Amanda Stevens. (Twitter).
Amanda Stevens, a sports journalist, was on her way to Chicago to cover the League of Legends quarterfinals. Ms. Stevens was wearing a Black Panther hat (as in the Marvelverse superhero Black Panther, currently being written by Ta-Nehisi Coates, and star of the eagerly awaited movie), and a T-shirt with an upside down U.S. Flag printed on it (that is a well known signal for distress, there’s more than one at the camps). It seems a United Airlines pilot was not pleased with Ms. Steven’s attire, and after several demeaning commands (remove the hat, turn your shirt inside out*), decided to kick Ms. Stevens off the plane. I doubt much will be done, but it would be nice if UA would smack their racist pilot, and let him know that airline passengers are not obligated to dress according to a pilot’s taste. After all, aren’t you pilot types supposed to be busy flying the plane and all? As in, you have plenty of shiny stuff to look at already, right?
*Shades of PZ’s visit to Ham’s Palace of Creationism, where a few people were ordered to wear their shirts inside out. Tsk.
You can read Amanda Stevens’s tweet stream about this at io9, or at her twitter feed.
Time to dig out abd wear the black panther/red leopard buttons I was given when I was a kid, marching in the “stop the war in vietnam” marches…
Its a control game. Maximize how much they can get you to comply, endless softening-up. Totalitarianism 101.
It’s utterly infuriating. Since when does a pilot have the right to dictate a dress code? Fuck’s sake, everywhere you look, it’s another bigoted asshole. And I have to say, I’m not comfy with a bigoted asshole in charge of a bloody plane. If anyone should have been kicked off, it was him. Operating under the influence of a broken, fucked up head.
On top of that, oh, the bigoted asswipes in Amanda’s twitter stream -- so many of them bringing up how mentally ill she is because transgender. :snarl:
This. She paid for a flight, not fashion advice.