fired from delta over a social media post?
Hello from the owner of That Fucking Feminist! I wanted to share a personal update with you all as I believe it is important and needs to be heard.
For those of you who may not know, I am a Detroit native and until October, I was a flight attendant with Delta Air Lines. On October 7th, Delta fired me for “failing to align with Delta values” over a Facebook post calling out a man who was trolling me through Facebook messenger because he did not like what my business represented and believed in.
On August 29th, I posted a screenshot of his message with the caption, “imagine having the ego of a white man in America. (no idea who this guy is. just some random snowflake who messaged me and immediately blocked me).”
The post did not mention Delta - in fact, my Facebook page does not include much about being a Delta employee, other than a handful of pictures that were taken at the beginning of this year at my Delta graduation. This is important to note because the termination letter stated, “you associated yourself with Delta when making the offensive comments”, however, I never mixed personal beliefs with Delta.
On September 10th, a Delta base manager informed me that there was an open investigation regarding my social media and that I would be called in for a meeting later that day. During our meeting, I explained that I receive about 10 of these messages each week, always from white men, and that I never provoke or interact with them. It is my belief that they thought I was being racist towards this man (note: you cannot be racists towards white people) and had a hatred towards men because I was asked, “do you feel this way about all white men?” regarding my “imagine having an ego of a white man in America” statement. To be clear, I answered this asinine question by saying, “well, my dad is a pretty nice guy so…”.
I was suspended without pay later that month and officially fired on October 7th. If the irony of being fired for upsetting a stranger’s feelings over a post saying “imagine having the ego of a white man in America” hasn’t gotten past you yet, take a quick minute to laugh/cry at that.
While this has been extremely upsetting, more importantly, I want people to know how Delta behaves behind closed doors. If you look in the news and at their social media, Delta claims to be this social-justice champion that will stand up against racism and inequality. But when they had to choose between an employee standing up for social justice and a man that was harassing that employee, they chose to side with the harasser. I want people to know who Delta is behind the scenes when they aren’t looking to score PR points.
I will never be quiet when it comes to fighting for equality, equity and justice for all, even if that means losing a once dream job.
xo,
your Fucking Feminist
