In the annals of airline history, particularly the passenger-crew dynamic of customer service, this has been an extraordinary 32 days.
Several incidents on United Airlines have occurred, starting with the horrific April 9 confrontation when police came aboard a flight to forcibly drag a 69-year old doctor who refused to be involuntarily bumped out of his seat and up the aisle of the plane.
Subsequent to that, major incidents also took place on American and Delta, respectively.
So is this it? Is this the tipping point for the airlines? Have they all learned their lesson in the wake of these high-profile issues - and all captured on videos that went viral for the world to see?
The heart desperately wants to say yes.
The head reluctantly says that's not possible.
Just look at the sequence. The United incident in which Dr. David Yao suffered two broken teeth, a broken nose and a concussion during the violent removal from the plane should have been followed with a memo from every airline CEO or Human Resources Director the next day, with words to the effect that "Dear Employee, We don't do that."
Even if it wasn't, it should have been enough of a common-sense reminder to flight crews. But it wasn't. In the ensuing days came the video of an American Airlines flight attendant forcefully yanking away a double-stroller from a mother traveling with toddler twins, and yet another video of a Delta flight crew member asking a family to exit the plane over a seating snafu and telling the father that he could be subject to arrest and his children placed in temporary foster care.
This is what airline consolidation has wrought.
This is why the heart wants to believe true change is coming, but the head realizes that the airlines have you trapped in no-man's land.
Where are you going to go? What are you going to do? The answer is, nothing. They gotcha. All the talk on social media about boycotting this airline and that airline is just that. Talk. To paraphrase a line from one of my favorite movies, what people are trying to do, in theory is highly commendable. However, in practice, it sucks.
Why? Two words - airline consolidation. Call for all the boycotts you want because it isn't happening. What is supposed to happen in a boycott is you refuse to buy services from one entity and instead choose to purchase goods from a rival business.
What rival business is there among the airlines? In the past decade, Delta acquired Northwest, United acquired Continental, American acquired US Air, and Alaska acquired Virgin America, with all of the larger airlines retiring the brand of the acquired carriers.
Going back even further, even the addition of relatively new carriers - JetBlue, for instance - have barely equaled out airlines that have folded in the last 30-40 years, such as the old Eastern Airlines, Pan-Am and Braniff, to name a few.
And then there is the hub system, making it even harder to boycott United in favor of, say, American, unless you're prepared to back up your moral outrage by paying extra. There are very few cities and airports now where all airlines are on near or equal footing in terms of the number of flights.
United practically owns Denver International and Newark Liberty. American more or less shares Chicago O'Hare with United but controls Miami and Dallas-Fort Worth. Delta practically has its own city at Atlanta and basically runs Detroit and Minnesota while sharing Seattle with Alaska Airlines.
Deep down, I want to believe the airlines are going to do better. I want to believe they have learned their respective lessons from the harrowing incidents in the last month. I want to believe that flight crews ultimately want to do the right thing.
But deeper down, I know what the airlines know - they are Nike in a world of Reebok and Adidas, Gatorade in a world of sports drink wanna-be's.
And there's not much we can do about it.
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