January 14, 2024 - 8:00am
Several stories and tweets went viral this week calling into question the competency of airline pilots over DEI concerns. Critics such as Elon Musk have pointed to diversity hiring initiatives for airline pilots, assuming that standards are lowered for underrepresented groups, but federal regulations on pilot qualifications are still as strict as they’ve ever been, and diversity training programmes are still bound by these rules.
But where DEI may play a more significant — and dangerous — role is not among pilots but in air traffic control.
Air traffic controllers are badly understaffed and overworked. As of June, 77% of ATC centres are understaffed, and it’s common for controllers to have mandatory overtime, 10-hour shifts and 6-day workweeks. Controllers are manning multiple frequencies at once and often don’t have the bandwidth to monitor runways as effectively as one would hope.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) blames the problem on the six-month closure of its academy in 2020 and a two-year pause in on-the-job trainings. But the crisis appears to have emerged about a decade into an Obama-era push to diversify the industry. Under the Obama administration, the FAA scrapped its hiring process based on aptitude test scores and training in 2013 and replaced it with one that considered applicants’ biographies, resulting in an ongoing class action lawsuit on behalf of about 1,000 applicants who were passed over under the new regime. The biographical component gave an advantage to applicants who had been unemployed for the past three years, among other traits the FAA believed would result in more opportunities for racial diversity.
The classes admitted under the system of racial preference are still occupying air traffic control jobs. From 2011 to 2017 the FAA reported an 83% rise in runway incursions — “incidents involving unauthorised aircraft, vehicles, or people on a runway”. Near-misses on runways have also become commonplace. There were at least 46 near-collisions on airplane runways in July 2023 alone; in some cases pilots steered clear of crashing into other planes with only seconds to spare.
The FAA scrapped the biographical component in 2018, and it’s unclear whether the agency is still considering race in its hiring practices. The personality test component of the AT-SA test, which asks applicants if they like to attend parties and if they like to follow instructions, could be an avenue through which this is achieved.
An FAA spokesperson told UnHerd that the agency keeps “extremely conservative standards” for avoiding aircraft collisions through air traffic control, with the goal of having zero close calls, but refused to answer questions about the agency’s use of racial metrics in hiring practices; she told me I would have to file a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain this information.
Jim Peterson, a pilot with 30 years of experience, told UnHerd that it is well within the realm of possibility that mistakes caused by air traffic control could cause an accident. “I can clearly identify that ATC is understaffed, and they still seem competent, but they seem like in some cases, they’re doing too much,” he said. “And that comes at a cost.”
Join the discussion
Join like minded readers that support our journalism by becoming a paid subscriber
To join the discussion in the comments, become a paid subscriber.
Join like minded readers that support our journalism, read unlimited articles and enjoy other subscriber-only benefits.
Subscribe“Legislation might create legal fictions, but magical thinking can never supplant reality.”
I always loved sci fi author Philip K d–k’s* view on this: “Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, does not go away.”
All of this gender identity nonsense will eventually go away. And then we’ll have to deal with the reality that it’s left in its wake: mutilated bodies, damaged psyches, and lifelong medical patients.
*(I had to put the dashes in because Unherd’s obscenity filter won’t let me type the man’s name!)
Right on the money
I hope you are right about it going away. Women have already been raped in prisons and homeless shelters by other “women” and have lost out on athletic prizes to other “female” athletes.
There are already many people who impulsively transitioned at too young an age and have to deal with the medical and social fall out.
Because gender self ID primarily harms women and girls, I fear it will take a very long time to be abolished.
It will go away because all ideologies rooted in a false view of man eventually succumb to reality. However, they can do a lot of damage before (and especially during) the collapse.
Oh that clause. Isn’t that the Sanity Claus, the Marx brothers had problems with (fell foul of it on Facebook and left because Americans don’t seem to understand British humour).
“A key focus was children and the weakening of parental rights. On extending gender recognition to children, the authors were unapologetic: ‘It is recognised that the requirement for parental consent or the consent of a legal guardian can be restrictive and problematic for minors.’”
I ‘think’ it was Douglas Murray, last week (?), who suggested the word ‘groomer’ was possibly ‘going to far’ and yet, if we are to take this paragraph at face value, this exactly what the people ‘promoting’ this ideology are. Maybe they aren’t the ‘nonces’ of nightmarish caricature, but that doesn’t necessarily make them any less insidious. What, I ask myself, is different about this form of ‘conversion’ therapy to ‘other’ forms, except that this one fits with the ‘zeitgeist’ of ‘certain’ ‘progressive’ versions, or groups, on ‘the right side of history’ ?
Vorsprung durch technik, the advertising phrase of Audi, seemed to sum up what we thought of German efficiency. What has gone wrong with the sensible Germans? Closing their nuclear reactors to rely on green energy and their Russian friends for oil and gas and now this idiocy. I thought we were heading down paths of idiocy but the Germans seem determined to plunge into the quagmire with far more relish. At least we have held back from self ID so far.
My son from starting school until year 7 loved wearing the odd dress, loved shiny jewellery and if dressing up was on the cards, it was the princess dress all the way.
Now 14 he has zero interest in all of the above, he loves his acting and his music and maybe that was part of the flamboyance, although now he expresses it through Metallica t-shirts and wild electric guitar playing.
With the wrong guidance, he might have been pushed down an awful path, instead we just left him to it (with nobody advising him!) and he just worked out his personality himself. Hallelujah for letting kids just do the kid thing.
I thought that German only had one word ‘Geschlecht’ used for both sex and gender. Was ‘Geschlecht’ the word used in the bill?
I suspect the addition of the word “Identität” — if that is the one used — is the circumlocution you use in German to distinguish between sex and gender.
Interesting clarification given that I am not a German speaker.
My German isn’t very good, but if I have got this one wrong, the people here who are fluent in German are sure to correct my error.
Thanks for your comments, Laura. I was working from pieces in English and German. However, my German goes little further than pleasantries in the check out line so I rely on translations of them. I’ve added a qualifier to the sentence.
The confusion between sex and gender (are they synonymous or are they not synonymous?) is mediated by the English language, but it is a confusion that has permeated into other languages, possibly because much of the original thinking has been in English. However the underlying issue – do we distinguish men and women by biology or psychology – remains.
Oh yes, the underlying issue is the same. I just think that you have been misled by a poor translation, and a better one would have said something like ‘everyone whose officially registered sex doesn’t correspond to their gender’.
If people are obsessed with having their gender recognised in official documents, we could add an additional optional field, gender. (And it had better be optional, or at least allow N/A for those of us who don’t believe we have a gender.) But I suspect that this is not what is at stake, what the people want is to have their sex removed on official documents.
Greetings from Germany! Traditionally, we only have “Geschlecht” for both “gender” and “sex”. However, “gender” has been adopted as an Anglicism and “Geschlechtsidentität” (gender identity) and “biologisches Geschlecht” (biological gender/sex) are now widely used. If this sounds confusing, that’s because it is. Even Butler’s “Gender Trouble” has been translated as “Das Unbehagen der Geschlechter” in German, i.e. the whole sex/gender divide does not really work in German. But what does a cult group care about language?
And to complete the muddle, the words transsexuell (adj) and Transsexuelle (noun) exist in German, presumably as foreign imports.
So they have made two categories from one to enable the ideology. Interesting. Here ‘gender’ crept into academic studies on the back of womens studies which quickly disappeared gradually enabling queer theory. And of course the word ‘sex’ was always overdetermined.
Outside of academia, the language of which can become very aspirational and fashionable, we have
two sexes: male and female
two roles: masculine and feminine. Historically society always managed to juggle those around to fit. Now no one knows what the F is going on.
Should the non binary have puberty blockers? Perhaps they should, in the bigger picture the last thing we need is to breed
Time to load the dishwasher
To describe gender as having crept into academic studies on the back of women’s studies reveals your distrust and disdain. It colours gender as surreptitious and exploitative. Women’s studies have not disappeared and queer theory did not need abandonment of earlier study in order for it to be enabled. I would welcome clarification of how sex is, of course, over-determined..
Two sexes; two roles? By denying the essential contribution gender and sex make to each other and to society, the plane cannot take off because there are too many males on board (obviously larger and heavier).
The non-binary are not subject to your opinion on their desire. There is no personal responsibility or need to breed. It is nobody’s business if I do. All genders who own a dishwasher should share the chore of loading it.
Thank you, Bernd, for that helpful clarification. As far as I am concerned, people have sex, German nouns have gender!
In the US, the Associated Press has issued guidelines prohibiting the use of “biological sex” in news stories; apparently, the use of “biological” is considered offensive by some subset of trans people, so it has to go.
The real question, should this policy be implemented, is when will violence by the oppressed become justified?
How far can the liberal democratic state go to claim our children are its own before that state must be destroyed?
I await Brussels, bowing to their German master – am I allowed to use that word – enshrining this in EU law.
Kraftwerk were singing about the Trans-Europe Express about 50 years ago. I guess they were ahead of their time.
Germany is an extremely misogynistic country, so I’m not surprised they are doing this.
Germany has been referred to as the “brothel of Europe” and is a place where billboards state that “you can buy a woman and a sausage” on your lunch hour.
Males are prioritized in Germany: sex buying is legal, pimping is legal, and the rape laws are ghastly.
This is just another example of male supremacy under the law. Gender self id harms women, especially poor women in shelters and prisons, which is why it is so popular.
Interesting observations. I’m not up on male supremacy as such, but gender self ID has consequences for both sexes.
Based on Stonewall and Mermaids, and their broad support in government, academia and corporates for crushing the right of women in the U.K. – I’d say we’ve got the Germans well beaten on misogyny.
The only hope for the rest of Europe is that this nation where Dr Mengele’s style experiments on children are becoming a part of the legal framework, is going to depopulate itself. The quicker the better.
Resistance is building in Europe too. Here are some links (translations in English are provided), circulated on 9 July:
Chers collègues
Notre Observatoire a initié un Manifeste européen pour une approche objective dans les médias du “changement de sexe/genre” chez les mineurs, qui associe plus de 140 scientifiques et universitaires et / ou professionnels de la santé (médecins somaticiens, psychiatres, psychologues, psychanalystes, infirmiers etc..), enseignants, chefs d’établissement, féministes de France, Belgique, Allemagne, Royaume-Uni, Suisse, Suède, Norvège, Finlande
Il paraît ce matin simultanément dans le Point (France) et dans le Soir (Belgique) ainsi que dans Bild (Allemagne)
Voici le lien du Point
https://www.lepoint.fr/postillon/changement-de-genre-des-mineurs-l-appel-de-personnalites-aux-medias-07-07-2022-2482447_3961.php
Ce Manifeste est aussi une pétition que vous pouvez signer à cette adresse (merci de diffuser ce lien de pétition) :
https://www.mesopinions.com/petition/sante/manifeste-europeen-approche-objective-changement-genre/182346
Il est lisible en trois langues : français, anglais , allemand
If this is an EU thing why is the the UK mentioned? Gosh, are some Continentals now seeking our assistance?
Germany seems to be remarkably susceptible to very bad ideas. It’s seems to be a major theme of their history.
Nasty! Apart from Nazism, what are the other examples that substantiate your claim? I’m from NZ, and on current form (under Jacinda Muddleduck) we’re at least as woke as Germany.
What body were you born with? That’s your sexual identity. Okay you might not identify your ‘self’ with your body, so in that case where does gender identity come into it? The Self has no gender and as for names, some people have names that can be either male or female (don’t you idiots know what subjective means? Names aren’t real, they are created and are labels society uses for official purposes. This is like a Monty Python sketch in language and ideas but unfortunately us adults feel like slapping you round the face with a dead kipper (and I feel more sorry for the dead fish than the live idiots, protesting their rights to be idiots: I am Grunfuttock and demand the right to be Grunfuttock!).
I had no idea the German authorities could be such complete a…h…s. Don’t they have any authoritative and sane opposition there, as we do here, to the toxic and absurd gender identity ideology, which is happily destroying children’s lives (and their bodies), erasing women, and generally enfeebling soclety? Are they all blind over there?
Not blind, but they have created and entrenched an ideologically dominant democracy. Founding fathers initially determined a Parliament with 598 members. One vote for half (299) directly elected, recognisable and accountable. Another vote for the other half providing favoured ideologues (mostly unrecognised) from lists maintained by favoured political parties. That was back in earlier post war days. That legal 598 limits still remains; however, the current Bundestag has 756 members! Still only 299 directly elected and accountable to their electorate, BUT with surprising ideological creep – 457 (not 299) are now coming from Party lists!
How did that happen? Seems that “evening up” and “being fair” has provided mathematical vote counting opportunities to discount those directly elected and accountable candidates in favour of a colossal collection of ideologically accountable members. Threatened with a Parliament in excess of 1000 members next time round a recent review is suggesting? Guess what? Cut down on those directly elected jokers. These are the current murmurs being heard from Berlin.
in the absence of members accountable to their electorate, majority members of the German Bundestag are primarily accountable to a political Party and the ambitions that party may represent from time to time. Not being directly elected, these members are relieved from any constraints from their electorate. The “will of the people” enunciating the “wisdom of crowds” is only reflected through polling. There continues to be some unresolved hazards for democracy in Germany.
Roger… red leader, Hun in the Sun… Angels one Five… bum bandits at 3′ o clock…
Gosh..are you still allowed to say b*m bandits? How brave!
So will they be allowed to reassign their genders at 14 or just choose their identity? Seeing mixed information. Just choosing their identity is absolutely fine, but getting surgery before 18 is wrong.
What has happened to Germany? They just don’t seem to recognize the law of unintended consequences!
(deleted)
Like literature, printing, radio, and mass media, new technology fosters new abilities for people to pursue their interests. The gender debate is an extension of the sexual revolution and is a result of electronic and social media. It requires profound social adjustment and offers new boundaries to our freedom. In order to fully benefit from such initially uncomfortable trends, we must surpass the idea that gender non-conformity is a malady that must be diagnosed and cured. Many will find it impossible to see that gender is more essential than sex and is ever-changing and flowing. These new possibilities are natural and undeniable. They will continue to add diversity and beauty to our lives.
Which is fine as long as the law isn’t changed to allow people with penises access to vulnerable people without them.
Men should not have access to the vulnerable, period. Ban the urinal and free the nipple.