I don’t have a TV at home, but several of you have shared this clip with me, so let’s explore Tucker Carlson’s extended attack against United Airlines on his Fox News program last night.
Tucker Carlson Attacks New United Airlines Pilot Program
On Tuesday, United Airlines announced it would train 5,000 new pilots at its training academy and would give preference for half of those slots to people of color and non-white minorities.
> Read More: United Airlines Targets Women, People Of Color In New Pilot Recruitment Campaign
Carlson led off his program with an extended segment on this topic, declaring, “Safety is no longer that airline’s concern – identity politics is.” That’s quite a charge. He also added that United executives are “ideologues, suffering from an incurable brain disease called wokeness.”
United CEO Scott Kirby has talked about “structural inequality” and a “lack of access” at the heart of United’s new initiative to hire minority and female pilots.
There’s an argument to be made for and against overt racial preferences, even if it such actions are directed at remedying decades of inequality. Indeed, there should be something very unsettling about why we are at this point now.
But the idea that United will put unsafe pilots in the sky is simply absurd.
Even putting aside the race-baiting dog whistles of ideologues, the issue is how to choose a narrow field of candidates among a huge applicant pool.
Traditionally, the U.S. military has served as a conduit for sending trained pilots into commercial roles. That will continue and United makes no promises of diversity in that applicant pool.
But as the military places increased focus on drones and other advanced technology, starting a flight school as a separate resource for future pilots makes sense. German airline Lufthansa has done this for decades.
And if there are thousands of qualified applicants, all of whom will be starting from scratch, is there not some good in trying to address that the traditional high cost of training has disproportionately kept certain segments of our society out of flight school?
But these candidates will go through rigorous classroom and flight deck training. They will log hundreds of hours before joining a regional airline and logging thousands of hours before even being considered to fly United Mainline. No corners will be cut.
So will these be “unsafe” and “unqualified” pilots? Absolutely not. And to insinuate otherwise is ignorant.
CONCLUSION
United Airlines is embarking upon an affirmative action program when it comes to choosing students for its new flight school. Some, like Tucker Carlson, take issue with this. While conversation on racial preferences is reasonable and necessary, the idea that these future pilots will be inferior and unsafe is misleading and absurd.
Carson had never had a real job in his life. Spoiled San Diego rich kid who blasts his own viewers in private. He’s a loud mouth idiot who knows nothing about the real world except how to be a douche no matter what the issue. Why would anyone listen to him on anything is beyond me.
We already tried identity politics in my former country (USSR). Failed miserably. Good luck with the US experiment. Will certainly fail as well.
I remember him from a show called Crossfire on CNN. He and some other bloke used to bicker like two dogs fighting over an old slipper. Good times…
It will be interesting to see how fox news changes after rupert dies. No single child at this point has a majority share. Let’s all pray james buys out or joins his sisters to push out lachlan.
TUCKER CARLSON Has ZERO credibility. Enough said.
Agree, we need more diversity. On that note, I will stop reading you since you are white. I will switch to a blog of women and/or person of color.
I don’t watch Fox, but, I think Carlson is the highest rated and most watched journalist in the USA, fwiw.
Also, has anyone explained how bringing back racism (judging people by the color of their skin), helps?
We’re now specifically hiring people based on their skin color, or sexuality?
This, uhm, seems exactly backwards.
“It’s not racist, to be racist, if certain skin colors are treated better now?” Is that the angle here?
The argument wasn’t that a 50% minority/female mandate would engender “inferior” pilots but that placing gender/racial diversity as a top line goal vs. safety/qualifications is what can create problems.
Isn’t it reasonable to think that safety is ASSUMED and that the diversity goals go beyond the baseline of safety? What does prioritizing safety mean to you in terms of choosing which candidates to enter flight school, all of which have zero experience?
I thought we had affirmative action already. Next up, all the Captain POCs get a higher salary to make up for years of oppression.
Kirby just wants to make sure those Federal dollars keep flowing.
I think your post reflects a general lack of understanding about pilot training. The question is not to have safe pilots, it is to have the best one. Hence why airlines typically draw from USAF pools because they know these guys are good.
The Colgan Air and Air France guys were probably deemed ‘safe’ on paper, yet when shit hit the fan they melted down. That is why you want the best one, Period. Doing otherwise insinuates that some applicants can’t succeed on their own merit. Kinda demeaning.
If you want to see discrimination in the cockpit, look no further than Korean Air and how they mistreat their expat pilots. Are you fine with trying to replicate these discriminatory policies in US cockpits, disguised with a feeling good memo about ‘paying for the sins of people dead 150 years ago’, Insane.
He is an entertainer who’s target audience is: 1) old scare white people; and 2) the white working class (i.e. the poorly educated under class that forms that base of Trump’s support). You know this by noting who advertises on his show.
He almost certainly doesn’t believe the majority of what he says on air, but his audience does and that is a major problem. Fortunately, demographics will function to decimate both groups as a political force in the coming decades. Can’t happen soon enough.
Matt Kline said safety is assumed…. hahaha… isn’t that what was assumed with the MAX… safety was assumed!
The best pilots period. Rank them brutally and throughout the process then start at the top and go down till you have the number of pilots you need. If they are all Asian females…so what. This is not complicated if you want the best.
Matthew is right. Diversity quotas never result in standards bring reduced. The US Army reducing its physical endurance standards for special forces just happened to coincide with upper brass pressure to recruit more women into these units.
And only dog-whistling reactionaries think that incentives matter.
Carlson spews all sorts of random invective that has no factual basis. Unfortunately there are gullible people who actually believe him.
Given the checks and balances that aviation is under. The scrutiny that pilots get day in and day out in this country. Anyone who imagines or believes that this somehow comprises safety or reduces its standards in training and applicants is either exceedingly ignorant or a pure racist. Period. Perhaps Carlson should be more concerned about angry white men like the WN pilot that ranted racist and ignorant statements to ATC over a hot mic when departing San Jose. Those are the ones I worry about in terms of mental stability to operate a commercial aircraft.
This is how we lift up our society. Further, we all win in that the long term economic growth from offering this training and career to otherwise underprivileged people of color is staggering. Imagine the potential of this country when millions are lifted out of poverty with targeted opportunities such as aviation. I hope they also look towards maintenance and other areas for subsidized training as well.
Hiring someone based on their race, heritage or gender is discriminatory, period. Hire pilots based on their performance, period.
@George He may have a big audience, but Tucker Carlson is NO “journalist.” He’s a clown.
Last I checked, being a pilot requires a lot of training and qualifications. Given that to actually be a pilot means one has to qualify, what is the actual concern of Carlson’s?
There are groups of people who are economically disadvantaged. That’s a fact. It can be proven in the research and data. United is taking an effort to allow for more opportunities that would otherwise not be made available to those groups of people. In no way does that mean those people aren’t as good as white pilots.
Is he inferring that being a different race of a pilot will lead to lower safety standards?
At the end of the day, this is just racism disguised as safety. A very familiar trope among racists.
I wish there was a way to recruit employees, pilots, students, etc… through a completely blind interview. You apply, go through all the required screening process, interviews, etc…. The best will get the job offer or college admissions. It is like watching that show “Masked Singer”. Let the best one win and then when the candidate is revealed if all happens to be white male with blue eyes, SO BE IT. If they happen to be transgender, have blue skin color, be atheist, etc… SO BE IT. I am tired of this BS of targeting a certain profile just to check the boxes of “diversity and inclusion”. Hired people blindly and the diversity and inclusion BS will be over. BTW, a friend was just promoted at a Fortune 500 company as VP of Diversity and Inclusion. WTF is that job? People lost their minds.
@Too Many:
No, TC is implying women and POC are of inferior intellect to white men such that United will train…and pass/certify…pilots using some lowered standard to ensure diversity. Thus leading to lower quality pilots.
Pilots are responsible for hundreds of lives every day. United needs to hire the best to be pilots. I don’t care if they are white, black, male, female, gay, straight, tall, short, thin, or fat. By trying to design a workforce based on certain traits in the name of equity, is simply ludicrous. I for one will minimize my future flights on United knowing they may not have selected the best to be pilots. Others will as well. I only pray it won’t take a disaster to eliminate this stupendous policy at United.
Circling back to the point of this blog entry, I think that your point is a good one, Matthew. I think it’s very important to keep in mind during this conversation (whatever one’s opinion), and I am glad that your brought it up.
The concern for some, if not many, is that because United wants to be recognized as a role model for diversity, standards might not be met, or stretched at least, for some. As a former military pilot, I remember well the debate that raged when women first became a significant factor in combat pilot training. While now there are many, many fully qualified women flying in both the military and commercial areas, I saw standards in some cases relaxed to get women into the pilot’s seat quickly to please politicians and those with an axe to grind about the military. I don’t believe for a minute that that is the case now, but I do believe it was at the start of the movement. Let’s hope U.A. holds everyone to the same high standards from the outset.
The only discriminating factor of hiring someone should be performance. I don’t care who works in my company as long as they can perform to the statement-of-work shown. This is United catering to the woke fellows.
At what genetic threshold does a “white” get categorized as a “non-white?” Prior to the societal evolution of the 60s, I’m fairly certain there were antiquated ways of making this labeling distinction. If a person from Whiteistan has a great-grandmother from POCistan, would this person qualify for the new recruitment initiative? Where is Whiteistan actually?
Yeah, affirmative action worked wonders in:
Rwanda (1 million dead )
Yugoslavia (1 million dead)
Sri Lanka (100,000 dead )
Nigeria (1.5 million dead)
Soviet Union (4 million dead)
India instituted Affirmative Action 70 years ago, long before the US. Proponents claim it has worked. If it has worked, why is it still needed after 70 years?
Bottom line: every affirmative action program in the world has been proposed as a short-term solution to address previous injustice. The reality is that every single one has either continued indefinitely or ended in genocide.
@Ex-Soviet Exactly. There is an excellent book on the subject of Aff. Action in the Soviet Union:
https://www.amazon.com/Affirmative-Action-Empire-Nationalism-1923-1939/dp/0801486777
It was a disaster that killed millions of people and still lingers to this day, accounting for strife in places like Nagorno Karabakh.
It is incredible that the crowd that talks so much about “following science” and history is so utterly ignorant of these subjects- that especially includes some of the woke idiots above, who presumably have seen some of the world.
Isn’t the idea the exact opposite to what Tucker says?
By ensuring you are casting your net wider, to groups who either wouldn’t have thought to or couldn’t have trained to be come a pilot, you have a wider pool of applicants to pick the best from.
United is not casting a wider net, or targeting economically disadvantaged groups. They are setting an explicit quota based on race and gender. Defend it on the merits, if you like. But inclusion, or economic fairness, are not what United is after.
I am sure there is no chance of them lowering standards as may be done in the legal profession.
“Several states say they could make their bar exams easier to pass as a way to address racial diversity problems and access-to-justice issues entrenched in the legal profession.”
https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2021/04/bar-exams-may-soon-be-easier-to-pass-as-states-eye-changes.html
I’ve been a pilot my entire life. I spent the first 20 years of my career as a naval aviator flying fighter jets off of aircraft carriers. I’ve spent the past 20 years as an airline pilot at American Airlines. I have put in thousand of hours in training at the highest level, have trained at least a thousand pilots and have shared the cockpit with several times that. For the record – I am a democrat.
I can tell you that the qualities that make a good pilot do not grow on trees. There are many more poor and average pilots than there are good ones.
What is going on I’m recent years has me very concerned. When I first began flying at the majors – 80% of pilots were military trained and that meant that most had already cleared a very high bar where the weak are washed out or killed (I was winged in the Navy with six others pilots and only three of us are alive today – 4 died in crashes) Today military pilots make up less than 20% of new hires – the rest come from back grounds – special schools that you pay to graduate and where the weak are pushed along. My military flying was orders of magnitude more complex and challenging than flying airliners – and that experience and confidence still resides in me. Flying is 99% easy and 1% hair raising. Most all the pilots can handle the 99% – but it’s the 1% where you NEED to have the best of the best up there! This is what Matthew Klint fails to see. He argues that as long as pilots achieve some level of competence arbitrarily deemed “safe” that other priorities should prevail. I could not disagree more.
I would bet that if it were this authors family on board a flight out of New York when both engines flamed out he would be praying for a Sully Sullenberg (former AF fighter pilot) up front and not a pilot who was picked over others because of his skin color.
This article was written by a guy, Matthew Klint – who knows nothing about professional aviation, doesn’t even realize how little he knows but worse is advocating a position which will lower standards of safety and endanger the public – all because he doesn’t like Tucker Carlson. I don’t watch the show either – but might start. He makes a lot of sense on this point and it is a subject I know a lot about.
Tucker sure looks like a chump for inviting pedophile Matt Gaetz on his show…yikes.
(Oh, and you “just hire the best person for the job!” chumps endlessly posting across the travel blogs…this is increasing the availability pool to those systemically locked out, they still have to pass all the tests to actually be able to fly you know…SMFH at your overt white nationalism praise).
UAL had a diversity Pilot program in the 80’s. UAL hired all applicants that checked the F or B box. They know the risks. Bypassing Military pilots to hire a Black or Female with 150 hours of Cessna time. It did not work out the last time and contributed to the downfall and bankruptcy of that Carrier. Now UAL has a bean counter from AA directing the company into terrane on woke mountain.
Piloting a Heavy Jet is not for ANYONE with low experience or low IQ. Administer color blind testing and demand and hire the best applicants.
@TWA John. Given you are someone with a user name honoring an airline that died years ago I will assume you are really old. As such, do you know how racist your statement is? “Piloting a Heavy Jet is not for ANYONE with low experience or low IQ.” I’m just shaking my head. Incredible.
Thanks, Jim D. Good to get the perspective from someone who actually has specific knowledge of the subject.
United must be doing the right thing!!
For decades airlines had their pilot training subsidized by the military. Now they have to hire more and more pilots who haven’t earned their wings and gone through extreme vetting thanks to Uncle Sam. I don’t doubt that United can find more qualified minority and female pilots than they have now, but there is no reason to expect that the composition of the pilot force should match the demographic composition of the larger population. Pilot training is expensive, so if United really is serious about recruiting and subsidizing it for BIPOC and womxn folx, it amounts to a racist/sexist reparations program. Recruiting with specific demographic goals is by definition racist/sexist. As I have stated before, no one seems to complain about the NBA being 75% black or 75% of teachers being female. Where is the equity and inclusion for White/Asian/male folx?
Tucker Carlson & Fox News… that says everything you need to know about credibility, legitimacy, integrity. Why is anyone wasting time on this waste of time person and network?
Tucker Carlson was spot on. Diversity has nothing to do with whether one should be a pilot. It should be based solely on your ability to be a good pilot, not the color of your skin or your sexual preferences. All of you have swallowed the Kool-Aid. Until Obama was elected, race was hardly an issue in America. We had a Black President so it is absurd to call this a racist country. All of you are going down the path to totalitarian government which will more likely than not follow in China’s footsteps since they already have corrupted most of our politicians. Race is being used to create further strife in America as is releasing all the prisoners. The Goal of the elite is to frighten all of us (COVID and Lockdowns, and Masks), so we will go anything to bring back order to our lives.
What did Tucker say that you believe is false and back it up if you can.