Airline pilot sent to re-education camp

It isn't only governments that are punishing Speech Crimes. Corporations are just as keen to smack around employees guilty of politically incorrect comments, as a Southwest Airlines pilot found out recently.

HOUSTON -- A Houston-based airline pilot has been suspended after his cockpit microphone became stuck, allowing an obscenity-laced rant to be broadcast over hundreds of miles, Local 2 Investigates reported Tuesday. ...

Air traffic controllers in Houston first alerted Federal Aviation Administration supervisors on March 25, 2011, around 1:30 p.m. and those supervisors forwarded a tape of the episode to Southwest Airlines to take action against the pilot. The Southwest Airlines pilot, who was not identified by the FAA or the airline, could be heard talking to his co-pilot in the cockpit, expressing frustration over the airline hiring so many flight attendants that he found to be unsuitable for dating.

The pilot's comments were vulgar and juvenile. I won't even quote them here -- although if you want to you can read them in the linked story, which also includes the audio.

The captain (I assume he was captain because of the reference to his "co-pilot") deserved censure by his airline and perhaps  disciplinary action. But the reaction by the airline and the online news site that carried the story shows how pathological our culturally Marxist society has become: zero tolerance for any unflattering reference to our enthroned minority groups. And how the once respectable trade of journalism has declined into a servile arm of the Ministry of Propaganda.

Pilots within certain altitude guidelines over that entire geographic area were unable to communicate with Houston Center air traffic controllers for the entire four-minute duration of his conversation since his headset microphone was stuck.

Yes, that was unfortunate. But it wasn't deliberate, and it's not that rare. Mics get stuck in the transmit mode, probably several times a day in U.S. airspace. If the captain had been yakking about some sports star, no one would have given him a hard time. But in this case, he was using bad language about Those Who Must Not Be Offended.

The FAA was, for a government agency, surprisingly reasonable: "The incident occurred during a phase of flight in which personal conversations are permitted in the cockpit. Nevertheless, the FAA expects a higher level of professionalism from flight crews, regardless of the circumstances." Fair enough.

In the age of honest journalism, the story would have simply conveyed the facts and left it at that. But today our hack reporters use every possible incident to carry political indoctrination. The first thing they do is speed-dial a mouth working in the indignation industry. In this case, an GLBT "resource center" the reporter knew he could count on for high-voltage outrage. To wit:

Cece Cox, the CEO of Resource Center Dallas, which advocates for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender issues in the city where Southwest Airlines is based, said, "This individual has made statements that are anti-woman, anti-age, and anti-gay in a way that can't be disputed and they're hateful and they're damaging to the employees of Southwest Airlines as well as consumers of Southwest Airlines."

She also said, "I hope it's an isolated incident. I hope they look and see what's happening in their culture because clearly this incident shows that there's something happening in this culture that allowed this person to make those kind of remarks and exhibit this kind of hostility, discrimination, and hate," she said, adding that means people who were targeted in this rant may not feel safe flying with the airline.

Let's analyze that. "Clearly this incident shows that there's something happening in this culture that allowed this person to make those kind of remarks ... ." Yes, there is something happening in the cockpit culture. It's called free speech, something the GLBT spokeswoman thinks is intolerable. We can disapprove of the captain's remarks without demanding that his corporate culture suppress them. Lots of people say things that others find annoying, but most of us who aren't special pleaders for GLBT accept it as part of life.

"This kind of hostility, discrimination, and hate." Sorry, lady, but individuals have the right to be hostile, discriminatory, and even hateful to anyone they bloody well please in the course of a private conversation. You are free to express your hostility, and you have.

" ... She said, adding that means people who were targeted in this rant may not feel safe flying with the airline." What nonsense. Who will feel unsafe? Are gay flight attendants (or passengers) worried that the captain will deliberately crash his plane if he knows LBGTs are in the cabin?

Next up, Southwest Airlines.

Airline spokesperson Brandy King declined to answer questions about the punishment, saying the airline considers it a "family matter."

 She then went on to reveal the punishment for the family matter.

"The Pilot in question has been addressed by Leadership and was suspended without pay. Prior to being reinstated, he underwent additional diversity education to reinforce the Company's expectations for all Employees to demonstrate respect for others. The pilot has formally apologized to FAA Controllers and his base Leadership. He will continue to undergo regular diversity and inclusion education as part of his recurrent training."

Diversity education. Formally apologized. Continual diversity and inclusion education. Captain, henceforth you will wear a dunce cap and be reassigned to the rice fields for an indefinite period. You think just because you have been responsible for the safety of tens of thousands of people over the years and gotten them all to their destinations fully alive, you can speak slightingly of GLBTs? Wrong! Welcome to Maoist America.