|
|
Monday, April 19, 2004
As promised, today I bring you Volume 2 of
Part II: God Is My Co-Pliot And My Stewardess
As I contemplated my wobbling frittata and wondered when They would just break down and give us the astronaut-style food capsules that They've been promising us since I read about it in Weekly Reader in third grade, I noticed a small scrap of paper on my tray. It had a picture of blue cloudy mountains, on top of which was printed the following:
I will be glad and rejoice in you;
I will sing praise to your name
O most high.
PSALM 9:2
I was shocked. I couldn't believe that, in a time when persecution of minority religions was on the rise, a major corporation would choose to distribute religious literature to its customers. Hadn't anyone complained? The ACLU files more lawsuits before breakfast than most people do all day. Surely they must have said something.
I then remembered a news story I'd read a while back about this. Some people had complained, but Alaska's response was basically, "People who are offended don't have to look at it."
I find this argument to be very thin. First of all, the card is placed face-up on your dinner tray. You have to look at it at least once just to get your silverware, which you will clearly need in order to pick the pork products out of your food. You can't help but read it. Second of all, their argument excuses the distribution of anything without regard for their customers. With that excuse they could just as easily distribute political pamphlets endorsing a Presidential candidate, or racy images of John Madden in compromising poses with a Turducken. After all, if you're offended, you can choose not to look. Where do you draw the line?
What truly offends me, however, is not the Bible verse itself. I've read the Bible; it's nothing new. What offends me is that Alaska deems it necessary to try and convert me to their avowed corporate religion. This practice implies that their customers are not intelligent enough to make their own decisions about which religion to practice and must be given a nudge. Whether or not I see the card is irrelevant; what bothers me is the fact that they feel the need to do it at all.
You might be inclined to say something like, "Hey, jerk, this is a free country! Alaska can distribute whatever they please, and to require otherwise would be censorship and political correctness at its worst. So step off!" You would be right to say those things. If I don't like it, I can (and might) choose a different airline. I just despair that our country has become so partisan that major corporations feel the need to proselytize to their customers. Why must everyone be converted?
If they really feel the need to bring up the religious question, they should do it right. Instead of a card with a Bible verse, they should provide a deck of cards celebrating all of the world's faiths. Each one would include an inspiring message from a different religion's sacred text, along with a fuzzy picture of something soothing and airline-related. For those of us who are agnostic or atheist, there would also be a card that says "THERE IS NO GOD", printed in red letters over a picture of a bleached animal skull in the middle of the desert. Maybe there's a sad clown there too for good measure.
Then we'd at least be able to have a discussion. They've stopped showing free movies on their transcontinental flights - the least they can do is give us something to fight about.
Tomorrow - Really Inappropriate Literature!
TALES FROM AN AIRPLANE SOMEWHERE OVER THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS EN ROUTE TO MIAMI
Part II: God Is My Co-Pliot And My Stewardess
As I contemplated my wobbling frittata and wondered when They would just break down and give us the astronaut-style food capsules that They've been promising us since I read about it in Weekly Reader in third grade, I noticed a small scrap of paper on my tray. It had a picture of blue cloudy mountains, on top of which was printed the following:
I will sing praise to your name
O most high.
PSALM 9:2
I was shocked. I couldn't believe that, in a time when persecution of minority religions was on the rise, a major corporation would choose to distribute religious literature to its customers. Hadn't anyone complained? The ACLU files more lawsuits before breakfast than most people do all day. Surely they must have said something.
I then remembered a news story I'd read a while back about this. Some people had complained, but Alaska's response was basically, "People who are offended don't have to look at it."
I find this argument to be very thin. First of all, the card is placed face-up on your dinner tray. You have to look at it at least once just to get your silverware, which you will clearly need in order to pick the pork products out of your food. You can't help but read it. Second of all, their argument excuses the distribution of anything without regard for their customers. With that excuse they could just as easily distribute political pamphlets endorsing a Presidential candidate, or racy images of John Madden in compromising poses with a Turducken. After all, if you're offended, you can choose not to look. Where do you draw the line?
What truly offends me, however, is not the Bible verse itself. I've read the Bible; it's nothing new. What offends me is that Alaska deems it necessary to try and convert me to their avowed corporate religion. This practice implies that their customers are not intelligent enough to make their own decisions about which religion to practice and must be given a nudge. Whether or not I see the card is irrelevant; what bothers me is the fact that they feel the need to do it at all.
You might be inclined to say something like, "Hey, jerk, this is a free country! Alaska can distribute whatever they please, and to require otherwise would be censorship and political correctness at its worst. So step off!" You would be right to say those things. If I don't like it, I can (and might) choose a different airline. I just despair that our country has become so partisan that major corporations feel the need to proselytize to their customers. Why must everyone be converted?
If they really feel the need to bring up the religious question, they should do it right. Instead of a card with a Bible verse, they should provide a deck of cards celebrating all of the world's faiths. Each one would include an inspiring message from a different religion's sacred text, along with a fuzzy picture of something soothing and airline-related. For those of us who are agnostic or atheist, there would also be a card that says "THERE IS NO GOD", printed in red letters over a picture of a bleached animal skull in the middle of the desert. Maybe there's a sad clown there too for good measure.
Then we'd at least be able to have a discussion. They've stopped showing free movies on their transcontinental flights - the least they can do is give us something to fight about.
Tomorrow - Really Inappropriate Literature!
Sunday, April 18, 2004
I went to Miami last week for a business trip. I flew in on Tuesday and then flew back on Wednesday night. 6800 miles is a long way to travel in 40 hours, no matter how you slice it. Luckily, I did not have to expend my usual effort to locate things disturbing and/or hilarious. This time, they were delivered right to my seat. As part of a burgeoning Fishsuit tradition, I therefore give you
PART I - VEGGIE TALE
The first amusing occasion was breakfast on the plane, which the good crew still insisted on serving even though the 2+ hour delay of my 8:30 AM flight had put us well into the lunch hour.
"It is now time for our meal service," the disembodied voice of a stewardess announced over the loudspeaker. "The first entree option is scrambled eggs..."
My lovely fiancee (Hey, check it out! I have a fiancee! I'm still not used to that...) is a vegetarian, so I have become sensitive to the need for veggie-compatible menus. I noted that, by providing scrambled eggs, Alaska had gone out of its way to provide a veggie option to its customers.
"...in the scrambled eggs are tomato and bacon. It is served with a side of sausage."
OK, maybe not. Surely the other entree would be vegetarian.
"The second entree option is a spinach frittata..."
Ah!
"...the frittata also has bacon in it."
Ah.
So much for veggie-friendly corporate America. I ordered the frittata, keeping to a long-standing personal vow to never again eat airline eggs. The futility of this decision did not hit me until my meal was served.
I had, apparently, never seen a frittata before. If I had, I would have known that a frittata is basically scrambled eggs mashed together into a rectangle. In addition to the bacon inside, this particular frittata was also served with a slice of ham, thus removing any illusion that what I was looking at was in any way a vegetarian entree. (It also served to further substantiate claims that Alaska Air is engaged in a secret military alliance with the Pork Council, should such claims exist, which I must disappointedly admit is unlikely.)
I let out an audible chortle as the full hilariousness of the situation washed over me. If you boil it down to basic principles, what the loudspeaker-stewardess-voice had actually said was this:
"It is now time for our meal service. Your options are:
a) an amorphous blob of bacon-y scrambled eggs mixed with tomato and served with a tube of pork, or
b) a lopsided cube of bacon-y scrambled eggs mixed with spinach and served with a sheet of pork."
The savvy Alaska air menu planners had taken the same basic ingredients and given us the illusion of control over our meal, when in fact the only decision we were making was essentially architectural. (These people have jobs waiting for them at Taco Bell if they want them.) Although I couldn't taste it, I can only assume that the apple muffin I ate was actually made of pork rinds and leftover eggs benedict.
Tomorrow - Inappropriate Literature!
TALES FROM AN AIRPLANE SOMEWHERE OVER THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS EN ROUTE TO MIAMI
PART I - VEGGIE TALE
The first amusing occasion was breakfast on the plane, which the good crew still insisted on serving even though the 2+ hour delay of my 8:30 AM flight had put us well into the lunch hour.
"It is now time for our meal service," the disembodied voice of a stewardess announced over the loudspeaker. "The first entree option is scrambled eggs..."
My lovely fiancee (Hey, check it out! I have a fiancee! I'm still not used to that...) is a vegetarian, so I have become sensitive to the need for veggie-compatible menus. I noted that, by providing scrambled eggs, Alaska had gone out of its way to provide a veggie option to its customers.
"...in the scrambled eggs are tomato and bacon. It is served with a side of sausage."
OK, maybe not. Surely the other entree would be vegetarian.
"The second entree option is a spinach frittata..."
Ah!
"...the frittata also has bacon in it."
Ah.
So much for veggie-friendly corporate America. I ordered the frittata, keeping to a long-standing personal vow to never again eat airline eggs. The futility of this decision did not hit me until my meal was served.
I had, apparently, never seen a frittata before. If I had, I would have known that a frittata is basically scrambled eggs mashed together into a rectangle. In addition to the bacon inside, this particular frittata was also served with a slice of ham, thus removing any illusion that what I was looking at was in any way a vegetarian entree. (It also served to further substantiate claims that Alaska Air is engaged in a secret military alliance with the Pork Council, should such claims exist, which I must disappointedly admit is unlikely.)
I let out an audible chortle as the full hilariousness of the situation washed over me. If you boil it down to basic principles, what the loudspeaker-stewardess-voice had actually said was this:
"It is now time for our meal service. Your options are:
a) an amorphous blob of bacon-y scrambled eggs mixed with tomato and served with a tube of pork, or
b) a lopsided cube of bacon-y scrambled eggs mixed with spinach and served with a sheet of pork."
The savvy Alaska air menu planners had taken the same basic ingredients and given us the illusion of control over our meal, when in fact the only decision we were making was essentially architectural. (These people have jobs waiting for them at Taco Bell if they want them.) Although I couldn't taste it, I can only assume that the apple muffin I ate was actually made of pork rinds and leftover eggs benedict.
Tomorrow - Inappropriate Literature!