Anjana Susarla on how social media turned United’s PR flub into a firestorm. Fly the angry skies: Claire Potter on airline travel and the militarization of everyday spaces. “Calculated misery”: Alex Abad-Santos on how airlines profit from your miserable flying experience (and more). United Airlines and Borussia Dortmund: Two tales, same story of corporate abuse and consumerism. Capitalism is violence: United Airlines’ forcible removal of a passenger exposed the everyday violence that keeps capitalism running. While coverage of Dr. David Dao’s involuntary deplaning has focused on United’s ineffective PR response, procedural failures, and various forms of victim-shaming, it is also a stark example of the failure of neoliberal political economy to abide its own purported logic.
United isn’t the reason air travel is so miserable. United Airlines’ bad week won’t matter — and we have ourselves to blame. We do have an actual example of the heeding of the people’s voice and the prevailing of their will in our national government: Cellphone calls will continue to be banned on airline flights.
