I saw today’s Cranky Flier mentioning a pretty disturbing incident experienced by Matthew of Live and Let’s Fly Blog.  This isn’t a case of United beating the stuffing out of a guitar or American Airlines picking a fight with an actor.  This is, in some ways, worse.

Because it wasn’t a mistake.  It was abuse of a passenger.

I’ve witnessed this kind of bullying.  While I’m unaware of the exact flight attendant or captain, it’s symptomatic of what is a general trend in the airplane these days.  Control by bullying.

This passenger presents a potential challenge for me because he’s knowledgeable about what he can and cannot do and he’s willing to question my authority on certain issues.  Off he goes by any means possible.  Captains are now very reticent to tell flight crew to grow up and act like adults because there is a bit of a culture of protection that exists among flight crew that can result in blow back on him.

I believe the blogger and while the Captain and Flight Attendant in this situation might have a different viewpoint of sorts in all of this, they don’t really have an excuse, do they?

This wasn’t done to this gentleman out of an abundance of caution.  It was done to punish and control and it was an abuse of authority.  Is that what we pay for when we buy a ticket to travel somewhere?

And if this kind of thing happens to high mileage frequent fliers who write blogs, what is happening to economy passengers that is going unreported?

People who lie to control their own customers are abominable and should suffer consequences within this company.  People who don’t exhibit courage enough to arbitrate a situation involving a customer that clearly has not gone out of control are abhorrent and should be retrained in leadership before being permitted to command an airliner again.

Filed under: Airline News, Airline Service by ajax