United Airlines Innocent, Flyer and Security Not So Much

By Douglas V. Gibbs
Author, Speaker, Instructor, Radio Host

Okay, I’ve just about had my fill with the news about the United Airlines passenger being dragged off the plane because the company overbooked, but the passenger refused to leave the flight.

Should they overbook?  Probably not.  There is an average number they have calculated of the number of people they believe will not even show up, so based on those numbers, they overbook a little bit to make sure the seats are full.  There is not exactly a very big profit margin in the airline industry, as it is.

Sometimes, when more show up than expected, folks have to be denied boarding.  The airlines usually puts the overbooked folks on another flight, and give them some extra miles, free tickets, or a hotel stay to make up for it.  It happens.  A friend of mine, who was willing to be held back for another flight twice wound up with enough free gifts to book a flight for free to Mardi Gras later.  It was a 2-for-1 deal for him and his wife, in the end.

United Airlines, last year, had to deny boarding to 3,765 passengers due to overbooking.  When you consider they had 143 million passengers in total in 2016, that’s not a bad percentage of boarding denials.

The overbooking thing happened on a United Flight, and three of the four passengers said, “No problem, we’ll take the goodies for being inconvenienced.”  The fourth passenger, not so much.  So, the individual was forcibly removed from the plane, and video of the occurrence, bloody face and all, went viral.

The viewing public went crazy with anger.  Snowflakes began to freak out everywhere.  How could this happen?

I was surprised the rioting snowflakes didn’t show up at United’s corporate offices with torches and pitchforks waving red flags of the proletariat revolution.

The top guy at United has apologized, twice, as the airline continues to feel the full and unapologetic brunt of the public’s outrage.  Problem is, the “jump to conclusions without paying attention to all of the facts” blame is totally misdirected.

Black Lives Matter emerged with their “hands up don’t shoot” motto (I prefer “pants up, don’t loot”, myself), accusing the police of using too much force against blacks.  In most of the cases the outrage occurred, however, it was obvious that each time the suspects were not cooperating with the police.  If you fight with the police, and get mean and nasty with the police, what do you think the response will be?