Here we go again guys.
Back at it at LAX
Now it's morning. Last I talked to you guys it was night time.
I'm gonna try to get on a plane this time.
Uh not American Airlines
So let's see if it works
I'm amused by that hashtag of "Cenk on a plane".
I did a series of videos if you didn't see on my own Facebook page last night.
https://www.facebook.com/CenkUygurOfficial
I got kicked off of an American Airlines flight.
A lot of attention has been paid to what happened with me
or some attention, not a lot but a couple of articles
and then you guys are mad about it and writing about it on Twitter.
But there was another kid on the plane and that's what's so frustrating
He gets totally screwed, nobody knows who he is, I didn't know who he was
He got kicked off for complaining too
So bottom line is
We complain... but that's okay everything settles down
because of the complaints they bring the plane
we're about to get on the plane, the first kid they won't let him anywhere near the plane
and I'm like "What?"
and then some guy makes up a story about how he smoked pot.
What? we were all there together in the terminal for the last 4 hours. Nobody was smoking pot
He's off the plane and security escorts him out.
Me? I'm in the tunnel
and the 2 supervisors that had come
one of them comes and goes "The Captain has asked you to come off the plane"
I'm like "What captain? The captain wasn't there at all when the whole issue broke out."
You can see it in the video there's no crew. In fact
some of the people were yelling "Where's the crew?"
and my phone was about to die so I went out to charge the battery as well as get the snack
I was nowhere near there when the captain arrived.
It wasn't the captain. That's an excuse that they use when management is annoyed by a customer
And wants to ruin that customer's day, wants to ruin that customer's week
Their plans etc.
Now am I ever going to get to Florida, get to the conference I'm going to
Eventually we're going to Washington to do civil disobedience. democracyspring.org
There we actually intend to do disobedience.
Here we didn't intend it we were just customers who were getting screwed over.
It turns out there is a couple of heroes to this story
and they're largely employees, right?
Not management! Uh so
The guy at the counter was wonderful. He kept apologising when it wasn't his fault.
He was really kind and patient with everybody
The supervisors come and unlike the guy at the counter their attitude is "So what?"
"So what? We're not gonna talk to you. We're not gonna talk to anybody."
"We're gonna be completely standoffish."
And
One of them even did this to me while I was asking a question.
I had forgotten it, but one of you guys
reminded me on Twitter or Facebook
Uh, and...
Like, "I don't care about your complaints
You're complaints are annoying me."
"Of course I can make you wait four hours."
and I said, "are any of us going to get refunds or
anything like that?" and they're like "No! Of course not!"
By the way, I mean, on top of all this they're basically robbing me
Cos at the time, until it became public
they never offered a refund, they're like "no, you don't get one."
"Nope. Ha ha!"
"You annoyed us as our customer
so we're gonna rob you,
uh, we're gonna make sure you don't get on a plane
we're gonna make sure you don't get to where you're going, okay?"
So, what could they have done?
Well, the thing that they could have done is,
say, "hey, guys..." just like the guy at the counter...
"We're here because the guy at the counter called us,
and we're here to help you guys." Right?
"And I super get that you guys are frustrated."
That one sentence right there
would have helped IMMENSELY.
"We totally understand."
Another sentence that would have helped:
"It's our fault."
"We made you wait for four hours, it's our fault."
"So we're gonna try to make it up to you."
Right?
"First of all we gotta get you your plane, that's why we're here."
NONE of that.
Like a cursory, "yeah, ok, sorry about the wait,
but OK, we're working on it! We're working on it! Hmph!"
It's not about the conversation but just, any gesture
where they're like "hey, you know what, our bad, extra peanuts on board."
Whatever it is, right?
Uh, but at the end, to be vindictive
and to make up a story, purposely
after already screwing up your day by
making you wait from 10:30 at night to 2:30 in the morning
then to remove me and that kid
I don't know if there were others who were removed but I know about us two
and that kid doesn't have any power, he doesn't have any viewers, etcetera
I dunno, I don't know his name
and so is american airlines gonna make it up to him?
No! If you don't have power you get crushed.
And that's another problem here, man. Now at airports
some of the employees at some of the airlines think that they're God.
They're on a power trip. "I can kick you off the plane for ANY reason
Just look at me funny! Sneeze funny! And I'll kick you off the plane!"
Right? Well
what kind of customer service is that, man?
Remember, we're actually paying you a lot of money to get on these flights!
That kid - he's the one that was most vocal and if it wasn't for him,
the supervisors weren't going to call up to management and go,
"Hey, remember that plane we were never going to bring? Ahh, these guys, ugh,
Looks like we gotta bring that plane."
Look, there's all sorts of heroes in this story: the cop's decent,
the guy at the counter was great, Edwin, who got me on the JetBlue flight...
I mean, just like that! It's amazing
how quickly you can get somebody on a flight if you care, right?
So there is a right way to do customer service.
Just because you're going on an airplane doesn't mean
that you have to get terrible service.
We should treat each other with decency, right?
And like we're fellow human beings on this planet
and that's not the way American Airlines handled it.
God Bless JetBlue. They delivered huge.
They got me on a flight right away, their employees were wonderful
Some of you guys whispered of a dream that I would actually make the flight
and it looks like I'm finally going to do that.
I gotta go board.
Could you imagine if I missed the plane now? *laughter*
Anyway, thank you to all you guys who backed me up here
and throughout the airport, dude, TYT army is all over.
I've been taking pictures, videos with people.
Much love, guys. I'll report back from Florida.