{"id":16403,"date":"2015-06-04T21:16:23","date_gmt":"2015-06-04T21:16:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/colorlines.madeostudio.com\/article\/flight-attendant-who-refused-muslim-woman-soda-will-no-longer-serve\/"},"modified":"2015-06-04T21:16:23","modified_gmt":"2015-06-04T21:16:23","slug":"flight-attendant-who-refused-muslim-woman-soda-will-no-longer-serve","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/article\/flight-attendant-who-refused-muslim-woman-soda-will-no-longer-serve\/","title":{"rendered":"Flight Attendant Who Refused Muslim Woman Soda Will ‘No Longer Serve’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Flight Attendant Who Refused Muslim Woman Soda Will ‘No Longer Serve’<\/h3>\n

\n By Kenrya Rankin<\/span> Jun 04, 2015<\/span>\n <\/p>\n <\/div>\n

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After denying Tahera Ahmad\u2014a Northwestern University Muslim chaplain\u2014an unopened Diet Coke because she could use it \u201cas a weapon,\u201d a flight attendant has been taken off United Airlines service.<\/p>\n

Last Friday, social media lit up when Ahmad posted on Facebook<\/a> about the encounter while still en route to Washington, D.C. \u201cThe flight attendant asked me what I would like to drink and I requested a can of diet coke. She brought me a can that was open so I requested an unopened can due to hygienic reasons,\u201d Ahmad wrote.<\/p>\n

She was refused, but a man nearby was given an unopened can of beer, despite the worker\u2019s contention that airline policy was to only hand out opened cans. Ahmad\u2019s protest prompted the flight attendant to say, \u201cIt\u2019s so you don\u2019t use it as a weapon.\u201d A man nearby cosigned the woman\u2019s statement, reportedly saying, \u201cYes, you know you would use it as a WEAPON so shut the f**k up.\u201d<\/p>\n

United Airlines and Republic Airways Holdings, which owns the flight operator Shuttle America, initially<\/a> called the incident a \u201cmisunderstanding regarding a can of diet soda,\u201d but released more strongly worded statements yesterday. United said<\/a>: \u201cAfter investigating this matter, United has ensured that the flight attendant, a Shuttle America employee, will no longer serve United customers. United does not tolerate behavior that is discriminatory\u2014or that appears to be discriminatory\u2014against our customers or employees.\u201d<\/p>\n

Republic Airways says that the attendant, whose name as not been released, has been \u201cremoved from United Express flying,\u201d and will have to complete additional sensitivity training before she can fly with other airlines in their network, including American Eagle, Delta and US Airways. An earlier statement<\/a> from the company confirmed that \u201cThere is no policy difference in serving alcoholic or non-alcoholic canned beverages to passengers. There is no differentiation between opened and unopened beverages, and there is no policy suggesting what may or may not be done with a container.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In a press conference yesterday, Ahmed Rehab, executive director of the Chicago chapter of the Council on American Islamic Relations, says Ahmad was wearing a hijab on the flight. Rehab called the situation \u201can act of discrimination that must be taken seriously,\u201d and said that while the airlines\u2019 statements were a \u201cgood first step,\u201d they don\u2019t go far enough. \u201cOur goal is to ensure this doesn\u2019t happen again, it isn\u2019t to get any money, it isn\u2019t to get anybody fired,\u201d he said. His organization has requested a sit-down with United execs and have not taken legal action off the table.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis isn\u2019t about me and a soda can, it\u2019s about systemic injustice that is perpetuated throughout our community,\u201d Ahmad told The Guardian<\/a>. \u201cFerguson happened, \u2018black lives matter\u2019 happened, and what is it these minority groups were saying? They were saying: understand my pain; understand my injustice. There is a lot of pain there. And I think that\u2019s why this story resonates with so many people.\"<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n

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Tags<\/h3>\n <\/div>\n
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\n Archive<\/a>CAIR<\/a>Civil Rights<\/a>Discrimination<\/a>muslim americans<\/a> <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Shuttle America flight attendent who denied Muslim-American Tahera Ahmad an unopened can of cola because she could use it \u201cas a weapon” loses her wings. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16404,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_gspb_post_css":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[16402,2783,3357,4525,10030],"article-type":[],"topic-meta":[],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16403"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16403\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16404"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16403"},{"taxonomy":"article-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article-type?post=16403"},{"taxonomy":"topic-meta","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colorlines.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic-meta?post=16403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}