‘Woke’ peaked around 2020, when United Airlines lobbied to bring back affirmative action in California and Delta – which flies older, less-fuel efficient planes and owns an oil refinery – claimed to be carbon neutral.
Now even Meta (Facebook) is removing tampons from men’s rooms. Southwest Airlines is promising not to use quotes in hiring and so is American. Delta, though, says it’s standing by its DEI and ESG efforts.
During the carrier’s fourth quarter earnings call last week, Chief Legal Officer Peter Carter responded to a question from the Wall Street Journal‘s Ali Sider about whether they’re following the lead of other companies “rethinking of sustainability pledges and DEI commitments.”
No, we are not. We are steadfast in our commitments because we think that they are actually critical to our business. Sustainability is about being more efficient in our operations. And really DE&I is about talent, and that’s been our focus. And of course, the key differentiator is our people.
Indeed, at Delta “Sustainability is about being more efficient in our operations” –
- Their eco-consciousness has been about cost-cutting from plastic cups and wooden utensils to lower quality indigenous amenity kits from Mexico.
- And suggesting business class passengers cut down on food cost ‘for the environment’.
Ironically, Delta was replaced by American Airlines in the Dow Jones North America Sustainability Index. After all, Delta’s fleet is made up of older, gas guzzling planes. And that was even before the airline’s claim of carbon neutrality turned out to be based on an ‘ESG but Evil’ carbon credits scam.
I’ve long said that Delta drives a hard bargain with its suppliers, partners, and customers (in a 50-50 deal, Delta takes the hyphen) and that while they’re a good airline their marketing far outstrips the reality. Of course Delta’s DEI and sustainability efforts are a fig leaf for efficient cost cuts and marketing, so of course they will continue.
Meanwhile, their social efforts continue alongside plans to codeshare with Saudia and enter a joint venture with Riyadh Air, the two flag carriers of Saudi Arabia. Try shaking that with a stick.
It’s the perfect con. Cost cutting dressed up as climate change or DEI, both of which are not real.
Delta has become flagrantly worse because of this DEI/ESG crap: Westin bedding replaced by recycled water bottle blankets – garbage. Wooden cutlery that is 10x more cringy than the spoon in the old sealtest ice cream cup. Bottled is selected because- of course -they have to source minority owned wineries. The canned wine is undrinkable swill. And if you take a flight from ATL to anywhere domestic with a junior FA crew the service is non-existent or over the top obnoxious (since 2020 the hiring standards for FA’s were removed or reshaped to a point where it feels like you’re eating at Popeyes). It would have been better had they actually hired the Popeyes lady who calls me “baby” – at least she makes me smile.
Good for Delta. I’d rather be woken up than a mindless zombie following a narcissist pathological liar and his enablers. Actually the term comes from an old Black song about wake up and realize that the police aren’t your friends and has been willfully distorted. But then that is typical of a group who appeals to negative emotions rather than logic and caring about people.
I am obsessed with “cost” and will take the 50-50 hyphen comment for future use.
This DEI thing has worked out so well thus far! What could possibly go wrong? <Sarcasm
Good for Delta and its loyal customers.
For those that actually fly the airline regularly, they know that Delta is notoriously more inclusive, diverse, tolerant, and welcoming to a wide variety of crews and passengers–notably more-so than its competitors. Many of them welcome ‘feel good’ announcements like this, regardless of whether it means much more than ‘marketing’.
Let’s see, where is Delta doing the most business in the US… ah, from: JFK, LAX, ATL, SEA, MSP, DTW… hmm, what do most of those have in common… could it be.. ‘blue’ cities and states?
People who travel more frequently, especially abroad, are *usually* more open-minded (yes, ‘woke’ even, the original definition, like liberal, not the bastardized bad-word right-wing talking-point). They believe in climate change, too. My goodness!
So, a lot of those folks have disposable income and prefer a premium onboard experience, where usually they are not discriminated against for their race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. Shocking!
Clearly, Delta has ‘strongly held beliefs,’ so it’s better that they stand for something, instead of cowering. If it goes well, the airline could capture some additional market share by differentiating itself on this basis, as it has in the past.
If it doesn’t go well, as-in, they may lose some customers who prefer ‘hate’ and ‘ignorance’. Oh no. Please. Don’t go. We’ll miss you. Byyyeee.
Discrimination by race or gender is against federal law, even if you are discriminating against who you view are somehow oppressors. This administration encouraged such lawlessness, the next one will not. I look forward to lots of civil and criminal suits against Delta and other woke companies.
@Mantis
You are describing ‘quotas,’ which are already illegal. By all means, please sue. We are a super-litigious society, after all. The lawyers are gonna love this. They may ask to paid up front, though, you know, because it’s silly and all. But I hear you, ‘when can a wealthy Christian heterosexual conservative white man with a job, home, and family, catch a break in this country!’
Whenever I see that “marketing far outstrips the reality”, I know it’s a BS artist. Which clearly DL has become.
“People who travel more frequently, especially abroad” are usually well-off and/or business people. Who see thru BS, lies and deceptions a lot better than others. And “climate change” is the biggest lie and scam of them. Bot some liberal dummies believe in it, which is fine by me – they will be fleeced and will never realize it.
DEI as originally and accurately intended was simply a means to ensure that those who were not equally represented in the work force or subgroups of it had equal access to and that companies took efforts to recruit those types of people.
As it should have existed, DEI is not wrong.
DEI became about EXCLUDING some people or groups in order to promote others and that is not only illegal but discriminatory.
In contrast to some competitors, DL has not been charged with illegal or discriminatory activity and it has not rolled back something which violated federal laws either before or after the Supreme Court’s ruling about college admissions which can reasonably be extended to other sectors of society.
DL is right to say it isn’t changing anything because by all appearances, they don’t appear to have carried DEI to its extreme which many companies have had to backtrack.
btw, DL is reportedly donating to Trump’s inauguration so, like Meta, they intend to stay on the administration’s good side. Unlike Meta, DL isn’t having to flip flop on a host of issues because it felt bullied by the current administration that has a 6 day expiration date.
Being Green is all about the “green”.
As for quotas, yes, they’re illegal, but plenty of organizations have them anyway. (As my late father came home and told us in the 1980s, his company didn’t have “quotas”, they had “goals and timetables”.) Filing lawsuits is expensive and the Wokesters figure their political goals are worth taking a chance for. Not their money anyway, it’s the evil capitalist corporation they work for.
If your company isn’t hiring the best person for the job, they aren’t doing their job. I don’t care if you’re excuse for hiring someone else is because you’re Woke or a White Supremacist, excellence at doing the job and not being an asshole are the only things that should count.
Elon Musk tweeted that the LA fires were caused by DEI policies. Is that true? Because Mel Gibson insinuated that the (deep state) government set the fires. Although, Mel did say the prior California fires were attributable to Jewish space lasers funded by the Rothschilds. I’m confused. So, which is it? Or, are they really the same?
@1990… Typical liberal comment if you disagree with someone they spew “hate and ignorance” You left out Nazi and a few other words. Give it a better try next time.
@Tim Dunn, “they (dl) don’t appear to have Carrie dei to the extreme”
Apparently you haven’t walked through the Atlanta airport lately on the Delta concourses.
dooley,
Many of those employees at the ATL airport (as well as DTW) were DL or NW employees long before DEI was a thing.
DL and NW have provided many good jobs to people in the communities where they work – just like every other large, high quality employer.
Race has nothing to do with it.
@Bestoink Dooley
My pleasure! Though, for Gary, I wouldn’t dare use that offensive acronym here.
@Gennady
A glorious day when I can offend you on two separate posts (see the Alaska FA ‘twerking’ one)! By ‘fleeced’ do you mean, pay basically the same price for better service? Because I’ll take Delta’s on-board experience over UA, AA, and every other domestic US carrier, any day, regardless of their DEI policy or lack thereof. Oh, and the ‘climate change’ stuff, yeah, that comes for us all, eventually, and sooner for some, it appears. *cough*
@Tim Dunn
You are the most accurate, objective, knowledgeable, and non-confrontational commenter on this site. Respect. You wouldn’t happen to be the Texas oilman by the same name, or is that just a coincidence?
“Deutschland wach” was the slogan at the Nuremberg rallies in the 1930s. Speaking of awake.
Yawn.
All people care is good product and happy employees. And Delta delivers.