Blog 4: The Response

Source: CNN

There have been many mentions of consumer response throughout my blog posts about the incident with United Airlines. There was responses ranging from the industry, politicians, and of course the consumers for United Airlines. In today's blog, we will be looking more closely at peoples responses and anaylzing it.

The People


Over 180 million people saw the footage of the passenger David Dao being forcibly removed from the plane. It was one of the top trending videos on YouTube for 2 days, along with a response hashtag #BoycottUnitedAirlines which also held a trending status on twitter for a day. Before you know it, every news channel was covering the incident. As the story grew larger, even more footage came out of the incident, allowing us viewers to get a better visual of what exactly happened on the plane. As the story grew larger, people began to express their anger for United Airlines. This was one of the biggest backlashes against a company that I've ever seen, and it was all due to one incident. On top of that, the first statement released by the CEO outraged people even more, due to its lack of sensitivity and severity of the situation. Many consumers and investors began pulling their business out from the airline, and even some began cutting up their United Credit Cards as a way to boycott United Airlines as a whole.

My new #united card. Not planning to fly them any more after this: https://t.co/j24MuPiCpQ. 1k bye bye pic.twitter.com/NUge0Ypjni

— Josh Perfetto (@jperfetto) April 11, 2017

Politics

Not only was there a response from people on social media, but even lawmakers and political influences have even weighted in on the situation. Current White House Press Secretary, Sean Spicer, has called the incident "unfortunate" and "troubling," adding that he was "sure" the President has seen the footage. He also said the following:

"I don't know that anyone looks at that video and isn't a little disturbed that another human being is treated that way," - Sean Spicer

People have even reached out to lawmakers, in order to understand if the overbooking practice was legal, which it infact is. This event has not only hurt business, but now people have been reaching out to their local lawmakers to investigate and implement a bill. According to Common Dreams, a progressive news source, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) on Wednesday introduced legislation that would prohibit airline carriers from forcibly removing passengers from flights that are overbooked, oversold, or in the case of crew wanting to travel as passengers. Instead, the companies would be required to offer appropriate incentives to encourage volunteers.

United Airlines faced an enormous amount of pressure from people all around the globe. They clearly did not have a PR plan for a situation like this, and it shows their lack of commitment to their employees. Anyone who has flown in the past knows that flying isn't always smooth sailing. In fact, more times then less there is an issue, so it is up to the airlines to ensure that their employees have the proper material and training for when situations such as these arise.  It is also the Ailrines responsibilty to come up with damage control, such as the attack they faced from the public's outrage. 

Resources

Yan, Holly, Christina Zdanowicz, and Emanuella Grinberg. "Backlash Erupts after United Passenger Gets Yanked off Overbooked Flight." CNN. Cable News Network, 12 Apr. 2017. 
Web. 23 Apr. 2017. 
Prupis, Nadia. "Bill Introduced to Protect Fliers from Being Violently Dragged Off Planes." Common Dreams. N.p., 13 Apr. 2017. Web. 16 Apr. 2017.
Hayden, Michael Edison, and Erin Dooley. "United CEO Feels 'shame,' Passengers Will Be Compensated." ABC News. ABC News Network, n.d. Web. 23 Apr. 2017.