Originally Posted by
parabellum
Expecting everyone will bow and scrape accordingly whilst acceding to their every whim
I think 95% of passengers would happily skip the 'bow and scrape' bit and would be delighted if the airline staff would act professional, follow the airline's own rules and procedures consistently, and tell the truth.
because they think they know better than the trained professionals. Trained professionals who have every bit as much concern for their own safety as they do for their passengers.
We're forgetting that passengers, in deciding whether or not to listen to the PA, aren't going to draw a distinction between the trained professionals in the cockpit and other "airline employees" (a group that, in fact, includes ground staff at the airport and people who aren't even airline employees), and to the extent that these "airline employees" have demonstrated a general lack of a clue, have acted capriciously, have withheld important information, or have outright lied, passengers will decide accordingly whether or not to follow instructions.