Beneath The Planet of theAnti-Poets

Yesterday my wife, Stacey, flew to the UK. As usual she travelled by Ryanir as we have been for several years now due to their low fares. However, Ryanair won't be the first site she checks in future and may not even make the list.
Five minutes before boarding she was queuing at the boarding gate behind an eighty-year-old lady. A uniformed jobsworth from Ryanair approached the old lady and informed her that she could only bring one piece of hand luggage on board and she would have to do something with her duty free. Now the woman had several bags of duty free - presents for her family of chocolate and booze and the usual duty free junk. There was no way she could fit it into her carry-on bag and she looked helplessly at the official.
"I don't make the rules, I'm merely carrying them out," she said, then suggested that the old lady should distribute the chocolate and booze about her person - "Under you coat," was the exact phrase.
What is the point in this? She would be carrying one bag but bringing the same weight aboard, no matter how the load was distributed.
Other passengers backed up the lady, who asked why she had been encouraged to buy duty free if she was not entitled to carry it aboard. One gentleman, an Australian, was more vociferous than the rest and demanded that the old lady be left alone and allowed onto the plane. The jobsworth insisted she didn't make the rules and repeated her suggestion regarding the duty free and the old lady's clothing.
Next, the jobsworth turned her attention to my wife, stating that Stacey's carry-on bag was too big and pointing at a measuring device. The bag was slightly bigger than the dimensions but very light. She redistributed some gear from the front pocket and this changed the dimensions sufficiently to pass the measurement test.
While Stacey was doing this the Australian man asked the official why she was hassling Stacey as there were plenty of passengers in the queue who had bigger bags. The old lady was still looking lost and increasingly distressed. The jobsworth insisted she would not be able to get onto the plane unless she got rid of her extra bags. The Australian demanded that the old lady be left alone and be allowed to board. Two more Ryanair functionaries appeared and asked the man to step out of the queue. They told him that if he did not stop causing trouble he would not be allowed to board. So Stacey and several other passengers said they would refuse to board the plane unless both the man and the old lady were permitted aboard. When the flight was called no-one moved. The attendants called for people to board but nobody at the head of the queue was prepared to approach the gate.
Unfortunately one weasel (Stacey's description) pushed his way through the crowd and marched toward the plane. Once the line had been crossed the rest of the crowd broke ranks and pushed through like sheep. Eventually the Australian and the old lady were also allowed on board.
However, I just thought that the description of the events and the way the vociferous Australian gentleman was treated smacked of Nazi thuggery. Is this what things have come to in the pursuit of buck?
Obviously Ryanair's low fares business model is no longer working, or possibly it is just not producing the level of profits required. So Ryanir is now attempting to load extra charges onto its passengers at every hand's turn. Apparently we will soon be required to load our own luggage onto the plane. What are the security implications of this? I would certainly favour loading my own luggage if I wished to get a bomb on board - I'd hate to trust a delicate timing device to careless baggage handlers.
I for one will be prepared to pay an extra twenty or thirty euro on each flight in order to avoid the fascist thuggery and I hope there are plenty more like me. Ryanair do not deserve the support of decent people if they do not know how to treat their customers with dignity. But if we are prepared to put up with their contempt then we deserve it.


Sheep Flights

Fascists bleat,
I was only following orders.