Muslims on Twitter pointing this out as another example of the evil imperialist United States. The fact that on U.S. Airlines, your drink is always filled into a plastic cup to everyone, seems to have escaped notice.
Via Mashable:
A chaplain from Chicago’s Northwestern University claims she faced anti-Muslim discrimination aboard a United Airlines flight on Friday, while en route from Chicago to Washington, D.C.
Tahera Ahmad said a United flight attendant refused to give her an unopened can of Diet Coke because she said it could be used “as a weapon.” When she said she was being discriminated against, another passenger on the plane hurled angry, anti-Muslim comments at her, according to Ahmad.
Others have called for a boycott of United after Ahmad’s Facebook post (see below) recounting her experience went viral.
By Saturday afternoon, the post had been shared thousands of times. After the flight attendant brought Ahmad a can of opened Diet Coke, she said she asked for an unopened one instead for hygiene purposes.
“[The flight attendant] responded, ‘Well I’m sorry, I just can’t give you an unopened can, so no diet coke for you.’ She then brought the man sitting next to me a can of UNOPENED beer. So I asked her again why she refused to give me an UNOPENED can of diet coke. She said, ‘We are unauthorized to give unopened cans to people because they may use it as a WEAPON on the plane,'” Ahmad wrote.
I may just be a skeptic, but this doesn’t sound to me like it would ever happen the way she is describing. What pilot would actually apologize for his ‘white privilege’?
Published May 31, 01:37
Update:
This story has now been picked up by many in MSM, of course, with many not even questioning it or asking United for further background on it.
United indicates that they made every attempt to reach out to her and resolve whatever her issues were, and typically, they apologized, as one does in customer service, whatever the situation. They do not admit to doing anything wrong.
There are no other customers who have emerged so far to support Ms. Ahmad’s story.
Interestingly, Ahmad has pulled her Facebook account. Most of the media have not seen the last Facebook post that I quoted above, the ‘white privilege’ quote she makes about the pilot, a post that seems to defy belief, and casts great doubt on her story.
Not only that but Ahmad has a long history as an ‘SJW’ or social justice warrior. Even in some of the posts remaining on the internet, she says she was going to DC to help fight for ‘social justice’. In addition to being an associate chaplain at Northwestern, she has read from the Quran at the ISNA conference and has been an advisor to the Muslim Students Association. Both organizations are connected to the Muslim Brotherhood. She’s also been recognized by the White House in March as a leading Muslim woman in the U.S.
Immediately after the incident, perhaps even starting while she was on the plane, she started sending out tweets to anyone she knew in the Muslim ‘social justice’ arena. Who she sent tweets out to is perhaps instructive as those who the tweets went out to included Linda Sarsour, a Muslim activist who has been involved with both Occupy and Black Lives Matter, and Lupe Fiasco, Occupy supporting hip hop/rapper. My point is these are people she already knew to reach out to, indicating her own involvement/understanding. Had we been given a greater chance to check her Facebook, we may have seen greater connections.
Update:
Her Facebook is now back up, she’s now claiming that people were trying to ‘hack it’ and her other accounts to ‘pretend to be her’. Convenient that…
The post where she made the the claims about what she was told by the pilot, i.e. the offensive white privilege post, is now gone, she cleansed her account.
But the internet is forever. Here’s a copy of all the posts, including the deleted one.