Posted on 01/30/2024 5:11:27 AM PST by george76
2021, United Airlines released the following statement:
"Our flight deck should reflect the diverse group of people on board our planes every day. That's why we plan for 50% of the 5,000 pilots we train in the next decade to be women or people of color."
In the past few weeks, a 2021 interview with United CEO Scott Kirby, in which he promoted United's pilot-training policies, went viral.
The bottom line is clear: It will no longer be merit alone that determines who half of United's pilots-in-training will be; it will be race and sex (or "gender," as the Left prefers to call it). Despite the New York Times and the rest of the Left defending United, there is no other honest conclusion to draw.
As one who flies about 100 times a year, often on United, this worries me. Until now, I rarely worried about safety issues. I have certainly never feared flying.
But this is troubling enough that, although I will probably have flown a million miles on United by the end of 2024 and I am at the second-highest level available to United Airlines flyers (Premier Platinum), I will now do my best to avoid flying United. I am also giving up my United Visa card.
And I am asking all Americans who have a choice in airlines and a choice in credit cards to do the same. If you don't fight this battle, you have no right to complain about the demise of our society, let alone of United or any other airline adopting similar policies. You have an opportunity to make a difference. United may be willing to compromise about safety, but it isn't willing to compromise about its bottom line.
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United is a particularly woke company. As one left-wing observer of the airline industry and defender of United, Gary Leff, writing on viewfromthewing.com, put it: "United was out way ahead of the Biden administration with vaccine mandates. This angered many pilots."
It is important for me to note that until now I could not care less if my pilot was black, white, male or female. I have flown on planes with black pilots and female pilots, and I slept equally well on board. Those of us who oppose United's affirmative action do not do so for race- or sex-based reasons. To cite a medical example, people of every color sought Dr. Ben Carson if they needed one of the country's best neurosurgeons for their child. But if people know that a hospital was hiring surgeons using affirmative action criteria, they might well think twice before undergoing surgery with a minority surgeon.
Here's a good test of whether opposition to United's affirmative action for pilots is racist or not: Ask a black friend or colleague if he or she would prefer a pilot (or surgeon) who was chosen on merit alone or by also using affirmative action criteria.
We already know that colleges engaged in affirmative action have not helped black students succeed. Why should it work in the cockpit? Would anyone respect the decision of an NBA team to diversify its players by using affirmative action to hire more white players?
The woke DEI notion of companies, physicians and cockpits having to "look like" the rest of the population is as absurd as it is dangerous. In fact, I can think of no area of life where this matters to anyone who is not on the Left.
How, exactly, have all the black mayors, congressmen, and even a black president, helped blacks in any way? Has the virtual absence of Indian American, Taiwanese American, Filipino American or Pakistani American mayors, congressmen -- or pilots, for that matter -- hurt any members of these groups in any way? Those four groups are the top-earning ethnic groups in America (Census Bureau, 2021).
The notion that the cockpit or the mayor's office has to look like the rest of the population is just foolish -- as foolish as the idea that professional athletes have to look like the rest of the population. It is an idea, like most stupid ideas, that appeals primarily to college graduates.
I flew United in the second week of January and it was a disaster. United is a garbage airline.
Mark me done with flying.
When the plane goes down, you can take comfort that at least the flight crew was diverse.
Who does that leave us with? Frontier? Spirit?
United’s CEO is a drag queen. They put color, sex, and queer factor over meritorious qualifications. I certainly will not patronize United Airlines. If they wanted a pro-faggot airline, they should resurrect TWA. (Trans World Airways).
Un-tied
My son is a pilot and works for a privately own company with a fleet of jets…because of what’s happening with commercial airlines. He says “dad, a lot of these pilots and maintenance guys are not qualified”.
Thanks, I’ll drive.
When my brother left the Air Force, he applied to almost every US carrier. The only one to not call him back was United. That was in the 90s. Even then, United was pushing AA. After he told me that, I boarded a United flight in Chicago and there were two young ladies in the cockpit. I no go, you know.
“Mark me done with flying.”
Understandable, but does competence in the cockpit really matter these days? Consider the the sophistication of today’s jets, and the highly skilled people who design and build them, before making such a rash decision.
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Hmmmm.
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Come to think of it, perhaps you have a point.
The Bud Light Lesson has not been learned.
I’ve posted about this before. A client/friend is a pilot at United. He warned me about this last year. He said due to the unqualified hires, it’s not if but when a major incident will occur.
Men are physically different from women in ways that matter for many reasons, not the least of which are occupations and war fighting. I hope this isn’t the slightest bit controversial here at FR.
Men are also mentally different from women.
Men score significantly higher than women on spatial relations tests. Funny, this matters when you’re piloting huge tubes of aluminum full of people and goods through the air around the planet. Especially if your highest goal is to not have them intersect, and take off and land and taxi safely.
We should expect to find significantly more men in pilot and ATC roles for this reason. That idiots are trying to force outcomes not based on skills and merit will result in failures to meet those goals, with tragic results.
When the first Boeing 737Max crashes occurred, I thought to get on Boeing’s web site and look around.
It had lots and lots of DEI content.
Leftists destroy everything they touch.
I will not fly United. I will look for an airline that puts competence first.
Boeing is the queen of DEI.
I heard Delta employs over 16,000 pilots. Replacing that many with DEI recruits is too large a challenge, so military veterans will predominate for quite some time yet.
Obviously, when flying internationally always choose a non-US carrier.
It shouldn’t be controversial, but to some, it always is.
As you say, the truth of it is, there are differences.
Anyone who pays attention sees that men and women view things and operate in an environment in very different ways. We are wired differently. If aliens came to Earth, they would likely view men and women as different species.
I have long held the belief that those differences are exactly the reason that a man and woman together can, in many ways, be stronger in unison than either of them could be as an individual...when acting as a pair (not just co-mingling males and females together in the idiotic belief that dynamic works in a group)
Males and females compliment each other in a Ying-Yang relationship. We can each bring something to the table and supply something missing in the other, and vice versa. There are some things women do better than men, and some thing men do better at than women.
Smart, intelligent men and women recognize this fact, and accept it. In healthy male-female relationships, both recognize this as fact...and are better for it.
The mistake ideologues (almost entirely on the Left) make is assuming that benefit scales into all facets of society and culture, and it does not. It doesn’t mean what they assert in their asinine claims of “strength in diversity”.
It means that in a bonded couple.
It doesn’t mean that in combat, or a number of any other things. And pretending it does is going to get people killed.
“I heard Delta employs over 16,000 pilots. Replacing that many with DEI recruits is too large a challenge, so military veterans will predominate for quite some time yet.”
Russian roulette.
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