A black passenger claimed a white woman “stole her seat” in premium economy class due to “white privilege,” but dismissed a more likely explanation and misled the public. And yet American Airlines ultimately refunded her upgrade fee even though she still flew in the upgraded cabin and had an open seat next to her! Let’s unpack what happened.
Black Passenger Says White Passenger Stole Her Seat On American Airlines, But There’s More To The Story…
Kaneisha Collins took to TikTok to complain, “So I paid almost $600 for a seat on a plane and they gave it to YT lady.”
(YT is the way that the kids on TikTok refer to white people)
She was flying on AA714 from Philadelphia (PHL) to Venice (VCE), operated by a Boeing 787-8 with four rows of premium economy. She upgraded from economy class for $562.
She further lamented, “I paid all that money to upgrade only for them to give my seat to a white lady.”
@collinskaye I was so annoyed! I truly felt i was treated unfairly and that her privilege allowed for this to happen. Nothing bad to her because she probably didnt know . This is totally the airlines fault ! But who should i start flying with next !? #fypシ #fy #foryou #tiktok #fyp #explore #explorepage✨ #foruyou #foryoupage
That’s concerning, isn’t it? Especially in the aftermath of a recent incident where American Airlines removed eight unrelated black men from a flight because one of them may have smelled like a skunk. You can bet that video caught the attention fo the folks at American Airlines.
Collins laments, “I truly felt I was treated unfairly and that her privilege allowed for this to happen.”
She claims she reserved seat 6A, but when she boarded she found the “elderly white woman” in her seat. After alerting the flight attendant of the seating snafu, she was asked to step off the aircraft to resolve the problem.
Collins fumed, “Instead of having her move, they let her keep my seat.”
The gate agents moved her back three rows–still in the upgraded premium economy cabin–and even told her the seat next to her would remain open. I’d call that an upgrade…
But even so, Collins felt she was entitled to seat 6A and demanded a refund from American Airlines for the upgrade, even though she flew. She later called American Airlines and recorded the conversation, with an agent telling her:
“I acknowledge how distressing it must have been to find your seat that was changed to a row with three seats at the last minute. We guarantee the upgrade on the cabin, but we don’t guarantee the seat.”
And of course, this is airline policy. I’ve been the victim of seat swaps numerous times and not been compensated for it. I also did not blame racial hatred for it even though the mechanics who took my seat from Newark to Brussels were brown. And I went from an aisle seat with extra legroom to a middle seat in the back…
But Collins still chose to make it racial while even admitting that the couple seated in the bulkhead row were elderly (i.e. per AA policy, mobility-impaired passengers may be reassigned to bulkhead seats).
And now she claims that American Airlines refunded her for the upgrade even though she still flew in the upgraded cabin AND had an open seat next to her.
@collinskaye American Airlines called me . Quick update . They have opened a investigation . #fypシ #fy #foryou #tiktok #fyp #explore #explorepage✨ #foruyou #foryoupage #longervideos
@collinskaye Replying to @ShekeenaKR American airlines is giving me a full refund #foryou #fy #foryoupage #longervideos #fypage
I don’t appreciate her conduct. It’s never fun to lose your preferred seat, but making it about race diminishes the very concerning situations like I mentioned above, where unlreated black men were grouped together, for no other reason that the color of their skin. This sitution, on the other hand, sounds to me like a novice traveler race-bating without any evidence.
If you listen to the video below, you can see how seriously AA takes this case (and you can bet that if it was me making this complaint, I would not be getting a call from the CEO’s office…). Kudos to AA for taking the allegation very seriously and for this sentiment:
“We don’t tolerate any type of discriminatory behavior from our passengers or employees. That’s very important for us to investigate and see. There’s no way we going to allow to get any discriminatory behavior from our employees.”
But here we see no evidence of racial discrimination. Just a person trying to scam a free upgrade for having to deal with what any frequent flyer has had to deal with it at one point…
Let’s all be sure to inundate American Airlines with demands for a refund if our seats are ever moved…the precedent has been set.
image: @collinskaye / TikTok
Shame on AA for caving in on this blackmail. She had a window seat in the same cabin with a free seat next to her. AA should have told her to get lost, as it now sets an example for other chancers to follow.
She does ruin it for people who do experience actual cases of racism on flights.
@Aaron … Good point . Although I recall only two incidents : When only black people were removed for b.o. , And When only orthodox were removed from their connecting flight in FRA . Not very frequent .
Being able to blame everything on “YT” is literally the ultimate privilege.
Ironic
Her personal sense of privilege undermines real issues of racism. Shame on her for gaming the system and shame on American for caving. American Airlines response will just encourage other grifters to do the same thing.
Unfortunately, people keep using the race card to get away with everything. We need to stop accommodating their fake claims once and for all.
To be fair, she paid the money to be in that seat. Why was the passenger allowed to sit in 6A? Why wasn’t she at least asked to move beforehand?
We saw a picture of a seat map, but the confirmation she shared did not even indicate 6A.
She paid for a bulkhead seat. The article states that the person was elderly and policy is that they can switch your seat for mobility impaired, and, I believe someone with an infant on a long flight. She received a comparable seat in premium economy. She got what she paid for.
She paid for premium economy and got premium economy (and even an open seat next to her).
I know AA is tiptoeing around the race issue for black folks, but this is just ridiculous and sets a dangerous precedent.
How soon before the Race Hustler “Rev” Sharpton announces boycott of AA unless AA pays him millions for sensitivity training?
Matthew- Please avoid embedding TikTok in your posts. Avoid the CCP !
She got an upgrade, and an open seat then had the audacity to complain for a refund? Get f….ed. This is the chit im sick of. No, she didn’t get “bumped” for some non-existent privilege, she got bumped back because of old people. As you stated, and this makes me lose any of the little respect for AA I had. (which was clearly very little anyway).
She’s spewing social media buzzwords to grift AA for a free upgrade.
I hate AA but I hate fake racism accusations more.
Nonsense.
[ed. note – N word is not permitted in all its forms]
It’s gets so tiring to hear blacks and other groups complain when everything good they have in the world is because of White people. They didn’t discover electricity, build cars, refrigeration, airplanes, or air plane seats. They didn’t make iPads, or smartphones, or vulcanize rubber. When they ride a bicycle like those 3 boys in Antigua, they should kiss the feet of White people. When they fly on a plane, they should kiss the feet of White people. The hate blacks have for those who gave and give them everything reflects very poorly on them.
The most fair and equitable thing to do is for each group to only be sold and provided with what they themselves can build or their ancestors built or could build. Same for medicine.
Wow this is insane. Maybe black people were too busy being literally enslaved by white people and fighting legalized discrimination.
If you really think that, White people would have nothing since Asians and Egyptians were among the first societies and literally invented the building blocks of society
Those Egyptians you’re referring to *were* white, midwit. The Arab conquest happened centuries later.
I don’t buy the white guilt. Millions of Europeans were enslaved by African Arabs including the ancestors of Barak Obama who qualified for affirmative action as the son of an immigrant Arab and a white woman. India still engages in a caste system. Africa and Asia continue to practice slavery. Cortez could not have conquered the Aztecs if not for surrounding tribes who were tired of being enslaved and human sacrificed.
Well, without whites she’d be living in squalor somewhere.
Black Americans are the most privileged group of Africans on the planet. Reparations? No, they should thank you for importing them. I’m dead serious.
As a veteran, I am offended that she is spreading this drivel while in uniform.
Easy to determine who the racist is here, and it just makes it harder to a knowledge the REAL cases of racism.
It’s true all of you are racist really every human being on earth is black It’s just some of us were cursed with white skin but when you die you goes back to your natural color which is black and some so ashamed they wants to be put in the ground the next day so tell me are white people black yep but I know you don’t like it but it’s a fact when you die look in the mirror the next day
another cry baby blaming everything on white people, just get a life
You might not like it but you are black yourself when you pass away(I hopeyou live as long as God pemits) the next coupleof days you will be my color
Of course, all you crackers take the side of whitey. I is disgusted.
There is no way to know what happened, none of us were there, could it be racism? Sure! Was it? I have no clue.
There are benign explanations as well from the elderly woman was disabled in some way and needed that seat to a computer glitch to other possible scenarios.
If it were a benign reason, AA may not have communicated to the passenger in this article well or at all.
My point, without being there and witnessing it with my own two eyes, hearing the conversation first hand, it is impossible to know if it was racism or not.
Until they look at themselves in the mirror a coupleof days after they die and notice they went back to their natural color black and of course in Hell
What a disgusting read, makes me sick to my stomach that all the commenters, the writer of this article and the subject of this article especially are so invested in the bogus concept of race. Please move on in 2024, there is no such thing as race black, white, brown etc. Just human beings. Stop with the identity hustle!
Your statement may be anthropologically correct, but the issue of race and perceved differences on the basis of skin color is still very much an issue in 2024…
Despite the expected cavalcade of racist comments here I have to wonder: would she have been good with getting another (presumably equal) PE seat if the seat she initially chose had been occupied by an elderly black lady. I’ve been moved by JAL more than once to a middle seat in first class and I really think that ethnicity had nothing to do with the change.
Yeah, the usual names and sock puppets do always show up on posts like this with their nonsense.
Black people haven’t invented any kind of civilization. I mean, that’s just a fact. No matter what your little manlet feelings tell you.
Say what?! Please go to Egypt, then try again.
Egypt? You mean the country populated by Mediterranean whites during the time of its ascent? You do know we have sources and science to prove blacks certainly didn’t invent Egyptian civilization.
MC , as an rducational experience, I suggest that you go to Egypt, or any North African country, for that matter, and tell the natives that they are black, and wait for their reaction .
You’re really proving that public schools badly need to teach people to think independently rather than getting your news from TikTok: comments that are insipid, insulting, and unable to address the topic at hand.
The photo depicted shows 6A open. All the other seats in the cabin occupied. Now, if there was any sort of seat change, she would’ve been notified ahead of time, well before embarking. Her AA flight app would’ve provided her new seat details. Now, the airline is right about guaranteeing a seat in the cabin and not the actual seat because there could always be an aircraft change that may not have that actual seat number on it.
If she had a problem with her new assignment and again, she was notified well before getting on the aircraft, she should’ve addressed it at the ticket/customer service counter.
AA went over and above for that person when she deserved nothing. Shame on that chick for making this about race.
Same happened to me on a United flight from Venice to Newark. My front row business class seat that I had the boarding pass in hand for was given to a young black gentleman. No explanation provided and I was moved to the back of business. I wrote it off at the time – perhaps a TSA agent. These things do happen for a variety of reasons. Unfortunately sometimes for the wrong reasons.
I call malarkey on this article and I’ll explain why. AA and other airlines have recently taken to refusing seat swapping after takeoff to empty seats and have claimed justification as people could have paid for those seats. If the airline is going to make a person move over their mistake, and why is it ALWAYS the brown person, then they should pay up right away.
There is nothing but the journalist’s privilege that leads me to believe race wasn’t a factor and nothing the airline did that excuses their behavior
Who says it is ALWAYS the brown person? On what basis do you make this claim?
BTW, I’ve learned she NEVER had 6A assigned…it was always 8H.
So she’s a swindler at best.
Utter comedy and irony that YOU call her a swindler (which she is) when you embed Tiktok content into your website and monetize it through incessant popups and ads. Completely using other people’s content by commenting on their content and pretending as though you have created a news story.
She is a grifter and swindler, no different than you or anyone trying to make a living on social media, pretending that they are reporting or otherwise are disseminating factual information.
You’re really reaching.
Why do black folks keep flying with American Airlines? They have been doing this crap for decades. Boycott them already.
Spoken like a true ghetto turd who should stick to Grayhound
Always a Taneesha or Takeisha causing a problem. If I see women of color at the airport i know from experience there will more than likely be some sort of problem. i never see trouble with black men, they always seem to just go with the flow.
The author of this article is racist as hell, I guarantee you that if a white person was mad about not getting WHAT THEY PAID FOR you would be right there defending that Karen lol. Super obvious you have issues with black people advocating for themselves, gross and embarrassing!
LOL. Oh Kevin…
So what did we learn here?
Can never please some people. Glad you got to Venice safely, in Premium Economy, with empty seat, cause you don’t like old White people. If you’re fortunate to reach 65 years plus? You will be Old and Black. Learn to speak clearly too.
I can only imagine the outrage if a white person complained on social media “They gave my seat to a BLACK woman”
Instant cancellation
When Air France moved us to a less desirable seats on a 13 hour flight I had sadly forgotten my White Privilege Amex Rewards card at home. When United moved our seats on a 10 hour flight and split up our travel group, once again I forgot that darn card. When Delta not only moved my seat and then gave me a 600# seatmate I almost cried that I forgot my card. Do you think I could still call and request my refund, or does that only work with the Amex Black Privilege Card? Why can’t these people just deal with it like the rest of us?
She’s just another disgusting race baiter trying to stir the pot.
Yes she is. People like her need to stay at home.
The ONLY example of true racism in this entire story is the entitled whiner using the slur ” YT ” ( whitey ) .
Racists gotta racist .
Take $562 off the reparations tab, this hoe already got her gubment money.
I just cannot blame anyone using the race card or taking advantage of the zeitgeist in a similar manner. The world isn’t fair, people get on in life by having rich parents, well-connected friends, or just being in the right place at the right time. If someone is to blame here, it’s definitely the airline.
A pretty silly stance, PM.
Care to expand? I appreciate that it may come across as cynical or not align with certain people’s values, but what’s actually silly about it?
At times like this, I wish there is an afterlife where we get judged. How do we think an ex would be treated if they knowingly falsely accused the other parent of abusing the child to obtain $ or custody? How would those claiming racism when it doesn’t exist to get $ from an airline be judged?
Whew.. when a racist writes an article, it shows. Not saying racism played a part in her story or not.. but reading how you wote it?? Oh.. it DEFINITELY played a part in this article.
Care to explain beyond a trite accusation?
Another entitled blackie (if they can call us “yts” we can call them blackies or however we want) crying until she gets what she wants, even though she wasn’t entitled to it in the very first place. You pay for an upgrade to a cabin, not an upgrade to a specific seat – it’s not exactly rocket science (although for certain ethnicities rocket science might be even harder to understand, since they still didn’t even master building bridges for example…), but of course it’s way easier to cry about “racism” when the only victims of racism nowadays are White people.