got to go home and rake the leaves. We all have lives to deal with, right? Yes, we do. So anyways, this gentleman resisted, and so they brought in the police that I believe were part of the Chicago-based, police force, and they grabbed this guy, and they forcibly removed him against his will, and he resisted being physically touched and moved.

And in the process, his face got bloodied up. According to the lawyer's reports, he got a bloody nose, a broken nose, lost two front teeth, and got a concussion, not to mention, like, you know, bruising, and bloodied gums and lips, which seems excessive. Okay? Now, if this was a guy that was waving a gun or was yelling threats or was acting erratic or was a drunkard or was being belligerent or was harassing other customers or was, you know, putting his feet up in someone's face or yelling, okay, maybe you got grounds to remove a

guy forcibly physically. But a paid customer just sitting there reading a magazine or talking on their cell phone or whatever, there's no way that a customer should be manhandled like that. Okay? So United Airlines is going to have their ass sued huge. Okay? They're going to lose a bundle. No if fans are but.

about it. And in this situation, I'm glad because I think the air, listen, guys, you know, I fly all the time. I fly almost every other week. I'm in the air going to do a comedy show or going somewhere. I fly like crazy. So I see it. I see the abuse. I see the belligerents. I see the airlines, you know, they lie, they keep you in the dark. And I'm not saying they do it all the time. There's good people at work at the airlines, but on a whole, the airline industry, you never feel good flying. You know, I've been lied to my face. I've been told that there's no seats. I've been told this. I've been told that. You get situations where a flight's like sitting at the gate and they tell you, oh, it's a weather thing or it's a

technical thing or and they're just lying not every time but they lie and they shuffle you around like cattle and the service has gotten worse and the meals are horrible and you know i'm a guy who flies first class 99% of the time and you know it's like cafeteria food up there if you think you're missing anything in first class you're not now there used to be a time when they pamper you. There used to be a time when first class meant first class. You got shrimp cocktails and steaks and towels and blankets and soaps in the bathroom and, you know, they really spoiled you. They treated you like a first class customer. But nowadays, you feel like a first class chump because you paid all that extra money and you're really not getting anything that's that first class.

the first class sections and planes now they don't even provide a blanket or a pillow they bring you a meal and and here's an example of how cheap they are you know how they give you those little packets of butter you know if you have a bun or you have some food and you get those little wrapped little dollops of butter they give you one and if you ask for another one they go no we can't give you another one everyone gets one dollop of butter So, you know, you can butter your roll, but you can't put any butter on your mashed potatoes or on your food. So you've got to decide because, God forbid, the airlines, you know, give you two little dollops of butter. But the reason I'm signaling out the butter is because it's indicative of how cheap they become.

And the standard of food is bad. I mean, I was on a flight to, I forget where it was recently. And the stewardess or the flight attendant comes up and goes, will you be eating with us today, sir? You know, and I'm in first class. Yes, I will. Okay, we'd like to offer you the cheeseburger today? The cheeseburger.

Yes, sir, a lovely cheeseburger is. Yeah, I know what a cheeseburger is. I'm in first class. I paid maybe triple, for sure double what everyone else paid on this plane. And you're offering me something I can get for 99 cents. Burger King? So the reason I take first class now, even though I know everything else sucks, that now the way I justify it is it's okay, at least the seats are a little bigger, and I only have one person

beside me, and I'm right at the front of the plane. So I get on and I get off quickly, and I'm paying almost double for that. There's small perks, but I certainly don't feel like I'm getting pampered or treated much better than anyone else on the plane. And not that I have a class thing with anybody, but, you know, it's like anything. If you stop at a gas station, maybe you get premium gasoline. When you go to a restaurant, maybe you want the primo seat. You know, everybody wants something that's a little better. And, you know, maybe you rent a car and you upgrade to another class of car.

It's not about being snotty or being better than anyone. It's just there are some things in life where you want to, you know, have a little better quality. Well, I hate to say it, first class doesn't offer that much more quality anymore. But anyways, the reason I'm harping on the first class thing is is because it's indicative of the airline service all the way through. If they're not treating first-class customers with any type of priority or dignity or class, then they're certainly not treating economy customers,

which is the bulk of the flight. You know, 90% of the flight is economy-class customers. So they're getting it even worse, getting the tight little seats, and they got to buy like substandard samuels. like the kind you'd find in a vending machine. And it's just like, oh, God. And, you know, flying is degrading enough.

Flying is scary enough. Now we've got to deal with, you know, the ISIS and al-Qaeda threats. You wonder if there's a bomb percolating in the underbelly of the plane. If somehow someone loaded a bomb into the fuselage with their luggage or some guy's about to go nuts on the flight and pull out. a box cutter or light his shoes on fire or blow up his underpants or I mean it's really scary there's a frightening element to flying now and then the issues with the luggage and now you got to pay for your luggage just know everybody's trying to bring their luggage on board and stuff

it in the overhead and it just goes on and on and on where they just make it miserable and then the biggest insult is when you sit down in the flight they play that annoying You know, that annoying videotape. And every airline, they copy each other. It's like, hi, I'm Charles Davidson, CEO and president of United Airlines. And we here at United have the most professional team to provide you with, like, this big bullshit speech,

like they care so much and they love us and they're looking out for us. No, they're looking out for themselves. The airlines are looking out for themselves. And the, you know, the customer is like the remora fish we're just kind of this passenger that sticks to the side if you don't want a remora fish is it it's that fish that sticks to the side of a shark you ever seen a shark swimming and there's these fish that actually stick to their skin and

wait for scraps that that's what we feel like and so it's a bad deal i i have no sympathy for the airlines. But here's the thing with what happened in this case. The good news is, A, I hope it changes the dialogue. I hope it changes the way everything works

with the airlines. I hope this forces them to switch gears and become more customer-friendly and, you know, help make it a much more pleasant and fair experience to the flying consumer. Because it is very aggravating when flights are late, when you're sitting on the tarmac, when you're waiting, when you get harassed about your luggage, this, that, it's annoying. Hey, everybody, who wants to have better sex? No? Yes. Yes. The

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Just enter the offer code Harland to check out. That's Harland, H-A-R-L-A-N-D at Adam and Eve.com. This is an exclusive offer specific to this podcast. So be sure to use this code Harland so you get your discount and a hundred percent free shipping code harland have fun don't throw your back out this is a true story it happened right here in my town one night 17 kids woke up got out of bed walked into the dark and they never came back i'm the director of barbarian a lot of people die in a lot of weird ways you're not going to find it in the news because the police covered Everything will love. On August days.

This is where the story really starts. Weapons. But all the, all the, you know, ill will I have towards the airline industry. And by the way, I guess I'm grateful for the fact that we can go from one side of the country to the other in like five hours. Okay. I'm not, I'm not going to be a total brat. Yeah, the airline, I mean, it's a miracle that we can fly. It's a miracle that we can be served food and listen to, you know, watch movies

and fly smoothly across the skies and land somewhere in five hours. I mean, it's beautiful. And the fact that we are spoiled and have airlines, okay, let's not sound like spoiled little, you know, brats here. let's give thanks and be grateful for the gift of flight and that there are airlines that I guess the airlines could do a lot better to make it make the customers feel a lot more respected and valued so all that said let's get to the incident where this guy was bloodied up he was banged around and basically he was dragged probably 60 70 feet from his seat out of the plane and onto the loading dock.

And here's the part where I just roll my eyes. Okay? This stuff made like front page news. This lawyer and the gentleman's family had a news conference and all the cable news outlets, CNN and United and, or not United, Fox and MSNBC, I mean, they all stopped the presses. They stopped running commercials. They filmed this press event where the gentleman's lawyer went on and on about the airline industry

and the daughter went on on the press event and talked about how mortified she was and how it disrupted their life and how everyone's in shock and horror. And basically, I was watching a lot of. a press event, a press conference about a guy that was dragged 60 feet off a plane, and I felt like I was watching a press event where they were announcing World War III, and the daughter and the lawyers talking about the trauma, and how horrible it was, and how psychologically scarred the family is, and yes, it's horrible, it's bad, it's deep. but did the 60 children that were gassed in Syria

like five days before that get the press coverage that this event got? No. I mean, the way they're carrying on about this guy that got dragged off the flight of it is like, oh my God, the world's going to end. And meanwhile, you know, the press coverage about the children in Syria that got

gassed and choked to death on gas from bombs that their own leader Assad dropped on them. This was kind of like paled in comparison to the guy getting dragged off the airliner. Oh, God! And it just made me go, what kind of priorities do we have? What kind of entitlement society do we live in?

I mean, you know, some guy was roughed up on an airplane versus, you know, a whole city decimated and, you know, 80, 90 of its citizens, you know, dying in the street from gases that are dropped in weapons and it's considered a war crime. It's a crime against humanity. I didn't see the big press conference for all that. I didn't see someone, you know, almost crying their eyes. out because the children were dead. I mean, my God. It almost, it was

comical to the point of it made my stomach turn. I was like, this is just pathetic. All I know is that the airlines can be duches. This guy should not have been treated the way he was. He was treated the way he was. He deserves to be apologized

to and compensated for the way he was treated, but I certainly don't think it needed to be a global press event, where the family looks like, you know, they just survived a plane crash or something. So there you go. I think, do we have a pilot? Yeah, Roger's telling me we have a pilot from another airline. They won't say what airline it is? Okay, well, I can get that. So we have a pilot from another airline calling in, and he's going to talk to us about, you know, protocol, about passengers' rights, about the rights and the legalities that the airliners have. And Rogers telling me that this pilot is of the mindset that the airline is in charge and the airline can do whatever they want. what he's saying? And he's saying he would have done a lot worse to this guy. Well,

okay. Well, let's get this guy on the phone. Can you patch him through, Roger? So here we go. Let's talk to a professional pilot for one of the big airline companies in America. He won't tell us who he flies for, but at least he's willing to talk about this situation. Put them through, Raj. Uh, yeah, hello, are you there, sir? How are you, sir? Uh, good, and who am I talking to? Well, why don't we just say Dave?

All right, uh, Dave, uh, you obviously don't want to give us your last name, but you are a commercial pilot here in the United States. Yeah, that's right. And, uh, you've been listening to the show, the podcast, and, uh, you know, let me ask you, And do you think I'm kind of giving a fair assessment to this whole scenario? No, sir. I think you're way off. Okay.

How so, Dave? Well, first of all, you know, we're flying in the sky. Okay, we're not driving along the ground or not puttering across the ocean. We're flying in the sky. That's a big open space, sir. and there are a lot of perils. There are a lot of technical issues when we're flying. We're not sitting up in that cockpit, you know, having a margarita and smoking a cigar.

We're very focused. We're very intense. And we've got a job to do. We got a job to do. And we got passengers that we got to get from point A to point B. And we don't mess around. I understand, sir. You know, it's not like just the average person.

person could step into a cockpit and fly an airplane. They're very complicated technological vehicles. You got that right. You got that right. And, you know, what I was saying we need is a whining baby back in the cabin area. And he's trying to tell us that he doesn't want to get off our flight. Now, let me tell you something. The pilot is the captain of the ship.

And as a pilot, what I say, goes on my ship what i say goes and what airline do you fly sir but i told you're a producer i cannot divulge that okay well um i can tell you that uh we do i do fly uh south and uh i do fly west okay so southwest i did i did not say that sir you're flying with southwest airlines I did not say that. Now, if I could just get back to the point. Yes, please. Go ahead, David.

If I have a guy or woman, you know, acting up on my plane. Now, I got a job to do, okay? So if someone's not cooperating, if they're not going to get off the flight or they're causing a disturbance mid-flight, well, I'll come back there and I'll administer my own form of discipline you understand well i don't know that i do sir okay well this gentleman got dragged off a plane correct from all uh from what we've heard yes all right if he was on my plane i would have choked

him out excuse me that's right i would have put him in a headlock i would have choked him out to he went unconscious and then and then i would have pulled his shirt over his head and kicked him in the ribs. Okay, sir, that's a bit excessive. Is it? Now, I got all my... Let's say I've got a cargo of, let's say, for example, 128 passengers, and I got one unruly guy that wants to act up around me? Well, he wasn't acting up. He was provoked because they tried to... Excuse me, sir, I'm talking. I'm a pilot. What are you? Well, I'm just trying to get the facts out here.

I am in the sky six days a week. You don't need to tell. me what the facts are. Well, I'm talking about the facts of this case. I'll give you a case right here. If you're acting up on my flight, I will give you a round house kick to the temple

and knock your head through the little window and slam that little window shade down on your head. Hell, I might even decapitate you and watch your head fly out into a cloud. Okay, now that's getting violent. Oh, you weren't violent. Oh, well, how about this?

How about I drag a woman out of her seat by her tits? Excuse me? That's right. I'll grab both her tits, drag her down the aisle, put her head in the bathroom door, and slam it seven or eight times until she goes unconscious. And then once she hits the ground, I'll kick her in the womb. You'll kick her in the womb.

You heard me, sir. I'm in charge of my airplane. All right, that's just violent. And maybe that's what's wrong with the airline culture right now. See, I don't think you're seeing the passenger side of this story here, sir. The passenger side of this story. I've got a job to do. I don't know if you're listening to me.

What's your name? Harlan Williams. Whatever. Excuse me? I got a job to do. I got to lift off that airplane. You know how much in airplane ways of commercial airline or ways, sir? I don't.

Well, a lot, okay? A lot. Well, you know, you get some packaging tape, and you tape, you know, 150 Rosie O'Donnells together, and you got the weight of a giant airplane. Okay, that's a little crude, sir. What I'm saying is we're lifting a giant mechanical miracle, 35, 40,000 feet into the sky. Now, I've got to keep my eyes on my fries, people are going to die.

Sir, I understand it's a very technical job. And you think I got time for a winy little bitch in the back? Oh, what, you didn't get your peanuts? Oh, your lasagna's cold? Oh, you know, there was a little bit of turbulence and some of your apple juice fell out into your lap, but I'll tell you what, stand up, customer, stand up so I can slap you across the face,

kick you in the goddamn balls, knee you in the fucking ribs and elbow you in the goddamn Adam's apple. You're going down, bitch. Okay, sir. This is not, see, this is part of the problem here.

I think airlines and their staff and their crew have to be a little more a genteel and a little more compassionate with the average customer. Well, I'll tell you, what. Boy, oh, boy, you just don't get it, do you?

You don't get it, guy. Well, I do get it, because guess what? I'm a flying customer. Well, let me tell you what I'd do to you, okay? If you started acting up in my plane, like, let's say, oh, I don't know, uh, oh, I don't know, maybe, uh, maybe you didn't like the food we brought you. Maybe, uh, your food was called. Well, I'd, I'd get my co-pilot.

I'd say, I'd say, Hank or whoever I'm with. I'd take control of the aircraft, and I'd get up out of the cockpit. I'd walk back and ask you to stand up. And when you stood up, you know what I'd do? I'd do a flying cartwheel right into your testicles with my knee. I'd put my knee so deep up your ball sack that you'd bend over, and you'd be able to see your own ass crack shining in the moonlight. I'd get a fucking karate chop right in the middle of your face,

right on the bridge of your nose so that your nose snapped and your goddamn fucking eyes went cross-eyed like a hammerhead shark that just fucking fell into a smoothie machine at Jamba Juice. Do you understand me? Listen. You need to dial it back a little here, sir,

because you are representing an airline. Oh, I didn't tell you what airline I flew for, so you can take that theory and just shove it right up your raisin-bread cup. covered ass cheeks. Uh, southwest. All right, well, where'd you hear that? You said you flew south and then west.

Well, no, no, what I meant to say is I fly north and then west. So Northwest Airlines. All right, you know what I'd do to you, buddy? I would grab you by your ankles, snap your knees in half, bend them over the back of your head, put you in the middle of the aisle, and ask one of the fat customers to, sit on you like a human goddamn rocking chair. Oh, really? Is that what you'd do? Uh-huh, that's right. And then what I'd do is I'd ask the stewardesses to get their fucking

little trays, you know, from little trays from their food cards, and bang you in the head until you were so fucking dumb. You looked like a Chinese moth flying into a bug light with a pair of fucking sneakers on your face. Okay, that makes no sense. Listen, guy, I do what I do, and you are going to listen to me because I'm the pilot. Yeah, well, I'm not going to listen to you because you sound like you're out of your fucking gourd, sir. Oh, yeah, well, okay. You know, that's good.

We'll wait and see. You know, I'm going to look up your air miles. I'm going to look up your airline account with us. And I'll be waiting for you, sir. I'll see you on one of my flights. In fact, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to find out what seat you're in, okay, you little fucking pissant. I'm going to find out what seat you're in, and I'm going to get on the flight early

and purposely tamper with your goddamn seatbelt so that doesn't click shut. That's right. And then when we get up to 40,000 feet cruising altitude, I'm going to do a series of barrel rolls right in the middle of the sky. Oh, fuck, yeah, I am. I'm going to roll that airplane, probably 30, 40 rotations, and you're going to bounce around like one of Dolly Parton's tits and a bra that doesn't fit her. That's what I'm saying.

Sir, that is violent, man. What's wrong with you? And then I'm going to do a dive bomb. That's right. I'm going to drop altitude. We call it the dive bomb procedure. I drop at a very fast altitude, and you know what that does?

That creates a G-force. And you are going to float up out of your seat and be hanging in mid-air. And I'm going to come flying out of the cockpit, and I'm going to do a full-on UFC drop kick right in your throat so your fucking Adam's apple comes out of the back of your mouth and your eyes go flying into the back door. All right, knock it off!

I think we've discovered the problem here, sir. Unbelievable. I'm going to sneak a log onto the plane. You know what, a fire log. I'm going to buy a fire log from a firewood place and I'm going to put up my little black aviation bag. And when I see you, I'm going to conk you over the head, and I'm going to eat your ass like Jeffrey Dalmer,

right, those teenagers. I'm going to eat your ass. I'm going to pull the table down and put the seat up, and I'm going to eat you in front of the other passengers, and then I'm going to stomp on your bones with my... All right, hang up on this freak. What the gudge? I think we found the issue here, people.

It's a culture of zero respect for the passengers. Maybe I should sue. God. Hello? Hello? You can't hide raspberry eyes, and your smile is a thin disguise. Thought by now you'd be real.

life. I ain't no way to have raspberry eyes. Rice, a rookie, the San Francisco tree. Puppy dog pals. I love puppy dog pals. Chicken, chan. Chicken, chan. Mane, baby.

Oh, my God. That voicemail made my day. Thank you. Thank you, Father. and child for that wonderful phone call. I just love the innocence and the sweetness of a child and a parent together. You can just hear the love and the joy in their voices. And I want to thank you. I don't know who you are, my little friend, but it sounds like you were watching my new animated cartoon on the Disney channel

called Puppy Dog Pals, which premiered on Friday the 14th of April just last week. And it sounds like you love it. And that's what I want to hear. I'm so glad you love it. Thank you for leaving me a message. And that's very kind of you. And dad, also thank you for calling in. And if you want to call in after you've watched a few more episodes and tell me

what you think of the little pugs, Roley and Bingo, who are the stars of puppy dog pals. You can leave me another message if you want, and I'll put it on the show because I want to hear what you think of those little puppies. So for those of you that don't know, I have an animated cartoon that I created for Disney

called Puppy Dog Pals. It premiered just the other day. And I was out promoting. promoting it, and I went on Conan O'Brien and promoted it on Conan O'Brien last week. Hey, Arlen, this Brian, and congratulations on your Conan appearance. You always have good chemistry, as you know, and you can get the failed to surprise him with a friend of comment at the end.

And it's really good to see that. good call on wearing the coat too you fat suck oh what whoa what what what oh my god Brian must be referring to my last podcast where Charlie Lee was referring to me as a fat I think he called me a fat fucky not a fat fuck but either way you know I'm still uh you know this this comes off of my podcast where I told about my life screening results where it indicated that I was a few pounds overweight, not obese, not a big fat. Like, I'm talking like, you know, five, six pounds overweight, and who isn't, okay?

Fat suck. Oh, whoa, hey, I'm not a fat fuck, okay? I'm a... Fat fuck. Fat fuck. Okay, well, anyways, I had a great time on Conan. I always have a blast with Conan O'Brien. And, you know, it's just he and I just kind of have a fun little chemistry together.

And I don't know why at the end of the segment, I asked him if he wanted to come over to my house where I was going to be putting apple fritters on my eyes. I don't know why I even said that. But a lot of fun on Conan. It was really cool. Conan asked me all about my band with my cousin and our new album, Rattlesnake Love. And he held up the album cover on the show. And that was a really unexpected treat.

So we kind of threw around the idea of maybe me and my cousin going on Conan O'Brien and singing one of our songs. And that was very loosely brought up. But I tell you, man, you want to see me squirm a little. You know, I'm fine on. camera doing anything. But singing in front of the world is probably not my most comfortable spot to be in. So, oh, my God. If we were able to get on Conan and sing one of our cousin's songs, it would be incredible. I would be very nervous. Let me tell you. But I would do it because life is about challenges and stepping up to the fear and taking control.

Fat fuck. Indians scattered on Harlan's highway bleeding ghost crowd the young Harlan's mind. Okay, I want to circle back to this airline thing, though, that we talked about earlier, because, you know, I had something interesting happened to me on a flight not too long ago. And it was awkward, it was uncomfortable. It was strange, but I thought I better talk about it to the pavement pounders because it's one of those dilemmas you get thrown into where you know you have to walk walk a line with decency with kindness with with morality and I was flying around the country

going to a gig and I had one of those gigs where there was no direct flights I had to stop at an airport at a major airport and get a smaller plane to the city I had to go to you know the smaller planes. They hold about 60 or 70 people. You know, there's no real room in the overhead bin. They're like the twin propeller planes. They call them puddle jumpers. So I get on one of those and I'd been flying all day. I flew from California all the way over to like Atlanta or something like that. And it was a long flight. You know, that's like five hours or whatever. And I got off my plane and I transferred over to the puddle jumper and it was about an hour flight to my next destination and of course uh you know i go in and i go in last because with the puddle jumpers

i can't take my luggage so there's no point in you know trying to rush onto the plane to grab some overhead bin space and i know i have a reserve seat so i wait till everybody's on and then I go on last because I figure, you know, the more time I can spend on terra firma in the, in the terminal, uh, it beats me sitting in a hot stuffy, you know, puddle jumper where the seats are really small and really tight. They don't have first class or even big seats in economy and the puddle jumpers. So of course, I walk down the aisle and I'm like, you know, halfway down the plane and there's my seat and I've got a window seat. And there's a woman sitting in the, aisle seat and you know it's tight quarters everyone's packed together and I said oh this is my seat

she says okay she gets up slowly and I realized that as she got up she was a very large woman well I wouldn't be so crude about it but if we're being technical yes and this was this was an obese woman. Okay, this woman was probably pushing 300 pounds, possibly more. She was a large woman. And so it didn't really dawn on me until I got into my window seat and then she sat back down. And when I say sat back down, she, her body was pressing against me. And I was now forced to press my body up against the side panel where the window was. And I'm not mocking her. I'm not being cruel.

I'm not being mean, but I'm just telling you the facts. Her left leg literally was rolled over on top of my leg. A third of her body, okay? A third of her body was in my seat. I literally was being squished against the wall. And the little armrest in the middle, that was pushed up. Because on the puddle jumpers, you can lift those up. So that was gone.

And literally I was squished over a third of her body, her legs, her waist, her, her, everything was on my seat and on top of me. And so the first thing we had to do was kind of like, you know, get our seatbelts back on. And this was, it was ridiculous. I literally had to reach under her, her fat to grab my seatbelt. She literally had to roll up and allow me to reach under and touch parts of her body that, you know, I could not be avoided. But she kind of got the drill. She knew it. And it's kind of like when you see an animal in the wild and there's a bird on their head picking a ticks or there's a fish in the ocean and they open their mouth and the fish go in and clean the parasites.

You know, there's that kind of, you have an expectation. There's kind of a, there's a kind of protocol. It's like, oh, okay, you'd do this and I do that. We're a team suddenly. So now I was reaching under her body, and she was reaching under mine, and we were touching each other in areas that, in any other circumstance, you'd be accused of groping or fondling. But we had no choice, and she knew it, and I knew it.

And it was just, it was really uncommon. Man, and it was not pleasant, but I was sympathetic. I go, okay, this woman's large, and we've got to deal with it. But then I started thinking about, you know, that old protocol that the airlines had where it was like, you know what, if you're too big that you can't fit in your seat, you have to buy two seats. And I used to think that was a bit like, you know, excessive when I heard it back in the day. I wasn't against it, but I'd never experienced it.

But now here I was really uncomfortable. Someone else's body all over me, and not just a body, but a heavy body, not a healthy body. And I'm kind of a guy that, you know, I'm not into the fat thing. I've never been into the heavy girls. And it's not a matter of anything sexual or anything. It's just a matter of, you know, I just don't like, if it was a fat guy, I wouldn't have liked it either. I just don't want someone's fat on me. Does anyone listening want someone else's fat laying on top of them, especially someone you don't even know?

And so I started thinking, what's going through this woman's mind? She's got to know this is horrible for her and for me, but you can't change it. And so now, because as one of the last persons on the plane, desperately looking around. I'm like, you know what? I'm not going to do this. I'm sorry. I cannot fly for an hour or more with someone's body on me. And, you know, I weigh 22 pounds. I'm six foot two, man. I'm a big boy. So I'm already using up all my seat. And now I got this part of this other person's body on top of me. So I start scanning the airplane for empty seats. And I a couple, and I'm, and I'm just about to make my move, and it was going to be blatantly

obvious, but I was going to turn to her in a very gentlemanly way, in a very kind and considerate way, not being mean or condescending or rude, I was going to say, hey, I'm just going to go up to that other seat so we're, you know, we can both have a little more comfort. or I was going to word it somehow that, you know, obviously she knew and obviously I knew. And so I was trying to think of a plight way to just say, hey, you know what, I'm going to give you your own space. And I'm going to move up somewhere where I'll be more comfortable. You know, I would have worded it somehow that it didn't offend her, hopefully, but she knew that, hey, yeah, that's a good idea. Because in the end, she would have felt better and I would have felt better.

But at the same time, I was nervous about doing it, but I was going to do it because I've learned in life that, you know, you shouldn't, you shouldn't be at the mercy of other people's whims. You shouldn't have to sacrifice your comfort because of someone else's actions. And in this case, this woman had become obese or let herself go or had a thyroid problem. I don't know, but her weight should not be, I should not have to adopt her issues when I've paid for my. space on a plane, and I've paid to carve out a seat for my human form and not have someone else on top of me. That's suck. So I don't know if the aviation gods were shining on me, but just as I was about to make

my uncomfortable suggestion to her, the flight attendant approaches and says to me and her and the people in the next aisle, they said, ladies and gentlemen, this is an evacuation aisle. you are sitting right over the safety door, do any of you have an issue with being in this aisle? And I just went, oh, my God, there's my out. There's my diplomatic out. And I just put my hand up on me. I said, yes, I do.

And she looked at it. She goes, okay, okay, because, you know, if you're not comfortable being the exit person, then you don't have to sit there. They will move you around if they can. And by the way, it was a little disconcerting that the person in the safety exit aisle was a very, very large 300-plus woman who was not agile, who did not have good mobility. And in the event of opening said safety door, which is very small,

I have a feeling she might not have been able to get through it. and even if she could, she would have moved slow, and she's so large, she would have been an obstruction to people fleeing the burning aircraft or whatever. So that's another safety issue the airlines should take into consideration. How physically fit is the person in the safety exit row? Should they allow obese people in there? Should they allow children in there? Should they allow the elderly in there? I don't think so, man.

could be the difference between life and death for people. And that's not being mean. That's being real, man. Would you want to, would you want a, a, uh, 87 year old woman sitting in the next to the safety door and being responsible for pulling the latch and throwing a giant, you know, I don't know how much those doors weigh, but it takes a bit of acrobatics to get them open, man. So I don't think really large people and old people, and small people that might not have the physical strength to do, it should be in that row. So I put up my hand, I said, I'm not comfortable.

She goes, okay, and she yells to the whole plane now. She goes, is there anyone that wants to trade seats with this gentleman? And this is where I felt even worse. So there was a guy in the back, okay, he was like two rows from the back. He put up his hand immediately. And he was a guy the same size as me, if not a little bigger, had a beard. He looked like a Vietnam vet or an Iraq vet.

He looked like that sniper guy that they did the movie about. He had the hat on, you know, the baseball cap and the big, thick beard. And he goes, yeah, I'll move. And so I got up. I moved forward in the plane to a real skinny guy that I think he looked like he had the Zika virus or something. I was like, thank God for zombies. because this guy's body came nowhere near me.

I had all the space I deserved, all the space I had paid for, all the space I needed. But this sniper guy, he walks up and I can tell he was thinking, oh, great, I'm closer to the front of the plane, I'm not stuck in the back, and up pops, you know, this lady. And in goes this guy who, as I said, is definitely right in the wheelhouse in terms of my proportions he sits down and then she sits down again and from my seat now I'm up a bit and I'm across the aisle and I look back and I just go oh my god this dude just walked right into the spider web and I know how uncomfortable I was and I knew this guy was on coming on I'm like is this guy crazy but see here's the difference this guy and you can call him a plight

wonderful guy or you can call him stupid it's up to you this guy i could tell did not have the wherewithal or he felt too exposed or felt too sensitive or or felt embarrassed or didn't want uh didn't want to you know bring any attention to himself he was too meek to stand up for himself and go no no wait a minute this this is whoa i'm going to go back to my old seat or i'm going to look for another seat by the way way, there was a couple of other empty seats on this puddle jumper. But what this guy did, which was compassionate and was courteous, was he bit the bullet so as not to probably embarrass or make this large woman feel bad.

But I go back to he doesn't deserve that. And if he's not being cruel or malicious or mocking or insulting, It is totally within his boundaries to say, oh, excuse me, you know what, I think I'm going to move again. Pardon me. And do it as politely as possible without stating the obvious and look out for yourself. And a lot of people don't do that. And you don't want people to do it in a, in a cocky and titled way. Or it's like, oh, I'm fuck, I should be taken care of.

I'm me. I'm the king of the world. You don't want that attitude, but there is an etiquette to dancing around uncomfortable situations and being plight and being sensitive. And I was all about that until I kind of got that out

when they asked me if I was uncomfortable sitting in an exit row, emergency exit row. And I took the, the lure was cast in front of my face and I swam up and swallowed the base. I was like, yep, I'm really uncomfortable, which I wasn't. I lied.

I've sat in the emergency exit rose before, no biggie, no pun intended. You fat, suck. But I managed to get my way out of a situation and look out for my own health, welfare, safety, and comfort. Which I think is a totally legit thing to do. so I don't know how you guys would have handled it maybe you have a different point of view would you have sat there with a large human beings

fat rolling over on top of your leg and onto your body pressed against another heavy kind of sweaty human being their big fleshy arms like rounder than my thigh I mean, this was, I'm not joking, this was a big woman.

Would you have tolerated it? Would you have sat there? I don't think so. But I hope if you did get out of it, you would have looked for a compassionate way to do it so as not to hurt the other, you know, heavy person's feelings. We should always look out for each other in that way. So there you go. That's my, you know, that's my, my, my, my, my.

circling back to the airlines, right? But maybe that's another thing that passengers should have rights about. You know, maybe we do have to force heavy people to buy two seats. Maybe they do have to create some kind of protocol. Or maybe if the airlines weren't so greedy, and this was something I said to a friend of mine when I told them this story, I said, you know, the airlines make a lot of money. They make a lot of money.

know, their CEOs get, you know, $50 million bonuses every year. And so do a lot of the higher people up in the pecking order. They get bonuses, millions of dollars in bonuses. When was the last time you even got a bonus for $100? Who gets bonuses? Well, these guys do, right? And guess how they get their bonuses. They get their bonuses off of our money, off of our backs.

Who the hell deserves a bonus that big? I mean, they're probably already making half a million dollars a year. How is the bonus bigger than your salary? I always get sick when I, you know, I hear about these CEOs. Oh, the CEO of United Airlines got a $54 million bonus this year, and I paid for a first-class ticket, and I got a goddamn cheeseburger. Fuck you. You fat suck.

what I propose out of the compassion in their hearts, maybe the airlines should give up a seat for obese people. Wouldn't that be the kind, compassionate, humane thing to do? Instead of, you know, this woman I sat with, I could tell she was embarrassed. I could tell she was uncomfortable. She was self-conscious. I felt bad. Even if I didn't get up to change my seat, I knew that this woman was hurting, that she was suffering emotionally because she was probably ashamed and had no control over her weight, or maybe she did, and she realized she let herself go, and I'm sure she must have known she was imposing her physical form onto me or whoever sat beside her. But would it be nice if the airlines were like, you know what, we

live in a society where there are some very large people, and we offer a vehicle that really doesn't service very large people. And the airline should recognize that when a very large person gets into a plane seat, the people around them are going to suffer. And the individual who's overweight is going to suffer. Because as much as I don't want a heavy person hanging all over me, I'm sure that the heavy person doesn't want their body touching another human being that they don't know as well. So would it be nice if the airlines just, you know, if you were very large, you could let the airlines know when you ordered your tickets, and the airlines are like, you know what, you're 300 pounds, you're 400 pounds, we're going to give you two seats.

And so the airline loses out on one fare. You know what I mean? If they did this as a courtesy, as a humanitarian thing, you know, I'm sure that the, the person's, you know, I'm sure that the, the, the, percentage of flying consumers who are obese and would need two seats is probably 1%, maybe even half a percent of 1%, okay? Not a lot of people. Now, if you added them up over the whole year on every single airline, yeah, it would add up. But if it's only 1% of your paying consumers, I don't think it's going to ground your airline. And gee, I wonder if the CEO could take maybe a million dollars less

from his $53 million bonus to help accommodate people who have weight issues and it's very uncomfortable for them to fly. And everyone needs to fly now and then. And maybe there is a way that they can bend the rules for the obese and not make them feel uncomfortable and not make other passengers around them feel uncomfortable. So, you know, these are just some of the things that maybe this whole thing

with the guy getting dragged off of the United Airlines plane, maybe this is going to force the airlines to start to rewrite the menu and start going, you know, how do we cater and take care of our passengers first? and then we worry about our bottom line, and then we worry about our bonuses for all the execs. Let's make sure our passengers are taking care of and comfortable and safe and made to feel human. And then after we've done all that,

after we've put all that preparation and done all the groundwork to make sure our customers have the ultimate experience flying, then let's see what kind of profits we can divvy up between our greedy CEO and our execs. And maybe we can do away with the cheeseburgers and the cafeteria food and maybe upgrade. You know what, maybe we can get two dollops of butter to our passengers. Maybe two, because, you know, some people need enough butter to cover their whole bun, not just half of it. So maybe there's a silver lining to this United Airlines event, and hopefully it causes a shift and it turns out better for all of us.

So there you go. How about that? Oh, how about this? How about I drag a woman out of her seat by her tits? That's right. I'll grab both her tits, drag her down the aisle, put her head in the bathroom door, and slam it. seven or eight times until she goes unconscious. And then once she hits the ground, I'll kick her in the womb.

All right. Thank you for that. That's not the way we're going to go. What a jerk. Aye, aye, aye. Oh, the boys think she's a spy. She's got raspberry eyes. That's all right.

Well, let's close it up there. I think we got a lot of issues, aeronautical airspace. airline industry issues out on the floor today, and a good discussion. Let's go to some announcements here. If you want to see me do some live stand-up comedy, I will be at the Mohican casino in Connecticut at comics with an X on the end, C-O-M-I-X, great casino out there, April 20th to the 22nd. so that's uh that's this uh thursday i start april 20th to the 22nd get your tickets online

at harlund williams dot com and then uh and then uh may 11th through the 13th i will be in vancouver vancouver british clumbia uh at yuck yucks the club where i where i actually got my start the yuck yucks comedy club chain where i got my start doing stand-up comedy. So I'll be in Vancouver, British Columbia, doing some stand-up up there. And then June, here we go. June 1st to June 4th.

I'll be in Tampa, Florida. Yes. Doing stand-up at the improv in Tampa, Florida. And then June 15th to the 18th, Brea, California. Brea! Brea! Sounds like a donkey stuck in quicksand. Braia!

For all these stand-up comedy days, go to Harlan Williams.com and you can click on the stand-up tour link and you can order your tickets right off my web page. Reserve your seat so you are not disappointed. And you can check other dates, other cities that I have coming up all over the country. Chicago, Irvine, San Diego, sorry, San Jose, I mean, all kinds of fun dates coming up. See if I'm coming to your city or town.

again, don't forget to check out puppy dog pals, my new Disney animated series on the Disney channel. You can also download the Disney Jr. app on your telephone and watch full episodes of puppy dog pals on your cell phone. Pretty cool, huh? Also, don't forget to pick up our new record, me and my cousin Kevin, the cousins, Rattlesnake Love, on iTunes and all your digital platforms. You can download the whole album or just your favorite song. Let us know what you think. Don't forget, we have a website for the band, The Cousins Band.com, where you can get news and updates and watch rock videos and look at pictures and find out more about The Cousins and Rattlesnake Love.

Who knows, maybe you'll see us on Conan singing one of our songs eventually. How cool would that be? Whoa! Also, check out Harlow Williams.com. We have a store in the website where you can order merchandise, crazy t-shirts, artwork, music, movies, you name it, books, digital downloads. We've got all kinds of wild stuff in there. So please check that out.

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Plus you get bonus features, stand-up comedy stuff, interviews, little offbeat things that the other regular pavement pounders aren't privy to. So 20 bucks a year become part of the club. You can subscribe to become a premium member again at the website at harloweems.com. And thank you all my premium members, for subscribing. I hope you're enjoying all the content. And there you go.

So a bit of a long show today. I rambled on a bit. But, you know, there's lots to talk about. And that's it for today. I hope you guys are doing great. Happy flying, safe flying. And until next time, chicken. Chowman, baby.

You fat suck. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.