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Comment by self-diversity | Hacker News Reader

The heated rhetoric around this outrage o' the moment is disguising the fact that United isn't culpable for the brutality the person underwent.

I suspect that the imminent next outrage o' the moment will supplant this in people's minds, and some savvy folks will snap up United at a bargain price and make a tidy profit from this affair.

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Sure, they weren't the ones who employed the officers who removed the passenger from the plane but things didn't have to work out that way if United had considered that the passenger did nothing wrong to expect to be bumped from a flight. In fact, United had many options at it's disposable that didn't need to involve forceful removal of passengers such as:

1) Upping the compensation considerably beyond $800. To be honest, that's just not enough considering that people routinely get $400+ for moving to a flight 2 hours later and this was moving to 3PM the following day.

2) Not accommodating United employees who they wanted to get on board this flight. That should be only when you have EXCESS seats, not so you can bump off paid passengers. Here's an idea, book them on another airline's flight. If that was not possible, then that's poor planning on your part, find a way to deal with it that doesn't involve bumping passengers involuntarily.

Overbooking flights is going to be norm, a small price we pay to get lower fares. The response when it happens is the problem that is completely in the control of the airlines.

I can't disagree with anything you said but I don't see a single word that makes United culpable for law enforcement overstepping the needs of the situation. Given how the outrage cycle regularly crucifies and then moves on completely inside of a week, United would be best served to hold tight and let the courts and the basic facts of the situation dictate the outcome, not the fickle waves of anger expressed on social media.

I am in agreement generally that people are conflating the actions of the officers (excessive force) vs. what United is responsible for (poor business practices, lack of consideration, poor judgement). It would be interesting to know under what specific statute were they allowed to use force to remove a passenger from an airplane? Is this covered under Trespassing or part of FAA regulations that you must obey everything the crew says no matter how legitimate the command is? Where do we draw the line?

I think that's open to legal interpretation. I think United is liable. They created the situation and asked officers to remove the individual. Any reasonable person knows that the police are capable of using force to take someone into custody.

Also the Seventh amendment guarantees a civil jury trial.

This was abhorrent and wrong. United should pay dearly and change its policies to prevent something like this from happening ever again.

I doubt you'll get your wish, because we don't run our legal system based on the outrage o' the moment for very good reason.

And likely elder abuse.

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