Bodybuilder pulled off DFW flight shows problem with airline dress codes, experts say
A bodybuilder criticized American Airlines after she was barred from her Dallas-Fort Worth flight Thursday because crew determined her outfit was “offensive.”
Deniz Saypinar, a professional bodybuilder from Turkey, posted on her Instagram story to her nearly 1 million followers that airline staff refused to let her board her flight to Miami. A screenshot of the post shows Saypinar wearing a brown cropped shirt, denim shorts and a white jacket tied around her waist.
“I like to wear feminine clothes that reveal my femininity, but I never dress in a way that will offend anyone,” she wrote in the post, according to the Dallas Morning News. “I’m mature and civilized enough to know what I can and cannot wear.”
Saypinar is not the first woman pulled from a flight because her clothes were deemed inappropriate.
In June 2019, a doctor from Houston was removed from her American Airlines flight from Jamaica to Miami. The flight crew told Tisha Rowe she could only re-board if she covered up her romper, according to the Washington Post, and she was forced to walk back down the aisle with a blanket over her shoulders.
Benjamin Roberts, a personal injury attorney out of Houston, said airline dress codes are vague and often purposefully broad. Many airlines, including American Airlines, do not have a detailed dress code. Instead, their carriage contracts include a general statement on how passengers should dress.
In a statement about Saypinar’s removal from her flight to Miami, an American Airlines spokesperson referred to the airline’s dress policy: “Dress appropriately; bare feet or offensive clothing aren’t allowed.”
Roberts mostly focuses on aviation law in regards to people being injured on planes; he said he had not heard of anyone before being booted from a plane based on what they were wearing. Unless someone reads the fine print as they purchase a flight ticket, they might not even be aware the airline has a dress code policy, he said.
Those vague dress codes also leave a lot of room for interpretation, Roberts said. For example, someone may have “a misogynistic view” about women who are not wearing a lot of clothing and make a complaint to crew members.
“Offensive is subjective,” he said. “In their conditions of carriage, it’s a broad statement. I think that the problem that people run into is that it’s not clearly defined. So what is offensive or inappropriate to one person is not to another.”
Adam Anolik, an attorney in California who specializes in travel law, told the Washington Post that airlines’ dress codes can be problematic because of their subjectivity. Because the enforcement is left up to individuals, “inherent biases and hang-ups can come into play when the employees make the determination,” he told the Washington Post.
Other airlines have unclear dress codes, as well. Southwest’s dress code says passengers will not be allowed to travel if they are “engaging in lewd, obscene or patently offensive behavior, including wearing clothes that are lewd, obscene or patently offensive.”
In October, a woman boarded her Southwest Airlines flight in Dallas with her 7-year-old son only to be asked to get off the plane by crew. The crew told Playboy model Eve Marie that her low-cut dress was inappropriate, and she was forced to wear a flight attendant’s sweater in order to get back on the plane, the Independent reported.
“I felt like the other women on the plane were judging me based on my attire and they were saying my breasts are too large,” Marie said, according to the Daily Mail. “Well, that’s something I can’t help.”
Airlines are unlikely to change their dress code policies anytime soon. Roberts said the broad language gives airline employees the authority to take action if someone’s clothing is creating a problem or someone makes a complaint. But, of course, that can in turn cause a problem for passengers who unknowingly agree to those conditions when they purchase a ticket.
“So you can be confined by these arbitrary rules,” Roberts said. “And your legal recourse is limited.”
