Pilots = Individuals with good motor skills and a reasonable intellect.
Given the flat promotion structure and the somewhat 'Hollywood' aura surrounding the job, most pilots soon think they know more about everyone else's job, from the CEO downwards that the incumbents of those jobs.
They then tend to believe they are the most important people in the Airline, something to do with the 'front-of-the-aeroplane' syndrome, not to mention the uniform.
Inevitably, they clash with the professional businessmen and accountants who actually run the business, NB BUSINESS.
Given that BALPA is a union, it behaves like a union, (even though most pilots feel themselves above the likes of the GMB or the TUC) and equally inevitably the union loses or the firm goes bust. Now factor in high oil prices and green political agendae - there was more chance of Scargill winning his miners' strike than there is of BALPA winning a Porsche Picket Line duel.
Sad - but true.