A racist man traveling on a Ryanair flight from Barcelona, Spain to London caused a ruckus because he did not want to sit next to an elderly woman. He was extremely ugly to her before the plane took off. Then, this happened:
The man was white, and she was black. Ryanair has been has been criticized for giving into his bad behavior rather than protecting the woman:
‘This is a Ryanair flight from Barcelona to London the racist old man didn’t not want to sit next to this elderly woman Because she was black & to him black People are dirty Instead of them escorting him off the flight or moving him they fulfilled his wishes and moved the woman
‘
‘This is a Ryanair flight from Barcelona to London the racist old man didn’t not want to sit next to this elderly woman Because she was black & to him black People are dirty
Instead of them escorting him off the flight or moving him they fulfilled his wishes and moved the woman? pic.twitter.com/g7k7M2S0rB— ??✨ || Nickisha ||✨?? (@NickiPlayhouse_) October 20, 2018
He threatened to physically “push” her into a different seat, shouting:
‘Don’t talk to me in a foreign language, you stupid ugly cow.’
The flight attendant came back to settle the issue. The woman said she wanted to sit with her daughter, and she urged the attendant to “kick him out.”
According to her daughter, her mother who is 77, has arthritis which makes her movements slow.
Another passenger, David Lawrence, filmed the incident and told BBC:
‘Everything was calm, we were getting ready to take off. And then a man came on board and arrived at his seat, then spoke very harshly to a woman sitting in the aisle seat. That was what got my attention as it was very loud and very aggressive. He started to shout at the woman, saying “get out of the way”, “move your feet,” “you shouldn’t be sitting here.” He pushed past the woman and went to his seat (with the) most disgusting exchange of racial slurs and foul language.’
Lawrence continued:
‘I am so shocked. There was no response (from most other passengers.) No-one said anything. The young man who actually intervened… he was compelled to step forward. (It was a) horrible, horrible situation. (He was) shocked (Ryanair) allowed something like this just to go unchecked.’
Ryanair spoke to the BBC, saying it would ban unruly passengers:
We operate strict guidelines for disruptive passengers and we will not tolerate unruly behaviour like this. We will be taking this matter further and disruptive or abusive behaviour like this will result in passengers being banned from travel.’
According to the Essex Police, they take “prejudice-based crime seriously:”
‘This incident, which we were made aware of this morning, is believed to have taken place on a plane at Barcelona Airport. Essex Police takes prejudice-based crime seriously and we want all incidents to be reported. We are working closely with Ryanair and the Spanish authorities on the investigation.’
Twitter world lit up after Lawrence posted his video online. Check out some of our favorites below:
Featured image via NickiSha Twitter page.
