Well that's it then. The consensus is clearly that pilots are generally incapable of controlling their own careers and we should just roll over and do what we're told by union leaders and management (who now share the same beds).

Pilots deserve to have their pay continually lowered. We will never again see the salaries from 20-30 years ago because we aren't professionals anymore, we are just drones who live under a system of controls and entitlements that will never require us to excel beyond mediocrity.

Pilots are incapable of behaving in a professional and civil manner without our little safety nets and rules to protect us from each other. We can't trust other pilots in a fair and open market because we must always have someone to blame other than ourselves to explain why people with inferior skills and abilities have somehow managed to surpass us. After all, they must have broken the moral code to get ahead and make more money than us...it's not our fault. They knew someone, they kissed someone's rear, they cheated the system...what awful people they must be.

We should just go on through life feeling safe in our little communist cocoon comforted by the knowledge we have followed the rules and are therefore "good and moral" pilots.

Keep the blue side up...they said. Not me..Call me a rebel. I say keep the red side down.