(LifeSiteNews) — “Hijackers” have long been a threat to the U.S. airline industry.
In the late 1960s and into the 1970s, a sudden burst of commercial aircraft hijackings — frequently to Fidel Castro’s communist Cuba — caused the imposition of security checkpoints and restrictions regarding boarding procedures.
The flying public accepted the extra hassle in return for a greater sense of security.
After 9/11/2001, when 19 terrorists hijacked four commercial aircraft and flew them into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon, and aimed for but were thwarted in targeting the U.S. Capitol Building, the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) was created, heaping far more severe, inconvenient requirements on air travelers.
Again, the flying public accepted extra hassle in return for a greater sense of security.
But now the entirety of the airline industry — airlines, air traffic control (ATC), aircraft manufacturers, and the government agencies charged with overseeing the smooth and safe functioning of the massive industry — is being hijacked, not by crazed terrorists but by a peculiar ideology that may prove to be the greatest threat to safety and security in the history of aviation: woke DEI neo-Marxism.
“Woke DEI neo-Marxism.” That’s a mouthful, but that’s the name of this monster that, like in the movie Invasion of the Body Snatchers where members of the human race were insidiously traded out for identical but soulless alien replicas, important aspects of the industry are being traded out for something that still looks like the airline business we’ve all known — and once loved — but in reality is a new entity: an integral part of a rising woke neo-Marxist society.
The terrifying part is that everything looks pretty much the same when you walk into the airport or board your plane, but things are no longer what they seem. We weren’t supposed to notice, but most of us — passengers and employees alike — now sense it.
While wokeism, accompanied by DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) hiring practices, had been steadily creeping into the airline industry and the U.S. Military since the Obama administration, it was COVID-19 that presented a golden opportunity for the woke DEI ideologues to finally transform the airline industry into a creature more to their liking.
Perhaps by design, extreme COVID-19 “vaccine” mandates forced thousands of seasoned airline pilots and air traffic controllers from the workforce, creating the perfect opportunity for DEI ideologues to fill cockpits and control towers with racial, sexual, gender, and other minorities.
Experience is being sacrificed on the altar of DEI ideology
Last year, an airline captain outlined in an article penned for LifeSiteNews the effects of forced vaccinations for pilots and crew and increased mandates of woke policies, especially the promotion of DEI over ability and experience for new pilot and air traffic control (ATC) hires, both of which currently suffer from severe shortages.
“As seasoned professional pilots, I and many of my colleagues are alarmed by the trends we see in our industry,” Captain Bradley Reed said. “Safety is being traded for woke DEI concerns, and health standards for pilots are being relaxed to accommodate adverse reactions to the experimental COVID-19 ‘vaccine’ that were required by major carriers for cockpit crews.”
Another pilot explained recently on X:
As an airline pilot for 39 years, I can tell you that qualifications for new hire pilots at airlines including big airlines are lower than they have ever been because of this & a shortage of pilots in the workforce.
In addition, because of massive retirements new First Officers will be able to upgrade to Captain much quicker than in the past. This means inexperienced first officers won’t have the time learning from experienced Captains before they upgrade. In addition, this administration and unions want old, experienced pilots dumped.
And it’s not just in the cockpit. Cabin crews whose most important function until recently was passenger safety increasingly serve as a means to signal an airline’s devotion to DEI ideology. In 2022, The Epoch Times reported:
One Southwest flight attendant, a Hispanic female, said: “They are compromising safety for the sake of race, gender identity, and sexual preference … They’re risking people’s lives because of agendas.”
Are tiara-wearing male flight attendants with big hair —and big feet struggling to walk in high heels — more safe or less safe for passengers?
Nowhere has an airline’s willingness to drop all pretense of common sense in favor of virtue signaling been more stunning than in a 2017 KLM Royal Dutch Airline pride month ad that went terribly wrong. The ad itself doesn’t present a danger, but it hinted to the world the willingness of those at corporate headquarters to sacrifice safety in order to broadcast their obsequiousness and fealty to the LGBTQ global juggernaut.
Commercial aircraft manufacturing: Quality sacrificed to meet DEI demands
It’s not just the airlines, the leading U.S. manufacturer of the passenger aircraft the airlines fly is also eschewing safety as its paramount concern.
“Let’s have a close look at Boeing and DEI!” wrote James Lindsey on X, directing attention to the nation’s premier commercial aircraft manufacturer.
“Boeing’s corporate filings with the SEC reveal that beginning [in] 2022, the annual bonus plan to reward CEO and executives for increasing profit for shareholders and prioritizing safety was changed to reward them if they hit DEI targets.
Let’s have a close look at Boeing and DEI!
Boeing’s corporate filings with the SEC reveal that in beginning 2022, the annual bonus plan to reward CEO and executives for increasing profit for shareholders and prioritizing safety was changed to reward them if they hit DEI targets. pic.twitter.com/kBU7wWw9Mk
— James Lindsay, anti-Fascist (@ConceptualJames) January 10, 2024
Lindsey’s report followed just days after it was found that Boeing had left out at least four of retaining bolts during the assembly of a brand new Alaska Airlines 737-900 MAX, causing the service door plug to blow out of the fuselage seven minutes after takeoff.
Lindsey’s report caught Elon Musk’s eye.
“Do you want to fly in an airplane where they prioritized DEI hiring over your safety?” Musk asked on X.
“That is actually happening,” he added.
Do you want to fly in an airplane where they prioritized DEI hiring over your safety? That is actually happening. https://t.co/FcTyzZD0uW
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 10, 2024
Federal government agencies are ruled by DEI ideology to an astonishing degree
Within days of his inauguration, Democrat President Joe Biden installed Pete Buttigieg as Transportation Secretary, chosen for the position not because of his experience in any realm of the nation’s transportation industry but because he is a homosexual.
Under his auspice, an air traffic controller shortage has grown to critical proportions as overworked employees spend long hours directing thousands of flights per day in the nation’s skies.
“A shortage of U.S. air traffic controllers has resulted in an exhausted, distracted and demoralized workforce that is increasingly prone to making dangerous mistakes,” declared a post on X by The New York Times, which has done yeoman’s work reporting on the deteriorating situation in the nation’s control towers in a series of articles.
“A pattern of incidents reveals glaring vulnerabilities in the aviation safety system,” the Times noted.
A shortage of U.S. air traffic controllers has resulted in an exhausted, distracted and demoralized work force that is increasingly prone to making dangerous mistakes. A pattern of incidents reveals glaring vulnerabilities in the aviation safety system. https://t.co/FS9KAUPayK
— The New York Times (@nytimes) December 2, 2023
A stunning report by the Post Millennial further revealed:
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) places a priority on hiring people with “severe intellectual disability” as part of its diversity and inclusion initiative.
According to its website, the FAA claims, “Individuals with targeted or ‘severe’ disabilities are the most under-represented segment of the Federal workforce.”
Under its People with Disabilities Program, the agency says it “actively recruits, hires, promotes, retains, develops and advances people with disabilities.” The FAA targets the following disabilities as a matter of policy: “Hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability and dwarfism.”
United Airlines drag queen CEO Scott Kirby is playing with fire
The poster boy — or queen — for the rise of the airline industry’s woke DEI ideology is United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby, who is as famous for showing up at events dressed in drag as he is for pushing a radical DEI agenda at the organization he heads.
On the one hand, it’s possible to dismiss Kirby’s drag appearances as nothing more than party behavior, all in good fun. That was perhaps plausible 10 years ago, but as the harmful contagion of transgenderism has taken hold of so many young lives, mutilating body and soul, Kirby’s viral drag videos serve as a confirmation to the young: “The CEO of United Airlines gets lots of attention and has a blast cross dressing; maybe I’ll give it a try; maybe even take it a few steps further; maybe I’m trans.”
As such, Kirby is playing with fire.
This is Scott Kirby, the CEO of @united. He’s a drag queen and has been incorporating drag into @united.
This video should tell you everything you need to know. pic.twitter.com/RR5nWwC5OR
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) January 18, 2024
“This is Scott Kirby, the CEO of United. He likes to dress up in drag,” a series of posts on X by Libs of TikTok begins. “United hired a drag queen to be their CEO and now United has turned their focus to incorporating drag into their business and sponsoring drag shows.”
The post features multiple pictures of Kirby in drag — often dressed as female pop singing stars — as well as other male United employees dressed as women.
This is Scott Kirby, the CEO of @united. He likes to dress up in drag. United hired a drag queen to be their CEO and now United has turned their focus to incorporating drag into their business and sponsoring drag shows. https://t.co/Hhzd5o6SyN pic.twitter.com/9tqkjTfVvs
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) January 15, 2024
As disturbing as the video and pictures of Kirby are, what’s more troubling is his future plans for the company.
In an interview with Axios, Kirby admitted to drastically overhauling the complexion of United’s flight crews. “We have committed that 50 percent (50%) of the classes will be women or people of color.”
“Today only 19 percent of our pilots at United Airlines are women or people of color,” he lamented. He then boasted, “And by the way, from all the data I’ve seen, that’s the highest of any airline in the country.”
‘This is your captain speaking’
Under Kirby, United Airlines’ extreme commitment to DEI ideology has led to a male UAL pilot, Captain Maya Tallman, who identifies as a woman, to chair the company’s new “Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB)” committee.
Libs of TikTok posted several pictures of the UAL DEIB head urging followers, “Pray United is focused on safety just as much as they’re focused on diversity.”
The most important thing you need to know about woke DEI neo-Marxism is that it’s dangerous if not evil. It’s not meant to improve or augment the airline industry; it aims to hollow it out and replace most every aspect of the airline industry with substandard practices and personnel.
For now, the U.S. airline travel remains extremely safe, but how long that will last is anybody’s guess.
