The choice: a control tower staffed with a “diverse” crew to land your airplane, or one with properly trained air traffic controllers who meet a rigorous psychological profile to cope with the stresses of the job.
President Biden’s Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has prioritized hiring people with these characteristics: “Hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability and dwarfism.”
Major players in the private airline industry have also adopted similar practices. In 2022 Boeing changed its executive compensation to reward Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) hiring quotas rather than shareholder profits and safety records.
The news comes on the heels of the January 6 Alaska Airlines incident in which a door plug broke loose from a Boeing 737-9 MAX mid-flight, forcing an emergency landing.
Additionally, nineteen near collisions occurred at U.S. airports in 2023, the highest since 2016.
Many feel that while providing career opportunities to underserved groups may be an honorable goal, aircraft design and air travel safety are not the proper playgrounds for such efforts. Elon Musk, speaking through X, stated: “People will DIE due to DEI”. In another X comment, he wrote: “Merit should be the only reason for hiring, especially for jobs where your family’s lives are at stake.”
The “box-checking” practices of United Airlines are particularly disturbing. In 2022, United established a standard that 50% of its new pilot recruits would be “women of color”. To achieve this, flight attendants are being promoted.
It is possible that these “diverse hires” have been responsible for some notable near disasters that have recently occurred on United’s watch. In December 2022, two United pilots nearly crashed a Boeing 777 into the ocean, yet both are still employed by United and their identities are not being revealed. Anonymous sources told then-Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson that the first officer was indeed a “new hire”.
On July 29th a United aircraft landed hard and was badly damaged at George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) in Houston. There is evidence that a co-pilot hired via DEI may have been a factor.
Hey @united
On July 29, a United plane was nearly totaled after a hard landing
Who was flying that aircraft?
Was the co-pilot a former flight attendant who was FIRED and then rehired through United’s DEI program despite being on a list to not return to United?
Am I correct…
— Ashley St. Clair (@stclairashley) January 5, 2024
Hiring practices that prioritize minorities and other protected classes are known as Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives. DEI has dominated U.S. hiring practices across nearly all industries, owing partially to political pressure following the 2020 shooting of George Floyd.
