The tighty righties are having a hissy fit on Twitter over this United Airlines announcement:

I can see why they’d be so upset...

against white men??? Is there no justice in this world???

gave them a chance once in a while, they never get to do anything*



*Without being bugged by the other humans on the planet thinking they have rights and stuff.

to be so oppressed and misunderstood. I don't know how they can bear it!

Just wish we could break down the structural barriers and racism that prevent qualified candidates from getting the support they need to pursue careers because of discrimination against different groups.

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

so you can't do it any more without either a lot of your own money or crushing loans. Of course the righties would be horrified at the prospect of an airplane they are riding on being flown by one of "those people."

Most pilots I knew got their start in the Air Force, as it was the only way to learn to fly a plane and get experience for free. An F-18 doesn't prepare you for a 777 with 350 people on board, but it does give you the basics of how to pilot a plane. Learning how to fly other models comes a lot easier if you have had solid experience beforehand.

True funny story to go with this: a friend of a Dutch colleague was obsessed with speed. He made himself some money, and bought an expensive German car just so he could drive over to Germany and drive the Autobahn, where there are no speed limits. In the Netherlands, the limit usually is 120 KPH (around 75 MPH) max, and they enforce it. But even the German Autobahn wasn't enough, so he took lessons and got his pilot's license. One day, on his way over to Germany, his anticipation took over before he crossed the border, and a Dutch cop stopped him doing something like 200 KPH, usually enough to get your car and your license confiscated. The enraged cop who stopped him demanded to see his registration and his pilot's license. The guy said, "sure," and handed the cop his registration and his pilot's license. The cop stopped for a second, and studied the document handed him, as it looked nothing like a driver's license. When he saw it really WAS a pilot's license, he burst out laughing. He told the guy, "in fifteen years of using that line this is the first time anyone really DID hand me their pilot's license." In honor of the occasion, he let the guy off, but warned him that if he ever caught him AGAIN doing that speed within the Netherlands, he WOULD lose his car AND his driver's license (though, presumably, he'd be allowed to keep his pilot's license).

I also have a pilot's license, including a flight instructor certificate, got it the slow, expensive way. A pilot friend (general aviation, not airline) was driving through Wisconsin, whose state troopers are notoriously aggressive and hostile, when he was pulled over for speeding. The trooper said, "You were really flying. Let me see your pilot's license." My friend handed him his pilot's license. The cop looked at it, sighed, and said, "Get outta here!" And he didn't give him a ticket.

Going to share this with a pilot friend of mine!

Someone needs to tell them their story isn't unique any more. I'll have to break it to them gently....

to fly commercial airlines. That means the pool of candidates almost always comes from the military. Its a simple fact that female and minority pilots are just uncommon. There simply isn't a "diverse pool of candidates" that they speak of. 50% of people looking to be a commercial pilot would never consist of women and minorities.

Otherwise, you're correct.

The norm is for air force pilots its true, but there are alternative paths. If United requires that for their branded regionals that will be a real opening.

In one of the Aeronautical programs, and I'm pretty sure he didn't go to military, but rather the Airlines took him and trained him from that background. Maybe this aid program is to put some people through Purdue, Georgia Tech, etc. before giving them airlines training? Just my guess.

Just like any other field. Not everyone wants to be a doctor, corporate person, programmer, cop, or anything else.

Flies for American. Her mother's having worked as a flight attendant for American for 30yrs probably gave her an edge.


(Funny fact: her dad won ribbons & $ in national hot-air balloon races for yrs. & yep, he's taken us up a couple of times.)

Before I retired I worked in the training department of a major airline. Far more than half of the new hires came from regional airlines, not the military; the Air Force doesn't need as many pilots as it used to. But they were still almost all white men, though more women and PoC were being hired.

flight time....
Many flight instructors are just cranking out hours so they can apply to one of the airlines, beginning on smaller reginal carriers, usually sub-contracted out by the majors.... That's how my instructor decades ago did it. She was hired by Delta and for all I know is still flying...

Big corporations don’t take these actions because of liberal political beliefs. They exist to maximize profit for their owners and stockholders, and being a modern and inclusive organization is the best way to create a good image for customers now and in the future.
There’s a very good reason most private company market research is directed st the 20-50 year old set. United Air is not concerned that some old fool in a red baseball cap might be thinking, “Oh my God, I think our pilot might be gay (or Muslim or black or etc etc).”

And we've flown a lot. Not just the flight itself, but the response afterwards.

United is permanently in our shithouse.

After the fourth time they stranded me I swore never again and stuck to it. Their schedules are rough estimates and their passengers are treated like necessary annoyances with credit cards.

considering how many Trump administration appointees were completely unqualified for their roles and were often trying to destroy their agencies from within.

Corporations are getting on board... how are the repukes going to stop change?

Yes they'll try, but... I don't see how they can stop it.

Again, kudos to United!

To them unless their pilot's name is White Goodman, they're not good pilots.

could be a good pilot, but I'll pass on any airline who will hire pilots based on anything except how good they are. Electing to hire in order to reach a pre-determined ratio of various demographics of the pilots does not make me feel confident about who is in the cockpit.

Trust me, it's not easy, and you won't get through it unless you're good at it. No airline will hire people based on their demographic qualifications, but it looks like United is trying to make the career accessible to people who have often been excluded because the training that qualifies a person for an airline job is so expensive now. But they'll have to get through some very challenging training.

There are shortages of opportunities.

If most pilots are white guys you can assume it's a shortage of opportunity.

The same applies to college admissions and 99% of all work, even physical labor.

My grandmother was a welder in the shipyards during World War II. She must have been good at it because they kept her on when the war ended. Most women were sent home so that returning soldiers could take their jobs. My grandma then got assigned to lightweight repetitive detail work that women were supposedly better at. I think she would have been happier if she'd continued on with the "men's work," assembling huge plates of steel.

I hear he even went to night school to try to evolve a thumb.

That will come as a surprise to Colonel Kim Nichole Reed-Campbell, a decorated (DFC with Valor) A-10 pilot.

Easy job.

Qualified candidates will have a history of incompetence, sexual assaults, DUI convictions, etc..

Seriously, what kind of moron would object to having the best and brightest flying them around?

across all pilot categories there was a total of 42,694 active pilot certificates held by women in the US.

There's a pool for United to draw from.

If they don't like something, it must be good for everybody else who isn't republi-CON or super-rich.

I'm glad I did.

that they aren't going to throw untrained people into pilots' seats.

FFS, people who aren't white men can do things too.

So many of the bigoted commenters said this. How the fuck do they know who the best pilot is? Would they be willing to pay more to fly on the plane with the best pilot?

I commend United on this effort. Only a person with poor reading comprehension of United's statement or a fucking bigot would make such a big deal out of this. It goes to prove that these ignorant people do make assumptions about the fitness of women and minorities to pilot airplanes because they are offended by an attempt to make the pilots more diverse.

There's a 2+ year training process for getting a pilot job with United, and it's not guaranteed. Also, you have to pay approx. $71,000 to go through it. Of course, financial aid is available.

And just like with military training, there are lot of opportunities to bounce out of the program.

You might not think it... being such an essential position and each individual pilot being trusted with the lives of hundreds of people and some of the most expensive machines money can buy, but pilots often live in dismal conditions and often do not make enough to get by.

I would have thought good pilots were worth their weight in gold.

The next time you’re flying in an airplane consider this: The person operating the aircraft might not be making much more than the person who made the Egg McMuffin you ate for breakfast.

That’s right. According to the Wall Street Journal, new airline pilots rank among the lowest-paid workers in the country, with some regional pilots earning as little as $15,000 per year.

That’s horrifying for a number of obvious reasons. For one, $15,000 — or even $22,400 a year, the starting salary for pilots at 14 regional airlines — is lower than the federal poverty line for a family of four in the U.S.

It’s also startling because of the extraordinary price of becoming a pilot in the first place. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, airline pilots usually need a bachelor’s degree, a pilot’s license, and certification that requires hundreds of hours of flight training. According to Bloomberg Businessweek, the cost of training flights alone can set you back more than $100,000.

No wonder there’s a shortage of pilots.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/pilots-minimum-wage_n_4775989

It's anecdotal, but I have also heard tales of pilots living in absolutely cramped conditions, squalor even, with 8-12 other pilots in apartments not meant for 8-12 people when they're all not working.