Originally Posted by
corporate-wage-slave
Yes, I did think "oh no, just what we need today".
In terms of de-escalation, I did really like the post that young KARFA put out in a slightly different context. While it's good to encourage people to do the right thing, and sometimes people genuinely have forgotten to get the mask in place, nevertheless this is ultimately about personal responsibility. You can allow yourself to get tied in knots about this but frankly it's bad for your soul. The best you can do is to lead by good example, safe in the sure and certain knowledge that you are on side of the angels.
That said, I would have just offloaded myself. If you do that then the captain would have some explaining to do. There are very, very few things in life that can't wait 24 hours.
As ever, the voice of reason!
Ultimately the cabin crew are not police officers. They can ask people, they could threaten, they could probably have called the police if still on stand. But then the flight would have been delayed and others would have become annoyed and possibly aggressive because they personally feel that mask wearing is a bit of a waste of time or whatever.
When people reach an aircraft even under the old normal they were often at Defcon 1 - lots of people are scared of flying and don’t admit it; lots more find the whole airport experience overwhelming, add covid into the mix and everyones’ baseline mental health anyway, and you can see a potential tinderbox. I’ve seen a discussion about a World Traveller special meal on the ground between a CSL and a customer escalate to the point where the police were called at the gate - and it created an atmosphere that was very weird for the entire flight.
Is using the full armoury of your powers really the right thing to do? Or do you risk escalating an already smouldering situation? The crew had to make a judgment call. The OP also swore and whilst that may be understandable, you sometimes just need to take a step back, think ‘is it worth it?’ and decide. Which the OP did. Don’t think it’s worth a complaint in the grand scheme of things - unlikely to achieve anything other than more frustration.