Never a boring day in Argentina's aviation. Unhappy over deregulation, the pilots' union (APLA) that represents pilots at AR, OY, AV & LA is asking its members to read an "informational" message to passengers during flights. It is not mandatory but there has been an incident yesterday at USH where an AR flight had to be cancelled because the captain was taken to hospital after a discussion with an union rep. The airlines and authorities have said that pilots that engage in this behavior will be disciplined.

General public reaction has been one of disapproval, accusing pilots of fear mongering. Five unions have called for a 24-hr strike against deregulation during the peak winter break holidays last Friday, but the Ministry of Labor slapped them with a 2-week cooling off period.



https://tn.com.ar/sociedad/suspendieron ... oto_882890

what's the message? The photo is too small to be read

c933103 wrote:

what's the message? The photo is too small to be read

In a nutshell, it says the government is pursuing a policy of less controls on aviation, less oversight on maintenance, opening to foreign capital, etc.

They couldn't have gotten a native English speaker to review the translation?

Anyway, I have mixed feelings about this. I think that politics and religion should stay out of the workplace unless directly related to the work. If the airline would like to make this announcement, I think it's related enough to the industry that it's not inappropriate to share their political view (unlike a certain spaghetti company deciding to have an opinion on gay marriage...bad move). But perhaps using advertising space to express this message would be more appropriate. I think that a message of this sort would be unexpected and pretty jarring to passengers who expect the announcements to stay related to the flight itself.

DocLightning wrote:

They couldn't have gotten a native English speaker to review the translation?

Anyway, I have mixed feelings about this. I think that politics and religion should stay out of the workplace unless directly related to the work. If the airline would like to make this announcement, I think it's related enough to the industry that it's not inappropriate to share their political view (unlike a certain spaghetti company deciding to have an opinion on gay marriage...bad move). But perhaps using advertising space to express this message would be more appropriate. I think that a message of this sort would be unexpected and pretty jarring to passengers who expect the announcements to stay related to the flight itself.

This is a message by labor union instead of by the airlines, if I am reading it correctly. It is indeed about aviation it appears

It's pure politics. Unions using the cockpit to spread its message and propaganda to the passengers. Crying and non sense. That'd actually make not fly in such companies again.

They must really fear an airline like Norwegian when it finally does launch domestic ops...and could also transfer Dreamliners to the Argentinian unit.

As for management, they need to say: not in our cockpits!

c933103 wrote:

This is a message by labor union instead of by the airlines, if I am reading it correctly. It is indeed about aviation it appears

My same criticism applies. Labor unions can also rent advertising space. Moreover, if I were part of the airline's PR department, I'd have a serious issue with crew utilizing company material and company time to make such an announcement.

Union agitation has no place in the aircraft, much less while in flight. Totally inappropriate to hold passengers captive and hostage to this crap. Do your duty.

Jayafe wrote:

It's pure politics. Unions using the cockpit to spread its message and propaganda to the passengers. Crying and non sense. That'd actually make not fly in such companies again.

its okay, NK isnt unionized yet, so you can still enjoy the BFD while not worrying at all.

DocLightning wrote:

c933103 wrote:

This is a message by labor union instead of by the airlines, if I am reading it correctly. It is indeed about aviation it appears

My same criticism applies. Labor unions can also rent advertising space. Moreover, if I were part of the airline's PR department, I'd have a serious issue with crew utilizing company material and company time to make such an announcement.

Airlines did said pilot doing so will be subjected to disciplinary action, according to report.

Flighty wrote:

Union agitation has no place in the aircraft, much less while in flight. Totally inappropriate to hold passengers captive and hostage to this crap. Do your duty.

I get this attitude, to a point. But part of me wants to send you back to a Victorian mill and see how well you get on for a day, or a week, or a decade, or a working life, before you make these superficial ideological statements.

This is so inappropriate and unprofessional whoever decided to do this should be fired and their license revoked.

axiom wrote:

Flighty wrote:

Union agitation has no place in the aircraft, much less while in flight. Totally inappropriate to hold passengers captive and hostage to this crap. Do your duty.

I get this attitude, to a point. But part of me wants to send you back to a Victorian mill and see how well you get on for a day, or a week, or a decade, or a working life, before you make these superficial ideological statements.

A well paid profession like being an airline captain or a surgeon is not a Victorian mill. The responsibilities and accountability are totally different. If people need to picket, it should be outside and off the clock. The customers deserve your best. If I picketed about my job, people would laugh their butts off anyhow.

Flighty wrote:

axiom wrote:

Flighty wrote:

Union agitation has no place in the aircraft, much less while in flight. Totally inappropriate to hold passengers captive and hostage to this crap. Do your duty.

I get this attitude, to a point. But part of me wants to send you back to a Victorian mill and see how well you get on for a day, or a week, or a decade, or a working life, before you make these superficial ideological statements.

A well paid profession like being an airline captain or a surgeon is not a Victorian mill. The responsibilities and accountability are totally different. If people need to picket, it should be outside and off the clock. The customers deserve your best. If I picketed about my job, people would laugh their butts off anyhow.

You missed the point: there would be no cush middle class without, in part, labour organising in the past. If you think the status quo is certain, you're not paying attention.

I respect the right to disagree (strongly) about tactics, but I don't understand the outright hostility towards labour activism in the aviation sector on this website. It seems... hypocritical.

It is going to get worse before it gets better... Aerolineas Argentinas SA has asked the Ministry of Labor to remove's APLA leadership and appoint an interim administration ("intervenir" in Spanish) over "the dissemination of a statement on some flights, whose content has not been consulted or approved by the company, content which is completely inappropriate and that constitutes an illicit labor action". The union, in turn, has threatened to take the Ministry to court.

https://www.lanacion.com.ar/2153864-en- ... -politicos

axiom wrote:

Flighty wrote:

axiom wrote:

I get this attitude, to a point. But part of me wants to send you back to a Victorian mill and see how well you get on for a day, or a week, or a decade, or a working life, before you make these superficial ideological statements.

A well paid profession like being an airline captain or a surgeon is not a Victorian mill. The responsibilities and accountability are totally different. If people need to picket, it should be outside and off the clock. The customers deserve your best. If I picketed about my job, people would laugh their butts off anyhow.

You missed the point: there would be no cush middle class without, in part, labour organising in the past. If you think the status quo is certain, you're not paying attention.

I respect the right to disagree (strongly) about tactics, but I don't understand the outright hostility towards labour activism in the aviation sector on this website. It seems... hypocritical.

Yes it is hypocrital, you're in a board whose posters are mostly anti union and that airlines will never do any wrongdoing.

c933103 wrote:

DocLightning wrote:

They couldn't have gotten a native English speaker to review the translation?

Anyway, I have mixed feelings about this. I think that politics and religion should stay out of the workplace unless directly related to the work. If the airline would like to make this announcement, I think it's related enough to the industry that it's not inappropriate to share their political view (unlike a certain spaghetti company deciding to have an opinion on gay marriage...bad move). But perhaps using advertising space to express this message would be more appropriate. I think that a message of this sort would be unexpected and pretty jarring to passengers who expect the announcements to stay related to the flight itself.

This is a message by labor union instead of by the airlines, if I am reading it correctly. It is indeed about aviation it appears

99% of people who hear that english announcement read through a muffled PA system will have no clue what the pilot is talking about. Its a poorly translated, rambling, incoherent statement.

kjeld0d wrote:

c933103 wrote:

DocLightning wrote:

They couldn't have gotten a native English speaker to review the translation?

Anyway, I have mixed feelings about this. I think that politics and religion should stay out of the workplace unless directly related to the work. If the airline would like to make this announcement, I think it's related enough to the industry that it's not inappropriate to share their political view (unlike a certain spaghetti company deciding to have an opinion on gay marriage...bad move). But perhaps using advertising space to express this message would be more appropriate. I think that a message of this sort would be unexpected and pretty jarring to passengers who expect the announcements to stay related to the flight itself.

This is a message by labor union instead of by the airlines, if I am reading it correctly. It is indeed about aviation it appears

99% of people who hear that english announcement read through a muffled PA system will have no clue what the pilot is talking about. Its a poorly translated, rambling, incoherent statement.

Alas, the message, by its very political nature, is targeting Argentinian people. I really don't know why they even bothered with an English version and such a mangled one to begin with. It goes to show the inappropriate nature of the whole idea. Leave the politics for an informational booth at the airport, not during a flight when people could care less - all they want is to arrive safely and comfortably to their destination.

Frankly this just seems like nationalistic BS and xenophobic fear-mongering. And it's pretty ironic that they're reading this out to the same people that would benefit from a deregulated aviation market.

idp5601 wrote:

Frankly this just seems like nationalistic BS and xenophobic fear-mongering. And it's pretty ironic that they're reading this out to the same people that would benefit from a deregulated aviation market.

While I can understand why you might think that, I think that it isn't so much motivated by prejudice as much as it is by money. Local unions are concerned that the introduction of foreign carriers into the market might lead to more competitive bidding on salaries for pilots and other aviation workers. They are concerned about their own salaries and the union is concerned about its own revenues.

When unions are concerned about their revenues and try to communicate this to the public, they often resort to publicly claiming concerns about safety. For example, when New York's subway tried to convert to single-operator trains (they had been using one worker to drive the train and one to open and close the doors), TWU, the MTA's union, made a bunch of noise about how unsafe such an arrangement would be. The reality is that most subway systems operate quite safely with a single train operator who both drives the train and opens and closes the doors. It's not as if opening and closing the doors is such a burdensome workload.

But when you are trying to get the public to go along with their agenda, an argument of "we'll make less money" tends to fall flat. So they need to figure out a way to arrange the message so as to appeal to the public's self-interest, even if that messaging might be a bit dishonest.

Now, I should add that I am not anti-union. These kinds of tactics are common to any such large organization. When the first environmental regulations on petroleum came out, ExxonMobil took out a full-page ad in the NYT and other newspapers talking about how these regulations would increase costs to consumers. We all know who was really going to get hit by the costs.

But PR is PR and sometimes it is not an honest job.