Tommy Tuberville gave a 20 minute speech in which he claimed that furries were sick psychos who were flying passenger planes, and that all transgender people should be locked up in mental institutions.
Many airline pilots, flight attendants, and air traffic controllers are part of the furry community,Tuberville said sternly.Lord help us.
It’s terrifying when you think about this,he continued. When you walk on to a commercial flight, it’s possible that the pilot flying your plane could have a deranged fetish of dressing up like an animal.
I think all airlines have a dress code for their crews that involves wearing a uniform. He’s wrong and is lying.
I am not all concerned about someone, in their free time, choosing to wear clothing that makes them happy, even if it doesn’t conform to conventional social expectations. They are not insane.
I’m more concerned about the lunatics who drag their weird, unfalsifiable, untestable and authoritarian religious beliefs into the public square, where they try to use them to oppress other peoples’ freedoms.
Tuberville is running for governor of Alabama, and is doing well in the polls. I’m sorry, Alabamians, you are confirming all the offensive stereotypes about your state.
If he’s governor he can only f-up one state. At least it gets him out of the senate. His replacement can’t be nearly as bad. Right? Right? Oh yeah, it’s Alabama.
Dumbest man in Congress? Dumbest congresscritter currently?
Sadly, there is far, far FAR too much competition for that dubious “honour.”
By far.
By far Imean b not just Astronomical units or light years but Megaparsecs.
Every contender a Repug / Trump Fascist Cultist party contender natch.
And my Alabama relatives wonder why I don’t attend family reunions there.
I’ve read the short take on this story and finally looked for the source of Tommy’s claim, if you can believe USA Today, which is a challenge. Anyway, apparently Tommy overheard some pilots making cat and dog noises over an air traffic radio frequency. Actually what he heard was a recording that claims to be pilots making animal noises. If that claim is true it’s a violation of FAA rules. ATC frequencies are for flight info only.
And apparently, Tommy’s rant is also based on the non-sense that furries are associated with trans-gender people, which itself is a stretch.
If Tommy bans people from wearing animal costumes in Alabama, what will happen to Halloween!!??
BTW PZ…There’s a very tiny spider hanging by a thread from the ceiling about 2 feet from my face and close to the screen of this computer.
Here’s the recording of the pilots: https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/s/chruHolRNB
Doesn’t Tommy the Tub actually live in FLORIDUH?
What is it about Floriduh that all these RWNJ politicians prefer to live there? (as PZ noted, about a MN gov candidate recently)
C’mon Bugs Bunny, saw off that dangling pesthole of stupidity.
During my darker moods, I often say “never underestimate humanity”. The fact he will likely be the next Gov means I failed to follow my own guidance .
Furry pilots, I wish. Something that would actually improve the air travel experience!
But you know you can never escape them. At least one of the passengers is a furry racking up their Frequent Furry Miles. As they should be.
(Insert joke about the plane going transonic here)
I’d rather furries fly my jet liner rather than MAGAs or especially Tommy Tuberville, who is a mindless hater.
I wouldn’t let Tuberville mow my lawn.
And yet, the people of Alabama are going to vote him in as their governor.
At least he is 2,000 miles away from the West Coast.
Tommy needs a good, hard yiffing,
Here’s some people who need worrying about:
Police investigating for hazing after men covered in food found in Wisconsin frat
It’s stupider than this: it has nothing to do with furries. There was an incident in DC in April where some pilots started barking a meowing over the Guard channel (a side channel that is supposed be kept clear). From what I can tell, it is a joke/tradition (goofing off) that some bored pilots very, very occasionally engaged in. (One guess of its origin is related to the very stupid movie Super Troopers.) In this case I saw that it was some regional jet pilots (who, on the whole, are less professional than others).
Again. Nothing to do with furries, except a chance for idiot Rs to gang up on people who are different in some way.
I was right. While scanning my newsfeed the other day I saw the headline “Dumbest Man in Congress.” Immediately thought Tuberville and moved on, didn’t have time to click and read.
Maybe Tuberville can consult Hegseth and get some height and testosterone requirements for pilots. That should fix the pilot furry problem. Or should that read the furry pilot problem?
We are constantly seeing this profane stuff pushed by people in power. Then add in the ungodly number of people who believe and support it. This causes my faith in humans to diminish proportionately.
Is Tuby really the “dumbest” man in Congress? There are quite a few really dumb ones in Congress, including some dumb women. And, not all the really dumb ones are Republicans.
@11 ahcuah
In the early 70s I was a radio operator in the Marine Corps. We frequently did comm checks. Common response to a comm check was I hear you loud and clear. Some people would say got you Lima (loud) Charlie (clear), sometimes LC would suffice. Our platoon of radio operators came up with our own alphabet, we replaced the name for letters, for instance Lima was replaced by Lucky and Charlie was replaced with Chicken. So, on a comm check you my hear, I have you Lucky Chicken.
Sometimes our comm checke went like this.
Enee menee minee moe how do you hear my radio?
Response: Fe Fi Foe, Fum, loud and clear with a little hum.
Boredom does this to people.
@ ^ robro : Which ones specifically are Democratic party members? Okay, t’ll give ya Fetterman..but other than him? Who?
It’s my experience that hating on furries is a way to hate on the LGBTQ+ community as a dog whistle: Lot of them find the furry community an accepting place.
What gets me is that the haters assume every aspect of every community must be tied to sex. I’m an asexual furry, which would probably break their brains.
[related]
Culture war issues are the old reliables, and this is one.
https://www.vox.com/politics/504097/democrats-trans-attack-ads-talarico-peltola-kaptur
↓
High energy prices, an unpopular war, and frustration with the economy are hammering Republicans across the country in competitive races.
But they have at least one more card to play: the trans card.
Republican groups, including Elon Musk’s America PAC, are spending millions to fund a blizzard of trans-focused attack ads against Democrats, focusing specifically on a few controversial sub-issues where conservatives believe public opinion is in their favor.
The ads accuse Democrats of supporting taxpayer-funded “sex change surgeries for children,” of wanting to “let biological men enter girls’ locker rooms and bathrooms,” and of letting “men play in girls’ sports.”
Former Rep. Matt Gaetz summed up the message pithily in an X post to a disillusioned Republican, writing: “Bro we need your vote. I hate the war too. But the Democrats want to trans your kids.”
Don’t forget, a furry pilot and co-pilot might mistakenly open the cockpit door to a furry terrorist!
StevoR @ #15 — You got the one I was specifically thinking of, and I don’t know all the rest of the candidates, but I’m confident Fetterman isn’t the only dumbass Democrat…say perhaps Jim Costa from the Central Valley around Fresno.
Fetterman is brain-damaged. Not that he deserves any sympathy.
So: What is Louie Gohmert up to these days anyway?
Just like there’s no single-scalar measure of intelligence, there’s no single-scalar measure of dumbness. It’s just not appropriate to say “this particular Congresscritter is the veryveryvery dumbest in Congress,” because there are just so many ways that they can be — indeed, that they strive to be — dumb. And at any one moment, at least half a dozen of them† are demonstrating it.
Too, “sociopathically unethical” can look like “dumb,” as in Coach T’s transferance of allegedly awful characteristics of one hate-group to another hate-group in service of another agenda (like, say, some weird aspect of the Trump-sponsored move of Space Command to… Alabama) (I wish I was joking).
So maybe the real problem is that the actual behavior is sociopathy, and we’re giving him/them too much benefit of the doubt by just saying he’s/they’re dumb… instead of knowing exactly what he’s/they’re doing and doing it anyway because there’s a perceived benefit. Sort of like “fan service” for his perceived base. “Fan service,” though, largely originated as a meme in the comics community, where there are… people… dressed as animals, like Spider-Man and Wolverine and maybe-sorta Batman…
† That’s probably an underestimate, but I lack recent data from personal observation. Once upon a time, for professional reasons I did have sufficient data.
Note that this thread is 9 years old.
https://www.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/8b3fwm/can_someone_please_explain_the_joke_with_the/
Yeah, just 99% of them.
@ ^ Jim Balter : 99.999% of them even..
Tuberville is only into tigers
https://www.al.com/alabamafootball/2020/02/tommy-tuberville-tests-loyalties-for-donald-trump-alabama-football.html
That was a solid 800 Milligohmert. He’s getting there.
@stuffin #12
Liquor
Cabinet
Just when I think Tuberville can’t get any dumber, he goes ahead and surprises me.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/maga-senator-tommy-tuberville-roasted-over-bizarre-furry-pilot-freakout/
Personally, I would be happy to be on a plane flown by a 6 foot squirrel if it meant that we would leave on time, fly safely, and land on time.
OH MESSENGER OF FNORD, SAVE ME FROM THE MODERN DAY STEERAGE THAT IS THE AVERAGE COACH CLASS FLIGHT.
Please explain to me how and why Alabama can get so worked up about nonexistent furry pilots flying the steerage skies but not twitch a bun over actual public menaces like pedophile and serial sexual offender Roy Moore, who was the Republican senatorial candidate for Alabama? (Doug Jones just barely squeaked out a victory over Moore for the Senate, 49.9% vx. 48.3%. Hang your head in shame, Alabama.)
https://www.courthousenews.com/supreme-court-wont-help-roy-moore-preserve-8-2m-defamation-award/
https://www.splcenter.org/resources/extremist-files/roy-moore/
@22
And now I can’t get the image of Tuberville having an Only Fans account and customers out of my mind’s eye… thanks for the nightmares.
Tommy is just another idiot being used to distract part of the electorate from the real issues facing the US. Throw him a rotten bone to growl over and watch the ears of the other idiots just like him prick up.
We have our own growly lap-dog here in the person of Pauline Hanson who is fed little morsels of culture-war meat by billionaire mining magnate Gina Rinehart. Pauline obediently eats it all up then shits it back out so the ignorant among us can lick it all up off the floor of the despoiled public discourse.
I think you’re all underestimating the seriousness of the situation Tuberville is drawing attention to. After all, what if the pilot was a cat-furry and the copilot a mouse-furry?? Have you never watched that troubling documentary, Tom and Jerry? Mayhem in the cockpit, absolute mayhem!
Damn. With all the deportations they must be running out of scapegoats.
Woo! Oh yeah!
Flying around at the speed of sound!
Got places to go! Gotta follow my rainbow!
Can’t stick around, have to keep moving on,
Guess what lies ahead? Only one way to find out!
Must keep on cruising ahead.
No time for fursuit, follow my plan instead!
Trusting in what you can’t see.
Take my leash, I’ll set you free!
Follow me!
Set me free!
Trust me and we will escape from this airfield!
I’ll make it through!
Follow me!
@ 33. christoph : They’ll find new scapegoats. They always do. Even if they have to invent them. Or circle back to old ones that they since stopped demonising.