Police interview ("Fair dinkum labelled swearing by US airline")

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Daily Telegraph

Police interview
By staff writers
August 10, 2007 05:17pm

AN Australian woman was branded a criminal by airline officials after "swearing" on an American flight - with a classic, and utterly inoffensive, Aussie oath.

"Fair dinkum," New South Wales woman Sophie Reynolds muttered when told by a air hostess that there were no pretzels for her to snack on.

The next thing Ms Reynolds knew, the flight crew had demanded her passport to note down her details, telling her that swearing at attendants was a crime.

The 41-year-old, who lives in Queanbeyan, near Canberra, was stunned to find three uniformed officers waiting for her when she left the flight in the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

"They said: 'You swore at the hostess and there are federal rules against that'," Reynolds told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22222222-38198,00.html?from=public_rss

[KT2000]

1. I hear that

telling them their airline is crap is against the law too.

[oscarmitre]

2. There's more to it, there must be.

When we say "fair dinkum" it can be used in several ways. It means to be honest or forthright, "I'm fair dinkum, you're in big strife". But it can be used with other words, "fair dinkum this f*ing airline is useless." Not saying the woman said that, just pointing out that the phrase, at least in my experience, is that it's usually not uttered in isolation.

[MADem]

10. It's the DINK bit--dink=penis in some parts of the USA

What an idiotic flight attendant. Provincial, reactive.

Not the norm.

[DCKit]

19. It doesn't take much

I've flown only twice in the past seven years, and both times I've had flight attendents do their best to push my buttons. They're looking for an excuse. You'd think they'd have something better to do than try to manipulate people into a confrontation, but I guess getting rid of all other services has freed up entirely too much of their time.

[liberalmike27]

23. Well

Let's face it, they are glorified waitresses in the sky. I'm sure they have self-esteem issues, not to mention travelers are probably assholes.

But it just shows how ridiculous things are that people are using this new power in this way. I swear if I have to travel less than a thousand miles, I will drive rather than take a plane. To start off with, the tickets are vastly expensive, it seems risky, and I've driven pilots and attendents around to their hotel, and they can be real jerks.

[lapislzi]

34. Your "glorified waitress" (how offensive!) is responsible for your safety and comfort

and has likely been working without a contract and in insecure working conditions, fearful of having his/her pension evaporate (if it hasn't already vanished) in the face of ridiculous regulations, overcrowded and under-serviced aircraft and an increasingly discontented public.

Do you suppose your "glorified waitress" is happy about having to tell passengers already grumpy about the delays and the security nonsense that there are no more PRETZELS?

Have a little compassion for the people who have to work in those cigar tubes.

[MADem]

42. Glorified waitresses who have to know CPR/first aid, be able to wrestle open a huge door and

deploy a slide if the aircraft goes down, use those shock and awe paddles if a passenger's heart stops, and who has a shitload of other duties as well. And some of them are "glorified waiters" too. It's not a gender specific job.

Let's not even discuss the older ones who spent years exposed to tobacco smoke, and the ones today, who continued to be bombarded with levels of radiation significantly in excess of that received at ground level, which is why a lot of them have thyroid problems. And of course, they have reduced crews to FAA mandated minimums, which means there's one or two fewer of those 'glorified servants' to wait on assholes who think they should get an asskissing and fucking pedicure for their Orbitz $99 discount ticket.

And not only were they working without a contract, most of them (especially the Delta ones) took DEEP pay cuts after Nahn Wun Wun changed ever' thang.

Amazing the ignorance and intolerance on this 'progressive' website. You're not gonna get compassion from people without the capacity to care about anyone other than themselves...unfortunately. It's always a surprise when one reads shit like that.

[smoogatz]

49. There you go.

If you were in any doubt about the general attitude of FAs toward their customers, this pretty much says it all:

"there's one or two fewer of those 'glorified servants' to wait on assholes who think they should get an asskissing and fucking pedicure for their Orbitz $99 discount ticket."

So sit down, shut up, enjoy your fucking flight, and if you complain the cops'll be waiting for you in Pittsburgh, you cheap assholes.

Caramba.

[MADem]

55. No, there YOU go. Mutual respect is a two way street.

There are way too many people though, who blame the wage slave flight attendant for the elimination of "their" meal, and the reduction of "their" legroom, the absence of "their" peanuts, and the delay they have to endure--like the FA has a choice over these issues, and is doing it deliberately, JUST TO PISS YOU OFF.

Instead of writing to the corporate suits about these things, instead, they order around their "waitress" who makes about ten bucks an hour after working for the company for twenty years, and feel important because they get to shit on someone who works hard for their money.

Caramba, indeed. Get ripped off? Go kick the dog and feel like a man.

I can't help but notice how eager everyone is to take one single, solitary dumb minimum wage FA on a FEEDER airline and extrapolate it to every single FA on the job. No care whatsover for these non-union workers slaving under hideous conditions with no job security.

Real progressive...caramba. Sickening.

[smoogatz]

74. Median flight attendant salary: $52,349.

http://swz.salary.com/salarywizard/layouthtmls/swzl_compresult_national_TR20000052.html

At $10/hour, you'd have to work 100 hours per week, 52 weeks per year to earn $52,000. Which would, if true, make this pretty much the worst job on the planet.

But I don't think your median FA works 100-hour weeks, 52 weeks per year.

Look, I'm sure there are people in this country who blame flight attendants for flight delays and midget-sized seats and the lack of meal service, not to mention the insulting and ridiculous security and the rude terminal personnel and the general disregard for passenger dignity, let alone comfort and convenience. But I don't think your average DUer is that dumb. I think what people here are responding to is a sense of shared experience: anyone that's flown the domestic airlines with any frequency in the past ten years or so is aware of the precipitous decline in onboard service, and the precipitous increase in general short-tempered sourness of many flight attendants. One starts to wonder if the airlines are hiring them directly from the ranks of former prison guards, or what. If you've flown an airline lately that doesn't suck--Swissair, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, Virgin Atlantic or even Southwest--the contrast between those airlines and the bottom tier (in terms of customer satisfaction) of domestic airlines like Northwest and U.S. Air is remarkable. There's no reason that at $50,000 plus (more than my salary, in fact) a flight attendant can't at least be civil when a customer asks for another five cent bag of fucking pretzels. As opposed to, you know, calling DHS.

[MADem]

77. Cut that pay you cited in HALF for a feeder airline like COMAIR or Delta Connection

THIS is what they've been dealing with for the last few years:

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060223/BIZ01/602230334

An overnight court filing by Delta Air Lines' subsidiary Comair heightened an already tense situation with its flight attendants, and cast the regional airline in a fresh financial light by reporting Comair lost $120 million in 2005.....The filings, in association with Delta's bankruptcy, seek to void the contract with Comair's 1,100 flight attendants. Delta and Comair officials said Comair's future is at risk if the company cannot obtain $8.9 million in annual compensation cuts from the attendants.....The filing stated an average Comair flight attendant earns $28,600 a year. The union says the cuts - including 20 percent to 26 percent pay cuts, plus the end of company retirement contributions and the introduction of part-time flight attendants - would cost an average worker $10,500 a year in benefits and wages.

But hey, whatever. Ignore the fact that it is the CAPTAIN that makes the call, not the flight attendant (who just takes the BLAME). Ignore the fact that the story, with only one side of the tale given out, comes out of a Rupert Murdoch rag.

Sure, onboard service sucks--why? You get what you PAY FOR.

[smoogatz]

78. The captain makes the call at the request of the FA.

That seems obvious to me. You get what you pay for? Really? Could I pay an extra hundred bucks and get a little common courtesy?

[MADem]

80. No, the Captain is in CHARGE of the crew. He or she is the lead dog.

The Captain is the "decider" of the aircraft. It's his or her decision.

The FA doesn't tell the captain what to do.

And the FA that served the woman is not the FA who took her details, per the story.

Which is why, as the report suggests, there just might be more to the story.

If you paid an extra hundred bucks, you probably would get better service. Before deregulation, when airfares in the early seventies were four hundred bucks to some simple locations, service was sublime, and coach seats were bigger than the ones in first class now.

You DO get what you pay for--and the desire of most coach passengers is for cheap, 'Greyhound/Leave the Driving to Us quality' air transportation.

[smoogatz]

81. So, the captain witnessed the "incident"?

Or did he just experience it via ESP? Or did one of the FAs tell him about it, maybe?

There's no option, as far as I know, to pay an extra hundred to not get treated like shit. If there was I'd pay it every time. It's $2000 for first class or whatever they're charging that day for steerage (which ain't so cheap anymore, as far as I can tell); there's no in between.

You don't have to tell me about what air travel used to be like; I've been flying commercial since 1967, and hating it since deregulation.

[MADem]

82. If the captain is ASLEEP, he's still responsible. That's chain of command for you.

If I had to guess, I'd say the junior FA reported it to the Senior FA, who reported it to the Captain. Or the senior FA saw unacceptable behavior, perhaps even behavior that was glossed over in this story, and stepped in.

But it's the CAPTAIN who talks to the ground, and gets the cops, the doctor, the ambulance, the wheelchair, what-have-you, to the gate.

Even Murdoch's Fox arm over here did toss in a similar paragraph:

Reynolds told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that she said “fair dinkum” out of frustration. The newspaper quoted the airline on Thursday as saying that SkyWest was still investigating the incident but Reynolds had exhibited other aggressive behavior during the flight.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,292920,00.html


And perhaps the Senior FA or someone else in the cabin (a "non-revenue" airline employee going to work, for example) had something to say about the passenger's conduct in other areas. Who knows? I wasn't there. Neither were you. But I can see that there just MIGHT be two sides to this story, though Rupert Murdoch, who loves a good "story," might be disinclined to focus overmuch on the boring facts in his reportage. It IS what he does.

There is an option for those who don't like a flying bus--it's called FIRST CLASS. You'll pay more than an extra hundred though.

There's also NETJETS, where you can leave at your leisure and have the whole aircraft to yourself. That's costly, too. Or if you're stinking rich, you can buy your own plane and keep your own pilot on standby.

But you DO get what you pay for--it costs more to go by train on the eastern seaboard than it does on some airlines, depending upon when you book. You can buy a sandwich in the dining car, though, and not suffer the 'pretzels (or lack thereof) of the air.' And you don't HAVE to stay seated. And the bathrooms are bigger. Trains aren't a bad way to travel, especially during off-peak times.

[Patriot Abroad]

54. blah blah blah

The point here is not that flight attendants don't have hard stressful jobs, it is that, in their (possibly overworked) role, they still have to be pleasant to the passengers, not overreact at any imagined slight, and not use their positions of authority to make passengers lives hellish.

That's the job.

Passengers are stressed out from long trips, and are sometimes inclined to say and do angry things.

Again, that's part of the job.

It's not a pleasant part.

If a flight attendent can't deal with it without calling the cops, they shouldn't be flying - this doesn't exactly paint SouthWest airlines in a rosy light;

Of course, we have the European version of SouthWest here, RyanAir, whom treat passengers somewhere between sheep and cattle, so we would know what to expect on SouthWest anyway . . .

[MADem]

56. It's the 'extrapolation' I find troubling.

The generic enthusiasm for piling on, for shitting on the wage slave.

I've flown RyanAir. My bag went missing for a week. I was luckier than some, I got it back.

It does suck, but you get what you pay for.

As for the flight attendant calling the cops, it's actually the CAPTAIN that does that--he or she is in charge of the crew overall, and that person is the one who asks the cops to meet the plane.

And unless that flight attendant was the lead FA on the flight (or maybe was the only one, if the plane was small enough) she may have had an FA boss between her and the captain.

There's way too much "assuming" happening, here, based on a story out of a Rupert Murdoch arm.

So who knows what really happened? We only have one side of the story. At this point, anyway.

[alfredo]

58. Oh and don't forget:

walk quickly down the center isle so your hopefully silent fart is diluted enough that nobody can nail you as the guilty party.

See "crop dusting."

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=crop+dusting

[smoogatz]

48. If the FAs are actually responsible for my safety and comfort

a) I'm screwed
b) They're doing a shitty job
c) They're still not justified in treating disgruntled passengers like potential terrorists.

I have a degree of compassion for them, but it's tempered somewhat by stories like this one in which FAs misuse FAA rules to take revenge on passengers they don't like. It's just another disturbing element of the encroaching police state. IMO, the woman should sue the airline and the FA.

[MADem]

57. You're assuming a Rupert Murdoch paper is telling the truth about this incident.

And never mind that the CAPTAIN, not the FA, is the one who requests that police meet the aircraft.

You're only hearing one side of the story.

[Ilsa]

61. Some of those "glorified waitresses" have died trying to get

escape doors open when aircraft were on fire when they could have run out through a safer, more distant, exit door.

Hey, I've had issues with them as well, like when one complained about my 8 month old baby crying when we were descending, like I wasn't trying to do everything I could to make my child more comfortable. Or the one that was too intimidated by a basketball team to ask them to bring their chairs forward for landing, so she let them recline in my face. So I reclined, and got called on it. But she wouldn't ask them to sit up for my safety. I've never back-talked one, but I fail to see how "fair dinkum" is a swear.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

32. I had a blast with that,

I was on a flight where a male stewardess was badgering this poor woman and her kid most of the flight - she took her son to the bathroom while they were serving the drinks, but after they passed her row and until a pilot who was another passenger threatened to report him to some person he named directly he was threatened her with charges of "obstructing the flight crew".

The child was also perfectly behaved, but the guy asked me over and over again if the child was bothering me.

[MADem]

43. "Male Stewardess??" Is this a GOP website? Have I taken a wrong turn?

I've never seen such disdain for working Americans in a thread like this in a LOOOOOONG time here.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

44. I guess I could have just called him an asshole,

[CreekDog]

67. You made fun of waitresses and flight attendants

Time to eat some crow and just admit you're wrong and everyone can move on.

The term, "glorified waitress" is just wrong on so many levels. Innacurate and offensive all in one shot.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

71. excuse me?

What exactly is unreasonable about calling out an asshole who was badgering a woman and her kid for "obstructing the flight crew" when all she did was take her kid to piss without getting in the way of anyone passenger or crew. The stewardesses were 5 rows behind us when they got up and 5 more before she got back. The asshole continued to torment the woman until a man got up, identified himself as a pilot with his company ID and told the guy if he didn't drop it he would make a report.

What is it with DU and stewardesses? are they supposed to be some sort of protected order from whom anti-social behavior, dishonesty and explosive over-reactions are to be tollerated from?

Seriously if your job is so fucking terrible that you are incapable of performing your duties without lashing out at customers... QUIT.

And why is it airlines like Frontier and Southwest don't seem to have these problems? If they have found the magic well of quality flight crew - what the fuck is everyone elses excuse?

Fire the assholes.

[CreekDog]

72. Calling all Flight Attendant's "Glorified Waitresses" is wrong

My complaint was not aimed at you, but at the poster that used the "glorified waitresses in the sky" term. You were not that poster and I'm sorry about that

My original post says what I think is wrong, calling people "glorified waitresses" which says fairly plainly that flight attendants are "waitresses" and suggests that "waitresses" don't do a job that that the poster even respects.

They used your broad brush and I didn't like it.

[Dukkha]

50. a lot of phony outrage on this thread too

get over yourself :eyes:

[Name removed]

51. Deleted message

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[Name removed]

59. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[DCKit]

60. Outrageously phony

I'm a nice guy, and worked in customer service far too long to believe that either side is always right. However, I've also been the victim of far too many people whose sole goal in life is to make someone else's life miserable, from whichever position.

I do not seek out the attention of mean people, they find me. Unfortunately, it took far too long for me to catch on and I have suffered. Now it is a goal in life to sling their shit right back at them and I try very hard to do so in a calm and patient manner so as not to be confused with a tin-hatter.

The number and scope of the ways and methods I have observed people using to push other people's buttons is long and amazing, but there is no slight too small to be overlooked when you're on a mission.

People with control issues have control issues. The only way to stop them is to teach them a lesson and if it takes publicity or a lawsuit to embarrass them into compliance with polite society, so be it.

[The Stranger]

25. The "more to it" is that America is becoming a Totalitarian state due to constant, groundless fear.

[Canuckistanian]

31. I DOUBT the flight attendant could make that fine distinction

I'm astounded at the attendant's lack of familiarity with the term. They come in contact with people from all over the world every day.

[dipsydoodle]

3. It'a an old english expression too

Just means fair enough.

I think the world is going mad.

[Judi Lynn]

5. Glad to read your comment. That expression has been used in many instances

in movies which have shown in the U.S., and I NEVER have heard it used in any way which would appear menacing, or ominous, or alarming. NOT ONCE.

Someone wasn't a very good "people person."

Give people even a small window of opportunity to wield some power over others, and many won't rise to the occassion to turn away from using it. What a shame.

[Tesha]

13. "Going" is the statement of an optimist! ;-) (NT)

[0007]

17. Urband Dictionary

1. Fair Dinkum.....Originates from when Captain Cook first landed in Australia. When they used to drink the toast would be "Fair Drinking" and the saying has evolved from there.

"Mick that koala just scratched my nob off"
"Fair Dinkum Shane, you did piss on him"

2. Fair Dinkum.....Australian slang; v, fair or true. To proclaim a fact or truth in a statement in such a manner.

Na mate, I'l tell ya what...the guy come roun he-gain..Il give to em right..bloody fair dinkum mate!"

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=fair+dinkum

[non sociopath skin]

28. Don't think so, Ed ...

I'm a Brit and I've never heard anyone but an Australian use it.

And never as a cuss!

The Skin

[dipsydoodle]

52. Try this then :

According to Melvyn Bragg's The Adventure of English: The Biography of a Language, "dinkum" comes from the English Midlands and meant work. "Fair dinkum" referred to a fair day's work and subsequently fair play.

Broadly speaking Bragg is somewhat more intelligent than me so I'm happy to take his word for it. My emphasis was on "fair play"

[twenty4blackbirds]

4. "good grief"

Golly, if Charlie Brown was in that situation the poor kid would have been arrested too. Cowabunga!

[suigeneris]

6. It's B.S. She should sue.

It's the only way they take you seriously or learn.

[TheMadMonk]

8. Trouble is that they don't really learn at their level.

Ultimately the taxpayer and consumer (through insurers) pays the monetary price which is all that counts when the auditors come to town. Until the individuals who make these decisions are held personally responsible and accountable for the results of their choices.

Idiots on the front line should get their arses kicked and if they won't reform, dealt with more harshly. Policy makers need to start with their arses canned, because it is their job to know what is/isn't acceptable/legal.

[tblue37]

35. Yep. I would sue, for sure--and I am not even slightly litigious!

About 20 years ago I slipped and fell on some stuff a local mom and pop hardwre store had left lying where it should not be. It was the same color as the floor, so I was not able to see it. I ended up doing a sideways splits--and I absolutely cannot do the splits. I hurt myself terribly and have never been quite the same since. I could have sued their pants off--but they are nice people, and I did not want to do them harm.

A few years later, I slipped and almost fell on some stuff they had left lying on the floor again. (I think their teenaged kids, who worked with them in the store, were the ones being careless.) I went to the owners and remidned them of the time I had really hurt myself in their store, and told them that twice was too many times for me to slip on stuff lying around like that. I said I did not sue the last time it happened, but that this one was a close call, and if I hurt myself again, I definitely would sue. I also told them that I was only trying to help them, because if someone else had fallen the way I did the first time, they would have been sued for sure. Even worse, someon might have been hurt even more seriously than I was, and my injury was bad enough!

I have, however, threatened to sue my son's junior high school when they made a point of not protecting him against violent bullies on school grounds despite my calls, and his high school, when the vice principal singled him out for harrassment when he had not done anything wrong other than look different.

All this is preliminary, to show how far from being litigious I am.

And yet, in a situation where someone abuses me (or, when my kids were young, them) by wielding power wrongly, as happened to this woman on the plane, not only would I sue--I would make a huge stink. I know how to get publicity if I want it, and that airline would be smeared publicly in a way that would make it unlikely that anyone would willingly fly on them again! They really need to have their noses swatted with a large rolled up newspaper for this sort of behavior. I hope she sues and wins big--whether by settlement or by jury award. If enough people do so, then the atttendants will get in trouble when they abuse passengers like this, and they will think twice about how they treat people who have paid a lot of money to be trapped in a sardine can for hours.

[Ian David]

7. Certainly, you can't be Yahoo Serious! n/t

[rock]

9. Swearing is not exactly an object act by golly cakes!

Who decides if what she said was swearing?

[LeftishBrit]

11. ROTFL - how ridiculous can one get!

[Tesha]

14. No one knows yet; the limit hasn't been reached. (NT)

[htuttle]

12. Crikey!

[Benhurst]

15. No wonder foreign tourism is going down the toilet in BushAmerica.

File under "I wouldn't want to live there; but it certainly isn't a nice place to visit."

[peacetalksforall]

16. It starts with the way a person say NO. Some can do it, some ruin it.

Then, this occurence was caused by a language barrier if those were the only so-called swear words.

It's one measure of stress in this counntry. Homeland Security saw to the manufacture of unheard of stress. Headed up by a liar with a ridiculous imagination for thinking up threats.

Carry-on baggage discouraged and restricted, can't bring drinks, can't get pretzels or decent protein, junk food when there is food.

This is some country. Nothing old-fashioned about it. Heading right towards Orwellian mellow. A flight attendent rules your life because of the backing by Homeland Security? Is there really a law against swearing? HS coming out of the PA Patriot Act? Who signed that law?

[SweetLeftFoot]

18. Strewth

I'm an Aussie living in Scotland and as it is Edinburgh festival at the moment, there are plenty of Yanks over.

Hearing them talk about 'fannies' is just hilarious, given what it means here.

Swearing is always subjective.

take the word beginning with 'c' and ending in 't'

In North America, its is the worst possible word - and is used in a different context.

Here, it is alsmost a term of endearment, and often simple punctuation.

When I walk into my local bar, the bar man will often greet me with a 'Alright c***' meant, and taken, in an affectionate way.

I suspect the Aussie woman in question here was being more aggressive than she makes out and the hostie, who may well have been on her third flight of the day, we don't know, misheard her. And over-reacted.

[Paulie]

21. take the word beginning with 'c' and ending in 't'

Cat? :) :) :)

[dipsydoodle]

27. Kinda reminds me of the crossword puzzle joke

Four letter word, appertaining to a woman - last three letters unt. The answer of course is aunt.

[superconnected]

70. I always liked how my nieces would point out someone mean to them and say

"she's the B word."

then after a few seconds they would say together, "bad!".

[dipsydoodle]

30. Different countries different meanings

One of the original american swing dances is the Shag. They didn't seem to use the expression in the USA in the way we do until they noticed that any UK dancers at camps over there always fell about laughing when the name was used especially if any the girls said "do you shag" ? :rofl:

[Apollo11]

41. I don't believe you

I lived in England for 22 years (mostly close to the border with Scotland) and if any barman (or woman) called one of his (or her) customers a "C**T" then there would have been some serious trouble.

It is certainly not a term of endearment.

The biggest differences are words like "SH*T" or "ASSH***". These words are considered rather tame in Europe. In Holland, they are constantly saying that the weather is $H!T (when it rains).

[daveskilt]

47. It depends on the socioeconomic strata in scotland

I used to count how many times per minute I heard the fuckword (avg of 45).

and have often been greeted with a rousing - haw dave yi big shittin cuntchyiare hoos it gaun yi wee poof.

To which an appropriate response might be - Rab yi wee keechin' bastard! cmere and gies a hug ya fuckin scunner.

anything can be affectionate if you fall into the scotish socioeconomic sphere of the shite.

[SweetLeftFoot]

75. Come for a pint

at my local then.

[MADem]

83. Yes, a young lady falling on her fanny--quite the contortionist, and as Doctor Smith might say

"Ewwwwww....the pain, THE PAIN!!!!!!

That always cracked me up, how that particular word changed coming across the pond...and the irony is, you would hear the US context (rear end) most frequently used by people of English, Irish, Scottish and Welsh descent!!!

It only took a generation for the meaning to take a REAR seat, if ya take my meaning!

[rekoveringamerikan]

20. i'm a rekovering amerikan living in OZ

and I wish the us gov would get over their paranoia. it's an embarrassment and it makes those of us digusted enough to really leave the hole that it is to have to live in a much more hateful world. is there such a thing as a nationality change operation?

[The Backlash Cometh]

22. Welcome to a preview of USA global control.

[Lasher]

24. Does this occur on Delta more frequently than on other airlines?

I was thinking I might stop using Delta in order to avoid bitchy flight attendants but that wouldn't make sense if this happens just as often on other airlines.

[Administrator1]

26. I'll Be ?

"They said: 'You swore at the hostess and there are federal rules against that'," Reynolds told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Don't ever say, "Well, I'll be damned." You may just end up in Idiom Court.


:wtf:

[tuvor]

29. If we'd all just learn to speak American, this would never be a problem.

[babylonsister]

33. I'm embarrassed at the knuckleheads in this country. And I'm sure

Ms. Reynolds was a real intimidation to those FAs. :eyes:

Ignorance is not bliss, for anyone.

[baldguy]

36. This is total bullshit.

We'd be much better off, much SAFER and do more to fight the terrorists if the airlines took their responsibility for the safety & security of their passengers SERIOUSLY.

Shit like this, and confiscating sippy cups, making mothers drink their own breast milk, treating bottled water & hand lotion like explosives, strip searching grandmothers, and treating people who pray before their flight like terrorists ready to blow themselves up indicates the airlines are ANYTHING BUT serious about security.

[glitch]

66. Not to mention not x-raying checked baggage. They are a sad, bad joke on themselves and us.

Some of them are too dumb and arrogant to notice. Others do notice, and have the decency to look apologetic for the actions they are required to take by the dumb and arrogant people who've made the new order.

[JHB]

37. All part of the War on Tourism...

What, you thought he said "terrorism"?

[DinahMoeHum]

38. Another case of "standing on a brick to kick a duck in the ass".

Fuck that flight crew for having no sense of humor.

:argh:

[Connonym]

39. and too many people are happy to give up their rights because "it makes us safer"

I personally strongly doubt that very much of what airports do in the name of safety actually makes anyone safer. It's all bullshit to keep us scared and make us think that our government is taking care of us. It's all an illusion and we're all a bunch of patsies. I'm disgusted by what is happening to my country. Hear that Agent Mike? Yeah well fuck you.

[redqueen]

40. Wow... that's pretty bad.

She must lead a very sheltered life, or she's just stupid... I've heard that term in movies, tv shows... where the heck did she get the idea it was a curse word?

And I love this part: "We witnessed aggressive behaviour throughout the flight." I wonder what constitutes "aggressive behavior" to people that think "Fair dinkum" is swearing.

[onewholaughsatfools]

45. of course another reason not to fly

Airlines are the worst way to travel, the service, the on time arrivals, the attitudes of their service workers, how does one expect a customer not to mumble a vulgar word every now and then.....blessings

[MADem]

53. When they cut pay, and cut it some more, and cut it still some more...

you aren't going to get the cream of the crop, especially on feeder airlines. The flight attendants on those small carriers are often new, doing entry level work at entry level pay that isn't enough to live on unless you fly to the FAA maximum number of allowed hours.

[Buns_of_Fire]

46. Cheez! Even Outback restaurants has the explanation on their menu!

Or at least they used to (haven't been there in a while). Durn good thing the TSA, airlines, et.al. haven't mastered reading minds yet.

The US, England, and Australia: Three countries divided by a common language.

[Bunny]

62. God, I can remember when you had to get stinking drunk and take a shit on the beverage cart before

you'd get thrown off the plane. I guess the terrorists have already won.

[alstephenson]

65. ROFL! That's a visual that made me spit iced tea on my keyboard.

Too funny and too true.:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[Bunny]

68. I think some guy actually did that a few years ago, but I can't remember if it was

pre- or post-9/11. Now, *that's* how you get kicked off a plane!

[struggle4progress]

63. The customer is always ... a terrorist

[MisterP]

64. and "Heavens to Murgatroyd" will get you the de Menezes treatment

[superconnected]

69. It's like the Airlines are run by a nazi police state.

I'm afraid of them now. Anything can be found offensive or terrorist material.

How come the civil liberties union hasn't sued their nazi asses yet?

[Jed Dilligan]

73. Like the defendant in SF, Vietnamese fella

by the name of Phuoc Yu, got held in contempt for stating his name.

[Hekate]

76. Remind me again why anyone would want to visit us here in The Homeland...

...where by golly we have Free Speech Zones in every third town.

Hekate

[ProudDad]

79. A short internet search

provides much evidence of the anti-union bias of this UTAH based airline...

I'm not too surprised that they would overreact to a common Aussie statement of frustration/acceptance...

They treat their people like shit, why not their passengers...

[XemaSab]

84. Who understands those Ozzies anyway?

:shrug: