I have Google Alerts set up for the leaders in the gun control movement, so I know when they are making the news. Shannon Watts’ alert has been very quiet. No one was really paying a lick of attention to her until a few days ago when the alert I have for Shannan Watts blew up in a frenzy, because apparently she can’t keep her nose out of the business of people she doesn’t have the first clue about. Oh well, I’d be happy if she would rather be the legging police than the gun police. Spandex came into fashion in the 1980s. It mercifully went out of fashion until recently. How quickly we forget the horrors.
I kind of like it that even when Shannon Watts scores, she still kind of loses. I’ve often said she’s not terribly good at what she does. We should be thankful for that.
UPDATE: Miguel thinks she might be gearing up to run for a political office. If she’s looking for federal office and not looking to be put up as a sacrificial lamb, she’s going to have to move. Her district is R+9. The other district near her is R+11 on the Cook Partisan Voting Index. That’s a tough hill to climb for someone with talent, and Shannon Watts has never impressed me.
Apparently, Shannon Watts supports an imaginary right to keep and bear Spandex, but not an enumerated right to keep and bear arms. She’s inconsistent like that. I’m thinking that she supports freedom when Bloomberg money isn’t paying her to oppose it.
A classic liberal says “people should be allowed to do what they want”.
A modern liberal says “people should be allowed to do what I want”.
That’s the way today’s left views “freedom”. Shannon likes leggings and hates guns.
I’m not saying that she’s going to be successful, but I imagine the purpose of branching out and virtue signaling on other topics is to try to expand her base.
Not to mention it reinforces the mom aspect of mom’s demand action.
“I imagine the purpose of branching out and virtue signaling on other topics is to try to expand her base.”
Thank God we don’t have any people in our camp who do that, huh?
I’m actually seeing several lefties I know condemn her tweet storm because it was so uninformed. Even she’s trying to walk that back a little by admitting in a Reuters interview that she didn’t bother trying to get the full information about the situation before tweeting. But then she tried to turn it into a gender issue, though I saw it refuted quickly that the spandex rules aren’t targeted to women. So I’m not sure this got quite as much traction as she had hoped.
I’ve seen several folks who are normally on board with the gender fights say that United’s policy is just fine as long as it is restricted to people getting the freebie tickets and doesn’t target women specifically.
Where it started to get traction is when United took so long to state that they have no rules against paying passengers wearing leggings, but that these weren’t paying passengers. They accepted free passes in exchange for following a dress code that they clearly didn’t want to follow and hoped they could get away with it. I think most people have agreed that it wasn’t an unreasonable expectation, but that United did a poor job in their initial response.
I’ll join anyone in decrying Watts’ inconsistency, but I say, hats off to anyone who finds themselves in the mood to stand up to what appears to be arbitrary authority, now and then.
Apparently she didn’t know about the employee/travel/dress code relationship; so it appeared young women were being denied the right to travel while wearing attire that has become generally acceptable to our society, whether we individually approve of it or not. I even wonder why a dress code would apply to employees not acting in a role as active representatives of the company, as long as they weren’t breaking any laws. I’m not sure employers owning our souls 24/7 is exactly a formula for individual liberty.
(If I were starting a religion, it would have a requirement that everyone stand up to authority at least once in their lives, sort of like Muslims are obligated to make the Haj.)
“I’m not sure employers owning our souls 24/7 is exactly a formula for individual liberty.”
Way to completely misrepresent their policies!
United makes clear that if their employees and their friends and family want to pay for their seats, they can wear anything they want that passengers can wear. Pack your tightest leggings, dude, you and the employees can flaunt them all you want.
However, if you want their free stuff, it comes with rules. One of those rules is that spandex clothing is forbidden. Shorts must be within 3 inches of the knee. If you score first class passes, you can’t wear jeans. (They apparently had coach passes, so jeans would have been fine. Hell, a little denim skirt over the leggings just to get on the plane would have covered them.)
When you’re taking free stuff from the employer, it’s not a case of “owning your soul.” You’re still representing the company in some manner.
If you want to wear your leggings, then pay for your ticket like every other customer on the plane. There’s still plenty of individual liberty there (or at least as much as can be had past a TSA checkpoint).
Unless the family at issue has come out with a statement admitting they just weren’t thinking when dressing their kids who they wanted to fly free, then it would seem they decided they wanted their free stuff, but that rules didn’t apply to them. Perhaps because of gender and age, but then that sets up United for a problem enforcing any kind of dress code at all on any employee if you can show gender or age discrimination in enforcement of policies.
“Way to completely misrepresent their policies!”
I don’t see it as misrepresenting their policies at all. They’re saying they offer an attractive employee benefit, but that employees have to behave a certain way while accessing it, if they want to enjoy it.
It may not be the best analogy, but when I was in the Army, there were things I could not do while in uniform and thus representing the U.S. Army. But out of uniform, I could do pretty much anything I wanted that wasn’t criminal. I could even travel on a military discount as long as I had my military ID to show; but I didn’t have to spit-shine my shoes to board a train.
Unless an employee is wearing a big badge saying “I work for the airline!” they are not “representing” the airline in any way. And the policy begs the question, by their standard, when isn’t the employee “representing the company?” Why not at home, when they are presumably still covered by corporate insurance? On the beach, where they might be expected to wear an approved bathing suit — again because, being entitled to company benefits 24/7, they are by corporate definition “representing” the corporation, 24/7?
I’m not saying the company “doesn’t have the right,” in this case, but I am saying it is both stupid and intrusive.
Forgive me for being argumentative, but I’m flashing back to my days as a corporate employee, when I would have to take a vacation day if I was going to do a radio or TV appearance, lest my appearance should imply corporate endorsement of whatever I might say; mere “personal business” or comp time to which I was otherwise entitled was not acceptable. I’ve had an aversion to undue ownership of my soul ever since.
Seriously, just admit you want to wear Spandex on the free flight your nephew hooked you up with to the “Leisure World Neckbeard Colony” in Portland.
We won’t judge.
“We won’t judge.”
Good. Because it would be neither your business, nor the airline’s. :-)
There are dress code rules for getting free flights in the military also. When I was in the Army you had to wear your Class B’s IIRC, but that’s changed.
http://www.amc.af.mil/Home/AMC-Travel-Site/AMC-Travel-FAQs/
Question 23: Do I have to be in uniform to travel?
Answer: Each service determines its own travel uniform policies. Currently, services except the Marine Corps permit appropriate civilian attire on DoD-owned or controlled aircraft. When civilian clothing is worn it should be in good taste and not in conflict with accepted attire in the overseas country of departure, transit, or destination, as defined by the DoD Foreign Clearance Guide. It should also be capable of keeping you warm especially on military aircraft. Passengers are also reminded the high heeled, open toed and “five finger” styled shoes may not be worn on military aircraft.
Only for the sake of history, and not intended as argument: In my time (when they were conscripting 45,000 – 55,000 a month) not too many of us had a chance to avail ourselves of “free military flights,” except possibly Air Force and Naval Air personnel. So in practical terms, it was a factor for a very small percentage of service people.
My personal experience was only with availing myself of discounted military fares with civilian carriers, and I didn’t regard myself as being subject to the military while off base. In fact, except on leave, I never signed out a pass, just so I would not have to sign back in and record my comings and goings. But, as I’ve demonstrated here, I’ve always maintained a bad attitude regarding “authority.” ;-)
(I was awarded a Good Conduct Medal, but never collected it.)
I live in Zionsville. She certainly has no chance here. But I am pretty sure she doesn’t live here any longer. If I am correct, she quietly moved to Colorado a few years ago.