If there’s one thing I have learned over the years, it’s that there are always two sides to every story. On April 9th, a very unfortunate incident played out on United Flight 3411,…

I Know You’re Mad at United but… (Thoughts from a Pilot Wife About Flight 3411) – The Pilot Wife Life

My honest response to this article (addressing the author) :

First off I have to admit I was already turned off by the article before I began to read it. “Pilot wife.” If someone introduces themselves to me and the only way they describe themselves is as an optional appendage to another human being, I tend not to listen. (1. It’s lame and self-degrading AF. 2. OK, if you’re just the wife, why are we listening to you and not your husband who is the actual pilot then, dear?)

But on to the content…

People who justify abuses of authority by saying ‘I would have bowed down to it,’ are making apologies and justifying the abuses of authority. If you start that way, you’ve ruled out being open to the point of view of the victim. And since you are not taking into account the other side of the story, why should I take yours into account?

The “that’s just me,” comment is wholesale obnoxious. It is holier than thou, patronizing, and self-congratulatory. All of which are major turns offs. (“But that’s just me. Obviously.”)

The premise that a paying customer who is forcibly and violently removed from the plane after he simply refused to vacate the seat (a seat that he paid for and was already given) was the one posing a security threat is absolute nonsense. Clearly they only ones on that plane who were in danger were the people who the computer selected to get booted off.

I see your obnoxious and self-satisfied, ” if you choose to take advantage of the service the airport provides, you play by their rules,” with this logic:

The laws you are referring to protected absolutely no one on 9/11. In fact every single passenger on those planes died and whether they were following the strong-armed, self-important rules of the airline or airport was completely irrelevant. They all died either way and “cooperating” wasn’t going to help anyone. Even your precious pilot husband would have died had he been flying the plane.

In fact, the only thing that saved lives on 9/11 was when the passengers of Flight 93 stood up to the authorities they were confronted with, broke the rules, and brought the plane down themselves. …So there’s that.

…And, as things like slavery and women not being able to hold property or vote shows us, just because something is legal DOES NOT MAKE IT RIGHT.

All airlines might have the ability to do what United did, but do they? Anecdotally it seems they do not.

As for your “you’re going to to have to take this up with the federal government” comment… Actually it wasn’t the federal government that is the issue, or even an active problem in this incident. It was the airline’s actions and policy that are issue here.

The response to the argument that the airline should have planned better, “you obviously have no idea about the complexities of aviation travel and should do some research,” – beyond being childish- doesn’t hold water. Many of us have jobs or work for organizations the complexities of which the public isn’t intimately familiar with but most of society manages to perform these jobs anyway, without putting the responsibility for carrying the weight of mistakes made onto the customers.

United is directly responsible for everything that happens on their planes. I believe that is even part of the argument the author makes (for Pete’s sake!) They didn’t up the offer, they chose to use “random computer selection,” they called security officers, and they provided the authority for the officers to act as they did. Was United responsible for the impact of how their crew acted? Yes.

Is it reasonable to expect that the specific individuals who handled this situation this way (i.e the Captain and crew of this plane) face consequences for the outcome of their actions? In a word? Yes. The employees may not have asked for the situation but they absolutely did create it. If they are upset that their actions upset others? Well, they need to take responsibility for their mistakes instead of blaming others for responding from a viewpoint of empathy and shared humanity.

Rolling my eyes as hard as I did when I read this article made my head hurt.

In summation? No. …And go back to the fifties, you holier than thou, myopic, dinosaur.