Everyone has an opinion on what happened to Tamika Cross – the disagreement is over whether the discrimination she suffered was due to race, age or gender – or perhaps a combination of all three.
Who is Tamika Cross, you ask? She is, in her own words, a ‘ young, corporate America(n) working woman of color’, who believes she suffered discrimination because of either one or all these traits of hers combined on a Delta airlines flight a week or so back.
Cross narrated her story on Facebook, where it has since attracted a lot of attention plus comments from people within her demographics, outlining similar experiences.
She was on a flight when a man had what can only be described as a medical emergency. When the air hostess assisting the man called if there was a doctor on board, Tamika got up to offer her services. But that’s when things started getting weird, as the attendant refused to believe she was a doctor, interrogating her credentials instead of allowing her to help the man.
Yet when a WHITE MALE doctor eventually turned up, he was allowed to help without any similar interrogation.
For the rest, let’s turn to her widely shared Facebook post…
I’m sure many of my fellow young, corporate America working women of color can all understand my frustration when I say I’m sick of being disrespected.
Was on Delta flight DL945 and someone 2 rows in front of me was screaming for help. Her husband was unresponsive. I naturally jumped into Doctor mode as no one else was getting up. Unbuckle my seatbelt and throw my tray table up and as I’m about to stand up, flight attendant says “everyone stay calm, it’s just a night terror, he is alright”. I continue to watch the scene closely.
A couple mins later he is unresponsive again and the flight attendant yells “call overhead for a physician on board”. I raised my hand to grab her attention. She said to me “oh no sweetie put ur hand down, we are looking for actual physicians or nurses or some type of medical personnel, we don’t have time to talk to you” I tried to inform her that I was a physician but I was continually cut off by condescending remarks.
Then overhead they paged “any physician on board please press your button”. I stare at her as I go to press my button. She said “oh wow you’re an actual physician?” I reply yes. She said “let me see your credentials. What type of Doctor are you? Where do you work? Why were you in Detroit?” (Please remember this man is still in need of help and she is blocking my row from even standing up while
Bombarding me with questions).
I respond “OBGYN, work in Houston, in Detroit for a wedding, but believe it or not they DO HAVE doctors in Detroit. Now excuse me so I can help the man in need”. Another “seasoned” white male approaches the row and says he is a physician as well. She says to me “thanks for your help but he can help us, and he has his credentials”. (Mind you he hasn’t shown anything to her. Just showed up and fit the “description of a doctor”) I stay seated. Mind blown. Blood boiling. (Man is responding the his questions and is seemingly better now Thank God)
Then this heifer has the nerve to ask for my input on what to do next about 10 mins later. I tell her we need vitals and blood sugar. She comes back to report to me a BP of 80/50 (super low, to my non medical peeps) and they can’t find a glucometer. We continue down that pathway of medical work up, but the point is she needed my help and I continued to help despite the choice words I had saved up for her. The patient and his wife weren’t the problem, they needed help and we were mid flight.
She came and apologized to me several times and offering me skymiles. I kindly refused. This is going higher than her. I don’t want skymiles in exchange for blatant discrimination. Whether this was race, age, gender discrimination, it’s not right. She will not get away with this….and I will still get my skymiles….
On the spectrum, how much of the hostesses hesitation was due to Tamika’s age, colour or gender? Whichever it was, her thick headedness could have cost a man his life, as Tamika noted. Thankfully, none of that really occurred in the end.
This post was published on October 15, 2016 10:58 AM
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