Look, I'm not saying her fears are unwarranted, but you have to help me understand where the dark patterns are in airline pricing. They show 1-2 seats remaining, but those are usually accurate... not like Booking.com or other shady booking sites.
When booking from first-party airline websites, I rarely have issues with unexpected prices popping up. Each "add-on" is clearly delineated.
The rise of even lower pricing tiers like Basic Economy on United also have their benefits (and severe restrictions) spelled out throughout the booking process.
The main point of contention seems to be that there are a lot of packages being selected by default, and to deselect everything you have to scroll way down an already long page or to click tiny buttons blending with the other elements, while the design of a site as a whole tries to railroad into clicking the large Next -> Next -> Pay buttons. Plus, the design of various packages differs a lot, so for deselecting, say, paid seat selection, extra in-flight meals and a premium lounge the user has to read the info in a completely different layout, understand it, and find a well-hidden place to click on.
The final price could be representative of what you've chosen, but the whole process creates massive anxiety over forgetting to deselect something somewhere and paying for a completely useless to you option.
Prices vary based on data they collect about you. Such as browser cookies, hardware info, browser, etc. You can often find different prices simply by clearing your cache or cookies. Or trying from a different browser. I left a comment in main about an anecdotal experience. One thing I'll add is that I also tried having 3 browsers open: Firefox, Mullvad, and Safari. I saw different prices on each.
This literally does not happen with first party airline sites (idk about sketchy third party scam sites). Where did this conspiracy theory come from? Which airline did you see doing this?
When booking from first-party airline websites, I rarely have issues with unexpected prices popping up. Each "add-on" is clearly delineated.
The rise of even lower pricing tiers like Basic Economy on United also have their benefits (and severe restrictions) spelled out throughout the booking process.