Chrissy Teigen, supermodel, celebrity, author, and wife of John Legend tweeted at American Airlines yesterday but it was all wrong.
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The Tweet
In a post Matthew wrote yesterday, supermodel, author, celebrity, and wife of John Legend tweeted the following throwing shade at American Airlines:
Not to be dramatic but American Airlines only cares about money and doesn’t care if you get sick and die. https://t.co/6q8ZfZiduB
— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) July 3, 2020
It is, in essence, a retweet with her own added sass to that of the junior Senator from Oregon. His comment suggests that American Airlines is killing people by not keeping the middle seat open on flights. Matthew’s post held back in some places where I will not. He’s much more diplomatic than I am, if you don’t believe me, just read the comments on this site on Sundays.
There’s so much to explore so let’s dive in.
American Airlines is a Business
The basis of Teigen’s tweet is preposterous. American Airlines is a business, it’s literally only around to make money. That’s the whole purpose of a company. It doesn’t matter if the company’s slogan is “Getting people there and making a difference” or any other esoteric approach – if they do not make money, they do not exist.
Further, American Airlines directly employed more than 133,000 people (pre-COVID numbers, I have no idea how many are employed today) but that number does not include the tens of thousands of contract workers like gate agents. There are further untold numbers that are indirectly employed by American Airlines through catering companies, cutlery providers, fuel businesses, napkin manufacturers, and more.
If American Airlines cannot stay solvent, all of those jobs go away. All of those lives are in tumult too. They must make money to stay in business, but what good is it being in business if all of your customers are dead, right?
It Wouldn’t Matter Anyway
Let’s just pretend for a moment that American Airlines did not sell the middle seat, what difference would it make? Seat width on American’s domestic fleet is between 17-18″. The seat pitch is 30-34″, slightly more if you are in first class. But six feet of distance, the minimum the CDC currently recommends assuming all parties wearing masks, is 72″. That would be a 72″ radius and does not generally take into account recycled air. That means that on any plane, only the window seats could be sold and only every third row.
Is 18″ of distance better than nothing? Yes, but barely. Matthew has promised a scientific post about this topic and while we all wait with bated breath, I fear it will only confirm that any of those distances are really a fallacy anyway.
Why? Consider how a person gets into their seat. Do they touch a common armrest when they sit down or get up? Are they using the same overhead bin? It’s kind of like a restaurant I visit in Pittsburgh. They go through the meticulous trouble of requiring masks, putting up plastic dividers, bringing food out to the car, and placing it in the back seat for guests, but still come to the driverside window with the same recycled pen to autograph the credit card slip. You might as well have done nothing at all.
Empty middle seats are advertising and nothing more for carriers that were struggling to fill up planes anyway. Instead of security theater, it’s health-safety theater, but theater all the same.
Personal Responsibility
What Teigen’s tweet and that of Senator Merkley also fails to address is any level of personal responsibility. We know that more and more Americans are flying every single day right now. United is ready to add another 25,000 monthly flights.
Is it the airline’s responsibility to provide an adequate wellness environment? Some could make a parallel to restaurants that must adhere to public food safety rules and that would be fair. However, would this tweet not change to “Look at American Airlines gouging customers” as prices jump to the equivalent of one seat per three rows. That’s a 900% cost increase for passengers who would have to bear the burden in order to comply with CDC guidelines. And those increases wouldn’t come out of greed, they would come from math. Airlines aren’t getting rich, they are trying to stop the bleeding and still failing.
Many of those passengers didn’t need to fly. They chose to. The height of the coronavirus prior to the latest resurgence proved that Americans can do without getting on a plane. Yet they are returning. Is this not at their own risk? Why is the carrier responsible for their choices? If one chooses to go inside a grocery store instead of taking a delivery or curbside pickup, do they not bear responsibility for the situation they put themselves in due to their own choices? Is it the groceier’s fault if they get sick inside the store even though they require masks?
If you want an open middle seat, buy it – all the carriers will be happy to sell one to you. If you don’t feel comfortable enough to fly, don’t.
Conclusion
Businesses have one purpose, to make money. No matter how many other jingoistic mission statements they come up with, if they do not make money they have failed their purpose. Chrissy Teigen has several companies – she should know this. Further, if they had kept the middle seat open it would provide next to no additional safety. The truth is, everybody loves an empty middle seat but it’s not shameful for American to not ensure it (by the way, United recently recanted this offering as well.) If you don’t feel safe to fly but fly anyway, you’ve taken the burden of your health not a third-party who facilitates your wishes.
What do you think? Do airlines have a duty to provide an empty middle seat? Do passengers bear any responsibility?
Many people are traveling together, and have quarantined together. Blocking the middle seat for traveling pairs means forcing one of them to the aisle, closer to others. Blocking the middle seat as a blanket policy really makes no sense.
The middle seat is only blocked for unaffiliated passengers. If you’re traveling together they welcome you to move next to each other. I flew Southwest last week and their implementation of this could save countless lives… but what do I know, I’m just a nurse.
Many of you are talking politics, money and ego which is what you do. Some of us actually believe in life and that’s quite simple. You talk of stardom and Fame but forget you choose the life you live. And regardless of senator, star, clansman, poet or homeless we’re all human to an extent but we don’t seem to care about that…do we? You want your voice to be heard, shut up and do something bigger than this. E Unum pluribus
I totally agree if you want or need to fly you have to take a certain amount of risk, otherwise stay home.
She is one of those entitled elite Hollywood types who thinks normal people care what she has to say!
AA is in business to make a profit which in today’s environment is impossible!
So even US domestic airlines are not my favorites in this case I side with AS
Hey
Get your facts right
Gate agents aren’t contracted out. This why I take a grain of salt to you bloggers
Get a life. Move on. You and that mile at a time guy
Unfortunately, this isn’t true at all stations.
Well if the senator and Christy said the same thing essentially then why not include the sensor
senator in the title as well. Looks like your aiming at her because she’s a super model and your think she’s ready picking to be belittled and talked about. Seems like your work rings hollow and you’re fishing for something noteworthy. Actually, you mentioned very little of her but talked about the airline with high regards like your a proponent of not wearing masks yourself. I believe this is an attempt to sway from the problem that you actually pointed out correctly. There isn’t enough space on places so they shouldn’t be flying anyway according to your somewhat accurate dimensions. So thank you for actually backing Christy and ultimately looking like a troll to the whole world.
Karl –
1) I mentioned them both but in the title, it’s Chrissy, because she travels more and knows better. Few people outside of Oregon know the Junior Senator but many millions know Teigen. I am not the only person to editorialize on her tweet.
2) I have been pretty hard on American Airlines. Just see my 30+ posts on the carrier in the last year with their terrible labor relations, mismanagement, and questionable profitability. So when you say “rings hollow” suggesting I’m some sort of American Airlines apologist is hilarious at best.
3) Where on earth did you construct the notion that I am a proponent of not wearing masks? It’s literally a device of your own invention.
4) Airlines have to survive, if customers don’t feel safe flying, don’t. But you can’t force a carrier to give you a loss-making fare and prohibit them from selling other seats because of your preference. Fly Delta if you don’t like it.
5) You’re welcome.
I just flew on a Southwest flight last week and they aren’t filling flights to capacity in order for the middle seats to remain open between unaffiliated passengers. What’s American’s excuse? If an airline that charges considerably less without all the excess fees can afford this sacrifice for safety certainly a carrier the size of American can do it. American also does not require masks to be worn for the duration of the flight. Who would you fly?
Do what you need to protect yourself. No one else will. Ie
Dont go to restaurants, or use airplanes, public transpertation
All close proximity for more then 20 minutes and staying masked cant be supervised.
Actually, in some stations they are. If the destination is seasonal, an airline finds it more cost effective to hire a contractor for ground ops for the few months that they operate the flight.
Unless you’re at an airline’s hub or very large station (over 20 daily flights), or on Southwest, it is very likely the gate agents are contracted out. Fly on Frontier or Spirit, the chances are even greater…Frontier doesn’t even hire its own gate agents anywhere.
Really they are not contracted out I have been in the industry for 25 years and yes some are contracted out they just wear the uniform. Next time you fly out of white plains ny ask the delta and United agents who they actually work for
Personally, I’ll take her tweet any day over travel bloggers boasting about flying into corona virus hot-spots for sh*ts and giggles…
I didn’t know Malaysia was a hotspot…the US on the other hand…
Actually all passengers and cabin crew members are required to wear face coverings at all times (except when eating or drinking) while on board both American Airlines and American Eagle air craft.
That’s great, except that wasn’t always the case, and still doesn’t excuse non-essential traveling.
Again, why is she flying commercial? Charter a private aircraft!!!
Perhaps she is trying to get free publicity ?
Obviously, is all about her
So, She will get over it, that’s all
Exactly, a year ago she was in the news for making headlines against United. There are plenty of private /partnership airlines that love tending to the rich, wannabes, and supposedly famous. Xojets, netjets? She stays relevant only by tweeting. Dear celebrities we normal people aren’t actually interested in your opinions about politics and corporate America. We habe our own. Our “earth” is a different planet than what you live on. Move along.
“Dear celebrities we normal people aren’t actually interested in your opinions about politics and corporate America.”
Except, that isn’t true. People only seem to say that when said celebrity opinions and view points differ from that individual’s opinions and view points.
Also, does you own “earth” habe spell check?
Remember the no smoking sections on an airplane back in the day?
Heh, yeah, you are totally sitting in the no virus section, Chrissy.
Stellar hot take. Did you get enough clicks?
You said Chrissy Teigen’s tweet got it wrong, but she’s saying American Airlines only cares about money, not your health… Which is more or less what you’re saying.
Yes Kyle is just proving her point.
As if your post wasn’t a desperate cry for attention…
I absolutely loved this!!!!!
Any complaint about airlines will find fertile ground, as they’re viewed with the same level of contempt as insurance companies, banks, used car dealers, ie with deep and abiding suspicion, and legitimately so.
I never heard of Chrissy Teigen…she must be US market only.
I’m an American, and I had no idea who she was. My second thought was, why do I care what a super model thinks ?
I said the same thing that is posted here. She is traveling on a Boeing 777 that starts at $320,000,000. She is flying to Asia, 10 hours with a crew of 13-15, Using fuel, and she wants to be Social distanced. If that were the case, they would only sell window seats in every other row. Not possible. She’s a millionaire. If you are that worried about your health take a charter.
I think your spot on Kyle. The blocked middle seat is health theater nothing more.
The hysteria from celebrities and politicians only shows their ignorance and desire for attention.
American was, is, and will always be a company who cares about itself. From CEO, to pilots, flight attendants, ramp agents and EVERYONE!. AA is company who leaves much to be desired. I blame NOT American Airlines, but the people who purchase tickets to fly with them . lol are the COVID-19 era . SHAME ON YOU AA….SHAME ON YOU !!! ( n people who used you.
Her tweets must really bother aa. I have been a customer for many years and find their attitude disgusting! You go girlfriend!!! Dr. B
So why are you still a customer?
Actually, there’s nothing wrong with her tweet. She said the same thing you did only it didn’t waste 5 minutes of my life. But thanks for mansplaining that to all of us.
Curious why you didn’t call out the Senator for posting the tweet in the first place?
I called out the Senator too, twice in fact. But no one knows the Junior Senator from Oregon, and most people know Chrissy Teigen. Besides, she flies an awful lot and knows better, the Senator doesn’t appear to get out quite as often.
Mansplaining? Really? That’s a new one, James.
“Businesses have one purpose, to make money.”
Just one? Well, if that’s the case during this generational crisis, maybe they should do away with all that crap about how our safety is their main concern.
As to the empty middle seat, in close quarters every inch matters. 6 feet recommended by CDC is a very approximate number anyway, used probably because people need simple and clear guidelines (WHO, by the way, suggested 1 meter or 3 ft). We still don’t know why some people get sick while others don’t, but if an airline can’t give its passengers everything, it’s not OK to give them nothing. These 18 inches you mentioned can make all the difference in the world.
If they “can” “give” them the 18″ they do. If they have sufficient space, this is the first protocol. But if they “can’t” they aren’t sentencing the others to death. Again, every single passenger can buy the extra 18″ if they so choose to. These are unnecessary trips as proved by the recent uptick so it’s not a matter of whether or not the airline is valuing selling one more seat over a human life, it’s whether that human values their money over their health (or they can always just stay home or fly with an airline that doesn’t sell the middle seat.)
American Airline should keep the middle seat empty if that is what they told the customer would be occut when the customer purchased their tickets. Otherwise it is false advertising.
That’s fair. I would agree with that entirely.
Kyle, please do your research before you post irresponsible articles that can endanger the public. I agree that American Airlines exists to make money and that it is unreasonable to shame an airline for not voluntarily operating at a loss with empty seats when passengers are not willing to pay a sufficient premium for social distancing. But it is simply wrong to claim that blocking middle seats has no benefit to public safety. Social distancing is not binary between 6ft or nothing; it is a probabilistic gradient on which risk gradually decreases with more distance. The CDC guideline of 6ft is designed for maximal risk mitigation; you still get significant benefit below that. Even the 3ft of head-to-head distance that you get by having one empty seat in the middle (18-inch seat width x 2) is actually sufficient to reduce transmission risk by a factor of 4~5. Of course, the seat pitch is still fixed so you don’t get all that benefit, but if you calculate a weighted average of transmission risk on a 737 just with middle seats blocked, it is clear that an average passenger on Delta still has 2~2.5 times less infection risk than an average passenger on United. See the study cited below, published in the Lancet. I’ve also sent examples of these calculations to Matthew.
https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2020/06/01/At-least-3-feet-of-social-distancing-likely-reduces-COVID-19-spread-study-confirms/7431591040809/
Your comment stating that going to a grocery store instead of doing delivery is akin to taking an unnecessary flight is ridiculous (and privileged). Most people don’t need to be flying. People need groceries. I could pay for delivery but I don’t because someone is going to be at-risk either way, and I’d rather it were me, with good health insurance and tons of sick leave, than the Instacart worker who may have neither.
Oh Amy… I am so glad you wrote this. “Privileged” is reading a post, deciding what to take offense to, and become self-rightous about regardless of what’s actually written.
For example, you completely ignored the fact that I stated people don’t need to fly: “Many of those passengers didn’t need to fly. They chose to. The height of the coronavirus prior to the latest resurgence proved that Americans can do without getting on a plane. Yet they are returning.”
Then you ignored when I wrote: “If one chooses to go inside a grocery store instead of taking a delivery or curbside pickup, do they not bear responsibility for the situation they put themselves in due to their own choices?” assuming that all grocery stores deliver at a cost that is too expensive for consumers, and ignoring the always free curbside pickup. You do this solely to then self-flagellate and become a martyr falling on the sword of disease rather than demonstrate your own privilege by just ordering from Instacart.
You can’t ignore the aspects where I acknowledge the other options for getting groceries without an extra fee then scream privilege. You “could pay for delivery”, great, maybe that Instacart worker had another full-time job but they are furloughed and by you jumping in front of the COVID-19 bus so heroically, they are sitting at home wondering how they will pay their bills next month because you were too busy saving them to notice.
If you want to take issue with something I write, that’s fine, but you can’t ignore the places where I acknowledge the exact thing you accuse me of not taking into account just to feel all the braver.
““Privileged” is reading a post, deciding what to take offense to, and become self-rightous about regardless of what’s actually written.”
That’s…not what privileged means.
Pretty well thought out. Mostly though, I’m impressed that you know when to use the word Bates.
I’ll pile on and add that the outrage about the full middle seat is silly in that if you sit by the window, you’ll also have someone sitting right next to you on the aisle.
That being said, I don’t begrudge AA making money. Philosophical insight:
I feel the golden era of travel was just before Y2K. Lots of great FF programs, comfy seats, non-smoking, and generally hassle free airport security. But it was also a time that airlines were going out of business left and right. I enjoyed great service and price at the expense of entire airlines going under.
After the market corrected itself, consolidation, and ruthless penny pinching, the airlines became profitable again. I don’t mind them recovering or even raising prices, but the penny pinching is obnoxious and notorious. It has alienated consumers.
So now, even when the airlines do deserve pity for using that middle seat, the emotional ire of all the other penny pinching comes home to roost.
*sigh*
You know, I used to enjoy this website a lot. The writers here do seem to have different political orientation than I do (I have seen enough union-bashing posts here), but they used to keep that to a minimum. But apparently covid-19 brings out the worst from people. I understand that it’s been hard few months, but can we not treat this like some kind of scoreboard?
If you allow me, let me go through this non-sense of a writing.
“Businesses have one purpose, to make money.” Sure, and Thai Airways will make money tomorrow. I heard Etihad also make money fist over mouth! On that note, all eco-travel companies should flood forests with tourists to maximize profits.
Businesses have the same relation with money as humans do. We need money to survive. Doesn’t mean we live to make money. A business is, at the core of it, a company, a group of people get together to do something. It needs money, yes. But it can, and frequently do, raise above that. In fact, if money is the only reason, why don’t all airlines go Ryanair route and charge about 3 dozens fees? I mean, why invest in customer service at all? Food for thoughts, huh?
“Personal responsibility.” Ah, the regular victim blaming skid is out. I agree, people should take responsibility. All mask-haters should be thrown out. But let’s face it, some people do need to fly. It’s been months since everything shutdown. Even my own mother has been itching to fly to one of her properties to sort out paperwork. Is it “essential travel”? It’s not, in a sense that she won’t get hurt not doing it. But it still needs to be done (about 3 months ago…). And let’s face it, releasing steam through flying is much better than marching to state capitals in full tactical gears.
I do support discouragement of flying, but that does NOT release the airlines from doing *everything* possible to make flying safer (will get to that in a bit). And it does NOT release the airlines from assuring people that they have done everything. Whether or not someone’s flying is essential should not impact whether that person would give covid-19 to someone who absolutely needs to fly.
“It wouldn’t matter anyway.” Pardon me? Pardon me? What kind of stupidity is this? I am serious. What kind of stupidity is this?
Let’s say the airplane has capacity of 100 people (round number, easy to manage). If they block middle seat, and a few people arrive already infected, 66 people are at risk. If they don’t, 100 do. It’s math. 750,000 people flew over July 4 weekend. 33% means 250,000 people (OK, not all of them on AA). That’s a *lot* of people. But it wouldn’t matter, right? These idiots should die, right?
Oh, and let’s not forget your stance on food onboard. Apparently, according to you, it’s OK to force FAs to crowd the gallery to prepare meals for business class. So, according to you, *any* crowding is, well, no matter! Doesn’t matter. Wanna join one of these political rallying?
“If American Airlines cannot stay solvent, […]” Excuse me, didn’t I just spend billions in my tax money to bail them out? Isn’t safety the reason why I spent that money? So, they want to take the money, to fire the people, and to cram customers. All of this because, umm, “businesses have one purpose”?
Look, I understand you don’t think businesses should be regulated. In *some* cases, that’s true. However, given the high entry cost of an airlines, it’s nonsense. It’s like saying “yo, no need for democracy at all! If this government sucks, we will just start a new one.” Yeah, good luck with that. We need to hold all businesses accountable on all fronts at all time by all means. You can disagree with this lady that perhaps AA really really have no choices. But of course they do. They just got bailed out. They just cut their capacity to maintain prices (to some extend). And, they could have shown remorse. “We tried our best, but people have been flying, maybe due to pending important businesses over the last few months; we can’t help it; we did try to scrub the planes down!” would have been nice. But no, do stupid dictum (“businesses have one purpose”) and victim blaming instead! Easier and cheaper, right?
From a FA, Thank you Kyle for having common sense.
Here’s my two cents because I have not read anyone else talk about the elephant in the room and I’ve been talking about it ever since airlines started charging bagging fees.
Every single airline makes billions of dollars a year. BILLIONS! And that’s all profit. Is this sinking in? After they pay for their employees and any other overhead they may have, they still have BILLIONS of dollars. The CEO alone makes over $11 million. I dont know about anyone else reading this, but I’ve lost my job due to COVID-19. Many Americans that didn’t lose their job are being forced into pay cuts and mandatory furloughs so they can keep their jobs. I don’t know what’s happened behind the scenes at AA or any other airline for that matter, but I’m pretty sure they can manage without 2/3 of their profits.
The baggage fees, the overbooking of flights, and the increase of the price of tickets to begin with was all to increase profits. It wasn’t done to help them stay afloat. They’ve made the seats narrower and reduced the distance in front and behind to cram as many people on each and every flight so that the CEO, CFO, COO, etc. can each make tens of billions per year rather than just several million per year.
Oversight needs to happen in every industry. There is no reason why at this time when the government has limited indoor capacity to 25% in many states that the airlines shouldn’t be forced to do the same. By my count, instead of making BILLIONS of dollars this year. They will only make hundreds of millions. And the CEO’s and CFO’s and the like won’t be able to make more than $11 million, they’d have to settle for $3 million or so.
Oh, the poor souls. My jobless self feels so bad for them.
Southwest doesn’t charge for baggage fees, but their fares are as high as everyone else 5% of the time and higher 60% of the time. You can get angry about baggage fees but then you’d have to also acknowledge that fares, in general, have dropped dramatically. Over the last 30 years, fares in the US are down 50% (post-inflation) yet baggage fees have risen. If you’re a passenger who doesn’t check a bag on every single flight, you have dramatically improved your financial situation since de-bundling. If you fly spirit for $30 one-way to Florida from Philadelphia but pay $60 in baggage fees, is $90 not still dramatically better than the price you would have paid when bundled before 9/11? It is. It just feels sleazier this way.