Courtney Love Arrested

Cafe Society
41

A couple of points. One, why does the size of the space or the quality of the air have any effect on whether someone should be arrested for mouthing off? If some people were trapped in an elevator and one yelled at the others, should the yeller be arrested after being freed? What about in a crowded store where one customer yells at the clerk? Since there’s a safety question, say it’s a store that sells hazardous materials of some sort. Arrest the rude customer?

Second, how exactly is someone who needs or demands extra attention automatically a safety risk? Say a disabled person needs flight attendant assistance in using the restroom. What safety-related function is the attendant shirking to do this? What safety-related function was the attendant not fulfilling while in a shouting match with Courtney Love? Is the attendant in line for any discipline for shirking that duty for the chance to yell at Courtney?

42

Well in the case of the store, leaving is always an option. (And if one customer leaving is prevented by another customer, than it does become a crimminal matter to be investigated) The elevator is a slightly better analogy, as no one can leave. Although someone in full blown verbal flip out mode might find themselves being sued by the other elevator riders for inflicting emotional suffering upon them while in a tense situation.

An aircraft is a closed environment that depends on control to remain safe. Passengers in aircraft are doing something that humans don’t normally do and they are all too aware of the fact that their lives are in the hands of others. The perception that the situation on board an aircraft is not under control can lead to panic spreading among the passengers and thus further danger of an escalation that might endanger everyone aboard.

43

Yes, it would be a bit of the h-word (thanks for the warning, Otto), but I’ll try and keep it short. :slight_smile:

It was about halfway through a flight home to see my parents, a 5 1/2 - 6 hour flight. It was a night flight, and it was real quiet, the way flights at night get. Then, I hear this guy talking loudly, coming up the aisle. He marches past me, and he ‘blesses’ me with one of those little airline pillows, tapping it on my shoulder as he passes. He’s doing this to all the aisle-sitters as he goes up the plane. The article says he was saying, “We’re all going to heaven”, but I actually heard him repeating, “It’s going to be alright, it’s going to be alright” over and over again as he blessed us. This guy was BIG. Not tall big; probably not much taller than me. But he was clearly powrful, built like a football player (which, as I discovered from reading a newspaper article the next day, he was a college football player). The other passengers were just looking at each other, nervously.

Very shortly later, one of the flight attendants leads the man back past me, towards the back of the plane. She’s talking very soothingly to him, and he’s trying to insist he has something he needs to do (I couldn’t quite make out what he was saying here), but he does seem to be calming down. She takes him to the back of the plane, out of my sight (I was sitting about the middle of the plane). The guy next to me and I roll our eyes at each other, smile, and go back to reading our magazines.

Nothing happens for probably another fifteen or twenty minutes, when the guy comes BOUNDING back up the aisle, followed by a clearly disturbed flight attendant. “I need to speak to the pilots,”, he’s saying. “Sir! Sir!”, she’s practically yelling at him. There’s a very nervous murmur running through the other passengers now. This was way before 9/11, but it didn’t take that to happen to know you don’t want a very large, crazy man in the cockpit. This was the first point at which I was truly frightened.

After a few mintues, he’s led back again, this time by the same flight attendant and a male flight attendant. I lean out of my seat and watch as they reach the back of the plane. The guy sitting next to me says something to me, and I turn away from the back of the plane to face him, but before he finishes, there’s the HUGE commotion and some shouting at the back of the plane. I turn back to look. The first thing I notice is that the guy is heading back up towards the front of the plane. The second thing I notice is that the flight attendant, the one that seemed to be doing a good job of calming him down, is friggin’ GONE. This was clearly when she’d been flung across the seats, but I didn’t know that at the time. And this huge, insane guy is marching up the aisle towards the cockpit. I don’t mind admitting, I’m scared. I don’t know what to do. Get up and try and stop him? He’ll run right over me. I unbuckle my seatbelt, still not convinced I’m actually going to work up the nerve to actually do anything.

But, before he reaches my row, still about three rows behind me, he’s grabbed by the male flight attendant. A few other passengers jump on him as well, and there’s a scuffle. He’s brought to the ground and held there, but it’s certainly not very easy. This guy is struggling and putting up one hell of fight, and it’s taking all of the guys on him to keep him down. Once again, I consider getting up to try and help. Then I see them tying him up with spare lengths of seatbelt. He’s still struggling, but not as much now. They lead him to the back of the plane. After a half hour or so, my heartbeat returns to normal.

As the plane is landing a few hours later, they tell us to remain seated and strapped in at the gate until told otherwise. We land, reach the gate, and several cops come on board and go to the back of the plane. After a few minutes, the guy is led out of the plane, handcuffed.

44

More importantly, is this the first time the words Courtney Love and Virgin have been used in the same sentence?

[sub]Sorry. Continue with your hijacks & flames[/sub]

45

GIVE HER THE CHAIR!! THE CHAIR!!!

THE CHAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRR!

46

While i agree that the standards of verbal conduct probably need to be a little tighter in an airplane than on the ground, am i only one who thinks that some flight attendants use these tighter regulations as an excuse to act like drill sargeants in the air?

The peremptory tone that many use nowdays is quite irritating, especially when they would generally get equally good results by being friendly and polite. And i wonder how many passengers have been threatened by flight attendants with being charged for being “verbally abusive” simply because they insisted on the level of service that one has the right to expect when one has paid good money for a plane ticket.

I fully agree that all orders from flight crew should be followed, and that the crew has an important safety role on the plane, but those people should also realise that they are there to provide service to passengers who are also paying customers. Being concerned with safety is not the same as being an asshole.

47

Maybe it’s because I usually fly Southwest, mhendo, but I’ve always been treated with courtesy by the flight attendants. Of course, I haven’t flown since 9/11 because I haven’t had the money to go anywhere.

Put me in the camp that believes 30,000 feet in the air is not the place to cause disturbances. I also don’t care that Courtney Love was being merely “verbally abusive.” I suspect that I would find Ms. Love’s verbal abuse ample grounds for jacking her jaw.

48

Joke post coming up…

Certainly, there should be electric cattle prods in the backrests of seats for passengers like Courtney.

Every time she opens her mouth, from the back of the plane, an air steward should press a button and ZAP!

More mouthing off? ZAP again!

Keep the insults coming Courtney… ZAP again!

Heh Heh Heh…

Do it enough and she’ll learn. Heh Heh Heh…

Alternatively, stewards should be allowed to put large “doctored” computer pictures on the movie screen which shows footage of the naughty passengers face superimposed over dreadfully embarassing photographs. At the very least, the rest of the passengers will get a good laugh!

49

As Blacklaw said, the fact that people are trapped with nowhere to go means that a simple annoyance can be very unpleasant for a lot of people. I see your point, but both an elevator and a store don’t have so many people involved and they’re not reliant on a small number of important people to stay safe. Now, if the person was yelling at a security guard or a police officer, impeding their ability to do their jobs, yeah, I might see a reason for them to be arrested in such situations.

As for the risk factor, flights are staffed with flight attendants for reasons of safety. A distracted flight attendant and an angry flight attendant (or an injured flight attendant who gets shoved or hit by a passenger) is not going to be able to their best if, god forbid, it is needed. I don’t think it’s ideal for a flight attendant to be tied up trying to help a disabled person to the restroom–or serving all of us food and drinks–but at least they’re not being antogonized while doing so. Is the chance of a problem slight? Yes, but that same slight chance is why you can’t have your bag blocking my path to the aisle, or your seat back cutting into my escape space on takeoff and landing. Airlines and the FAA take safety seriously–maybe too seriously. But is it up to you, me, or Courtney Love to decide whether the rules should be followed?

Sorry if I sound like such a hardass. A good friend of mine is a flight attendant, and I’ve heard a lot for him.

50

I don’t want anyone to get the idea that I think it’s all right to be abusive toward flight attendants (or anyone else in a service position). I work in a service-type job myself and I take more than my share of abuse. What I’m saying is that I think there’s a difference between a verbally abusive passenger and a passenger who is a threat to the safety of herself or others. The letter IMHO warrants arrest. The former doesn’t.

51

I’ll put it more simply: it’s like distracting the lifeguard. You may not hurt the lifeguard, but the lifeguard can’t do his job right if he has to deal with you. You increase the risk to everyone on the beach.

52

i used to be a fan but not anymore…she is such a turn-off.
well said,Boo Boo Foo, its the truth!

53

Oh come on. A lifeguard is watching an entire beach of potentially hundreds or thousands of people and a section of water, all of which are in constant motion. A flight attendant is, along with several co-workers, watching a cabin full of people, most of whom are going to be planted on their asses for the entire flight. Be serious, what vital safety functions, absent an actual emergency, do flight attendants actually do while the plane is in the air? Because hey, not to sell them short, but on every flight I’ve ever been on including trans-Atlantic the bulk of their time was spent hauling the drinks cart up and down the aisle which, excuse me, is more of a safety hazard than one yelling passenger. Any flight attendants in the crowd, please feel free to enlighten me.

54

Of course they do very few vital safety functions except when an emergency happens (or, the safety functions the carry out don’t matter unless an emergency happens. But that is what their jobs are FOR. The “waitress” function is secondary (although it’s a common misconception to believe that this is their primary job). You don’t see a lot of what flight attendants do, and if you’re lucky you never see them use much of their training. But they are there as trained safety employees who happen to give you peanuts in their spare time.

I don’t believe that a flight attendant is supposed to keep an eye on each passenger in the same manner that a lifeguard watches swimmers. But the lifeguard is a useful analogy because much of the time, the lifeguard doesn’t have emergencies to deal with – just like there’s rarely a mechanical failure or severe turbulence on an airplane. The airlines (I’m not saying you and I—I am telling you what the AIRLINES feel) regard their cabin employees as being there PRIMARILY to make sure that safety regulations are observed and to help more people survive (or have fewer/less severe) injuries if the worst happens.

I guess the FAA and the airlines have decided that serving meals and such is an acceptable thing for F/As to do while they are sitting around waiting for the wings to fall off, but that babysitting a rude celebrity isn’t. Maybe that’s inconsistent or hypocritical. They’re inconsistent in other ways, being paranoid about some things but not about others. Those drink carts are enough of a hazard, I can’t believe the FAA doesn’t make as much a fuss about them as they do a woman’s purse at her feet–go figure.