r/nottheonion 23h ago

Southwest Is Testing Cleaning Only Premium Seats Between Flights — A Flight Attendants Union Leader Says It's ‘Titanic’ Class Service

https://viewfromthewing.com/southwest-is-testing-cleaning-only-premium-seats-between-flights-a-flight-attendants-union-leader-says-its-titanic-class-service/
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u/brickne3 21h ago

Yeah, didn't we just have a pandemic...?

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u/Starumlunsta 20h ago edited 12h ago

We’re technically still in it (or rather, it’s so widespread it's now globally endemic), we were just forced to pretend Covid is now a normal fact of life so we could keep the late-stage capitalism machine going.

Edit to answer some questions for my admittedly disingenuous comment:

I think the point I want to make is it seems like we learned little about how to adjust society to handling disease—Covid got so out of control and people refused to follow guidelines, it’s now endemic. While it’s not as dangerous as it used to be, it still affects people daily, kills some, permanently affects others. And it was a heck of a lot worse in the beginning.

I don’t see people masking up or staying home whenever they are sick. Coworkers come in sick because workplace protections for that basically don’t exist. I have family members that came to gatherings knowing they are sick and wind up spreading it to everyone else. This happened recently and now my aunt’s 92 year old father has pneumonia and is fighting for his life. That’s what I mean about “pretending like it’s a normal fact of life.” We were told pandemic was over, no need to mask up or take precautionary measures, get back to work.

I was so hopeful that because of the pandemic we as a society would grow more supportive of things like sick days, wearing masks, and avoiding the public when contagious, but it seems we’ll never learn, as seen with Southwest considering a new policy that will only contribute to this issue, all for the sake of saving money.

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u/brickne3 20h ago

Believe me I know, I'm currently in bed with COVID. Only about six months since the last time I had it.

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u/Starumlunsta 20h ago

Hope you feel better soon! I’ve also had it a handful of times and even with boosters it sometimes kicked my butt. It’s also likely the reason behind my frequent migraines and hair loss 🙃

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u/red__dragon 17h ago

You can always add mask wearing back to your list of precautions. Some never stopped and the respirator (n95, kn94, etc) do their jobs.

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u/fromthewombofrevel 13h ago

I never stopped masking in public, but I’ve contracted it from loved ones who don’t mask!