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If you're afraid of turbulence, just imagine the plane is suspended in jello.

Fear of flying—aerophobia, in technical terms—is an extremely common phobia, affecting around 25 million adults in the U.S. alone. Some people grit their teeth and white-knuckle their way through their fear, while others find themselves unable to get on an airplane at all because of it.

Such a fear is understandable, really. Hurtling through the sky at 500 miles per hour, tens of thousands of feet above the Earth's surface, isn't exactly the way humans were designed to get from place to place. (We may have evolved with the brain power and ingenuity to make it happen, but that doesn't mean we automatically go along for the ride without our sense of self-preservation kicking in.)

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Identity

Women share the unbelievable ways they were treated on planes for being fat

"The most important thing that fellow passengers can do is just acknowledge the humanity of the people they're traveling with."

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Plane rides can be a dehumanizing experience for many

Before moving to London to pursue a degree in anthropology, Stacy Bias had to decide if it was worth getting on the airplane.

"As a woman over 300 pounds, flying was pretty anxious for me," Bias says. Over the years, Bias came to fear being stared at, subjected to rude comments from seatmates, or asked to purchase an extra seat. The anxiety got so bad that at one point, she stopped flying altogether.

With a little determination and encouragement from her partner, who had recently relocated to the U.K., Bias faced down the fear and got on the plane to London. Soon after, she started a Facebook group to offer discussion, support, and tips to other fat travelers who had encountered similar roadblocks. The group quickly grew to nearly 4,000 members and Bias, in conjunction with a research project for her undergraduate dissertation, presented the group with a survey, encouraging members to share their experiences in the air.

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An American Airlines plane at takeoff

A recent poll from the American Bar Association found that 85% of respondents believe that civility is worse than it was a decade ago, while only 8% said it's improved.

Why do people believe that civility is on the decline? Twenty-nine percent blame social media, 24% said the media and 19% said it's because of public officials.

A pilot on American Airlines has had it with “rude” and “selfish” passengers on his plane, so he gave an earful to anyone who would listen, and it was captured for posterity by comedian Anna Leah Maltezos. The video must have been cathartic for a lot of people because it has over 4.4 million views on Instagram.

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With thousands of flights canceled, tensions in airports are high.

Air travel is a hot mess right now, especially with Southwest Airlines apparently in a system-wide meltdown. Thousands of flights have been canceled. Passengers are stranded at airports across the country. Checked bags are nowhere to be found. People are complaining of hours-long customer service lines and no one answering phones.

All of this is immensely frustrating, of course. No one likes having their plans changed without warning and having to scramble to problem-solve on the fly. Traveling is already stressful as it is, especially during the holidays, which is all the more reason to follow the one hard and fast rule for when your travel plans get disrupted.

Be kind to airline employees.

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