Originally Posted by
LordHamster
As a founding member of the "former" position, I'd say "the heck with everyone else" is a bit of a biased misrepresentation. My feeling quite specifically is... when the overhead bins are full and space must be made that the minimalist one bag traveler should not be the first one to be "punished" for their choice to travel light. I'd suggest that perhaps the FA should first look to remove offending oversized luggage... or offer free gate-checking to late boarding passengers rather than targeting the earlier arriving (and probably more loyal to the airline) passengers.
Just my opinion. But I realize this is a philosophical difference that will not be resolved. Just wanted to clear up that I'm not indifferent to the woes of other air travelers, which is why I do my darnedest to travel with as little as possible.
It does bring up an interesting conundrum. The least resistance path is likely to ask people that only brought one item to put it under their seats, so I suspect this is where FAs start. Telling someone that they need to check a bag that was already in the overhead bin will likely be met with greater resistance. I agree that what is the "right" thing to do will not be solved here.
The attitude of the FAs when they work to resolve these issues makes all the difference (either actual attitude or perceived attitude) in these situations. Clearly on this thread we are seeing what happens when the FAs don't handle things as nicely as they could.