Atrios complains about the hassles of flying:
Some of this is not the fault of the individual airlines, such as stupid security theater, but plenty of it is. I mean bag fees, what the fuck? And it isn’t simply the money, it’s the extra hassle and just general sense of being screwed and harassed throughout the entire process.
If I can put on my Andy Rooney hat for a moment, doesn’t it seem as if this describes most of American business these days? It’s not just the airlines. As near as I can tell, consumer-facing businesses these days virtually never think about how they can make things genuinely more convenient for people. Rather, they seem almost obsessively concerned with calculating the maximum amount of pain people will put up with before they finally get pissed off enough to take their business elsewhere. When you venture out into the shopping world these days, you almost feel like you ought to have a lawyer at your side at all times to try and figure out what new and different way you’re going to get screwed this time around. It’s sort of exhausting. Is it any wonder that so many people are so angry all the time?
