Originally Posted by
jamesteroh
I was on a flight on another airline in June and we had a screaming infant up front. I was three rows in front of the infant and heard it screaming. I had happened to be on a PAID first class ticket on that flight (long flight DTW/SFO). The poor lady that got stuck sitting beside her kept getting up and walking to the front and standing. Seeing that baby was inconveniencing the entire first class cabin and probably the first couple rows of coach and was bawling loudly during the entire boarding process, shouldn't have we had the right to ask the baby to be removed? It was inconveniencing a lot of passengers and the infant obviously wasn't a ticketed fare to make things worse since the mother held it. I paid to be upfront on that flight since it was a long flight and I wanted it to be more relaxing. In this case the baby caused problems for multiple people on high fare tickets.
I'm sure if the mother would have gotten booted off because of a yelling infant (who wasn't paid for) because it was inconvenience 27 other passengers, a lot of people would have a fit, yet they think it's ok to boot off someone with a cat they PAID to have on board because it is inconveniencing one passenger?
I just hope the booted passenger is smart enough to know her rights and demanded CASH IDB compensation.
Screaming babies have long been a point of contention for frequent fliers and there really is no good answer. However, there are examples of parents and their kids getting booted off flights due to unruly or extreme behavior, so it's not like airlines don't have any options here.
The difference between a cat/dog and a baby is that the airlines are allowing those pets to fly in the cabin and can end that program at any time and can deny boarding to a PAX and their pet because it's at the airlines' sole discretion whether to let a pet fly or not. They don't have that same discretion when it comes to babies. By law, airlines can't institute a policy that denies boarding to all passengers under a certain age or allows them to remove any and all babies that cry before takeoff.