October 1, 2006 6:00 PM

Take your happiness somewhere else....

Air Kiss

American Airlines Flight 45—departing Charles de Gaulle at 10:40 A.M., arriving J.F.K. at one each afternoon—is a tourist’s delight: timed just right to avoid late checkout, leaving time for one last Kir Royale at Les Deux Magots. On August 22nd, the coach cabin was packed with vacationing New Yorkers….Assigned to seats 20A and 20B were George Tsikhiseli, a television journalist, and his writer boyfriend, Stephan Varnier….Twelve days earlier, British police had foiled a terrorist plot to blow up airliners. Heightened security had delayed the flight by about two hours, and passengers, by the time they boarded, were ready to relax….Shortly after takeoff, Varnier nodded off, leaning his head on Tsikhiseli. A stewardess came over to their row. “The purser wants you to stop that,” she said.

I’m not an advocate of homosexuality; in fact I’m rather neutral about it. No, it’s not a lifestyle I would choose for myself, but I don’t get all worked up about it, either. After all, who am I to pass judgement on the way another person chooses to live their lifed? What works for them, what makes them happy may not do the same thing for me, but that’s the beauty of living in a free country, eh? Just try telling that to some of the folks who work at American Airlines, though. Not only do some of them seem to consider themselves the PDA police, a few of them also seem to think it’s their job to protect their moral sensibilities of their passengers. Not only that, question their authority, and they’ll threaten to divert your flight…if for no other reason than because they can.

Tim Wagner, a spokesman for American, said that the stewardess’s injunction to the men was reasonable, and would have been made whether the couple was gay or straight.

Uh…so if She Who Endures My Myriad Eccentricities and I were flying, and she fell asleep with her head on my shoulder, a flight attendant would be within their rights to tell her to knock it off? WTF? Surely you’re not going to tell me that this incident didn’t happen for the sole reason that it involved a same-sex couple?

“Our passengers need to recognize that they are in an environment with all ages, backgrounds, creeds, and races. We have an obligation to make as many of them feel as comfortable as possible,” he said. (He added, “Our understanding is that the level of affection was more than a quick peck on the cheek.”) But a customer-service representative named Terri, reached last week on the telephone, offered the opinion that kissing on airplanes is indeed permissible. “Oh, yeah! Sure. I’ve seen couples who are on honeymoons,” she said. “They just don’t want you to go into the bathroom together.”

Certainly, I can understand that a flight crew has to keep the interests of all passengers in mind. Even so, have we really reached the point where a same-sex couple can be denied the right to express a degree of happiness without being slapped down by a member of the flight crew who happens to be offended by their behavior? What, really, is so wrong, so offensive about a same-sex couple clearly enjoying each other’s company? By all indications, there was nothing in the couple’s behavior that could have been construed as offensive or inappropriate…unless you’re offended by ANY sort of homosexual affection.

Not exactly the “friendly skies”, eh?

blog comments powered by Disqus

Technorati

Technorati search

» Blogs that link here

About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on October 1, 2006 6:00 PM.

No, it's not "Talk Like A Pirate" Day...it's "Scowl like Michelle Malkin" Day was the previous entry in this blog.

Ah, Hypocrisy...thou art a Republican, no? is the next entry in this blog.

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.

Contact Me

Powered by Movable Type 5.12