Mike, would you like your bust to be placed in the entrance to the soon to be busted Usapian HQ? Would you like an urn where one can worship at Usapian temple of dupe? The Church of LBS.
Let Courtney know I found out about the LBS faith on the internet......
"The Legacy Airline pilot Belief system. This Legacy Belief System (LBS) incorporates a certain hierarchy of entitlement and position within the industry ranking system amongst pilots based on aircraft type, airline and LOS/DOH. The hierarchy is Legacy, Major, Regional; legacy subcategory shifts but is currently Delta, AMR, United, SWA then the dead legaciesTWA, Eastern etc. The East did not mouth off to DAL in 2006 because DAL was Top Dog. Then you have wide body vs. narrow and DOH, which is why the EAST introduce themselves as wide body international Captain before speaking to Dougthey are displaying their rank in the LBS. FEDEX and UPS trump legacy airlines.
The LBS provides the justification for pilot on pilot violence, be it stapling TWA, AWA, AirTran during mergers or wide body vs. narrow or senior vs. junior pilot groups during contract negotiation strategies (UEL vs. RC4 at AAA). They believe only the best pilots were selected at their airline and everyone else just did not cut the mustard during the interview process. The losers went somewhere else, somewhere else being a lesser airline within the belief system hierarchy of airlines.
According to the belief system, no matter how bad it is in a legacy, no other place is as good, regardless of contract superiority. Pay defines status amongst the legacy pilot mind, which is why being highest paid during some point in history is worn like a credentialing badge of honor defining the pecking order amongst the big 3 legacy airline pilot groups. This bias and belief system is written into our MOU, as we are compared to DAL and UAL pay. The pay thingy does not apply if a major airline contract pays more than a legacy contract as in AWA vs. AAA because legacy trumps major. Even liquidating airlines or liquidated legacies trump major in this LBS Collective Mind as we continuously see.
The LBS provides the justification to abuse power to backstab lesser groups for money or use them as furlough fodder via staple because as lesser pilots, they are waiting in line to some day be lucky enough to be a Legacy Pilot. Non-legacy pilots are Rookies, period. James Anderson explained the LBS to Silver in his manifesto letter. While LBS provides the moral justification for abuse, Pilot Numbers provide the power to execute and apply this system of Airline Pilot Crow on other, lesser pilots. How far they go down the slope depends upon the groups core values development; we were wed to the bottom feeders in this area, unfortunately.
Unfortunately, in every step of arbitration and litigation, we battle this belief system of prejudice. We battle it in the public media too. Good old Ted biases the public every other month or so and that public might include judges. Only the fear of lawsuits keeps things in check, a fact recognized by legacy pilots too as evidenced by them putting paragraph 10 in the MOU as a risk mitigation strategy as they commit DFR to uphold the LBS and their position within it."