Honest observer? Honest observers don't lump everyone into one pile.
Nonsense. I never said exceptions could not exist. Themes, however,
do exist, and this one is common-enough.
Neither you nor the person that posted the ad in the OP seem to get it. Your job does not define you.
Oh no, I'm afraid I do get it. I get it all too well, as it takes someone of my particular disposition to call these plays as they are. It is axiomatic that one's job
should not define them.
In the
corporate world, however, the job defines
more people than otherwise. I've been made to listen to enough corporate pilot bullsh*t to fill the Grand Canyon.
Example for your consideration:
Corporate drivers arrive at the bar. Banefully uninteresting/uninspired talk of avionics/engine mod kits/etc. prevails. Work-related cellphone rings fill the air.
Airline pilots arrive at the bar. Normalcy in conversation prevails. The job is left behind, better subject matter is tabled--life is lived.
This observation is by no means comprehensive, however it has been my experience enough that this is the case the majority of the time.
In all professions you have people that are control freaks, jerks, laid back, friendly and any other adjective you want to use. Whether they are pilots that fly for a major airline or "sanitation engineers", people will have a wide range of personalities.
Certainly. I challenge nothing here.
You wonder why people don't want to go to the airlines? Having been there and left, I can tell you that I don't like being a number.
I'm sorry to have to be the one to disestablish this fantastic illusion for you, but
we're all numbers; be it employee or cost/benefit-analysis.
I don't need the union "protection" because I don't do anything to work against my employer.
Ah yes...only those who seek to sabotage an operation need protection.
All management decisions are just, of course.
I don't like airlines because I don't like to commute.
Who does? Then again, we don't
all live in BFE.
I don't like airlines because you work a lot more than the typical flight department.
Seems to me all of my airline friends work considerably less, as none of them are on the 30 on/0-off schedule I must endure.
I don't like airlines because I don't get to make decisions, I have to follow procedures and profiles that aren't always the best/safest practice.
For example? I find nothing but the most conservative procedures/philosophies dominate airline SOP's.
But that's just me. If you like to just show up, fly the airplane and go home then maybe that's the life for you.
Fair enough. That is, after all, why I and most everyone else got into this business. If I had the slightest inclination for any other brand of nonsense, I would have done something else.
I prefer to be involved, develop real relationships with my crew AND passengers/owners and tackle the challenges that come from flying to less than well traveled airports.
Every time I hear this line (very nearly verbatim, ad infinitum) and apply the requisite philosophical considerations I come away more mystified than before.
It is most often used as a weak justification for the superiority of this type of flying, when it should be relegated to the same classificatory bag as
"...well, I love that Lears have cup-holders built into the cockpit side walls, so given that I could see myself as flying nothing else..."
Make no mistake,
everyone enjoys it (at least until they have to deal with the attendant bullsh*t of small town airport accomodations). As we have addressed that this profession should not define the man, however, should not the appropriate concerns be somewhere in the realm of QOL, money, and time-off to do the wife/girlfriend thing? Given these essentials, pax/crew relationships, small airport inconveniences, etc. be damned, no?
Like I said, to each his own.
No question. This is FI, however, a forum of debate. :beer:
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