Originally Posted by
SATCOS WHIPPING BOY
Anyone stop to consider that BAME is statistically under represented as pilots because:
a) They don't want to be pilots.
b) Family and cultural pressures steer them to more "respectable" occupations like doctors, solicitors, accountants or surgeons.
Junior may wish to become the newer model E-Reg, but that matters not if mummy and daddy want to say their child is an important banker in the City.
I am all for getting the right person for the job no matter what their creed or colour or limb count, but the bottom line is they have to want to do it, and they need family support before any positive-discrimination vid will have an impact.
As a parting shot, I think every "White Male Pilot" should reply to Sarah and Gareth with a simple "Why can I not apply?"
Excellent points, SWB. A couple of years ago I was sat for the duration of a ~10 hour flight next to an extremely pleasant, intelligent and urbane young man of Indian descent, who had just left school with excellent results in all subjects. He'd been in and enjoyed Air Cadets or ATC, whatever it was at the time - in fact it was one of his main topics of conversation - but was off to university to do an economics/business degree.
I don't know what guided his decision, but it may well have been parental pressure. Equally, I guess, it may have been his own decision based on other reasons, but he was certainly going to miss the aviation environment.