Travel

Is My Outfit Appropriate To Fly?

By Jim Gullo

September 28, 2007 / 2:19 PM EDT / CBS News

(AP)

I simply don't understand why they wouldn't allow me to board the plane. I was wearing my best leather hotpants, a darling midriff top that emphasized my substantial abs, and my Elton John replica platform shoes. So what that I'm a fifty-year-old man and the other passengers all refused to sit next to me? Does that give an airline the right to kick me off the plane? What about the guy next to me wearing loafers and no socks? I hate it when men do that, and he shouldn't have been allowed to board either.

Well, that didn't actually happen, but after reading about the latest incidents of women being denied boarding from Southwest Airlines, I have a new fear of the fashion police judging my sartorial choices harshly. I mean, what's to stop a gate agent from ripping up my ticket and saying, "You're wearing that shirt with those jeans? I don't think so, honey." It makes me think it might be prudent to have Southwest pre-approve my outfit (by pictures sent via e-mail) before I leave for the airport.

I was thinking about this last week when I read how many major-league baseball teams like to haze their rookies by making them dress in outlandish outfits before the last road trip of the season. Daisuke Matsuzaka, the Red Sox pitcher, reportedly was forced to wear a Teletubbies outfit on the team's trip to Toronto. Mariners rookie catcher Jeff Clement got to wear an "I Dream of Jeannie" harem dress when the team traveled south to Oakland.

I'm just guessing here, but I'll bet that neither one of them flew Southwest.