ADFS,
I am not posting here to please you nor to become your friend.
You came on a professional forum to share your experience. Expect to face different opinion and counter-arguments, this is a democracy play. You actually discriminated yourself, just like EK did, when you opposed yourself to "the zillion of game boy and girls". If you categorize people, don't expect a run-for-profit airline to do it other way.
I never judged you and/or your acts, just emitted some thoughts and questionned your reasonning (especially your curious correlation between safety and experience only).
And...sometimes you mixed up everything: where do you pay your taxes? Somewhere in EU I suppose. So if you thought you had any right regarding employement/age discrimination issue, please refer to your local authorities 'cause UAE is not EU!
Dicrimination is legal here:
CHAPTER II
EMPLOYMENT OF WORKERS, JUVENILES AND WOMEN
SECTION I
EMPLOYMENT OF WORKERS
ARTICLE (9)
Work is a right of the United Arab Emirates Nationals. Others may not by employed in
the United Arab Emirates except as provided for in this Law and its executive orders.
ARTICLE (10)
In the event of non-availability of national workers, preference shall be given to:
1.Arab workers who are nationals of an Arab Country.
2.Workers of other nationalities.
Food for thought:...and that was well before the crisis:
Age Discrimination Is Still a Harsh Reality
09/ 12/ 2006
by Charles R. McConnell
A 60-year-old engineer who found himself unemployed when his company folded immediately began seeking a new job, but after six months of active searching, he remained unemployed. During those months, he found out about several jobs he could've had, including positions as a video store clerk, supermarket stock handler and courier driver. He received no offers in his primary field, although there was supposedly a demand for engineers locally.
Another unemployed professional on the edge of the Baby-Boomer age distributed dozens of résumés with no success. An outplacement counselor suggested that she rewrite her résumé in tighter, less detailed form so that a reader could no longer infer her approximate age. The new résumé earned her a few responses, but she never got past an initial interview. As she noted, "They simply have to see me to tell how old I am."
Unfortunately, age discrimination is alive and operating in most areas of American business. It potentially affects all older workers. Sometimes, it's a problem for older workers who have been steadily employed at the same jobs, but find themselves pushed out for a variety of "other" reasons. It's a significantly greater problem for those who seek to change jobs or find new employment following layoffs or retirement.
Age discrimination flourishes in spite of legislative prohibitions. The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 established 40 as the age at which legal protection begins, and it boosted the age at which someone could be made to retire from 65 to 70. A subsequent amendment removed the mandatory retirement limit entirely.
Because age discrimination is illegal, only one question can legally be asked about an individual's age on a job application or during an interview: Are you at least 18 years of age? And this question exists only because of the implications of child-labor laws. Age can only be a legitimate factor in employment or retirement for jobs in which it's a bona fide occupational qualification. This would include an airline pilot, a police officer or a firefighter, for example.
Even so, age discrimination problems are numerous. For several years, age-discrimination complaints have been one of the two most active categories of discrimination charges (the other is sex discrimination, primarily sexual harassment). And age discrimination charges have been steadily increasing as the number of workers in their 40s and 50s grow. The number of age bias complaints filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission increased more than 40 percent from 1999 to 2002, and it continues to grow as more and more Baby Boomers age.
Most laws addressing employment have their weaknesses, but most of the age problem lies not in the state of legislation but in attitudes of employers toward older workers. Many employers automatically see older workers as less productive and less willing to learn than younger workers and view older workers as costlier than others to keep on the payroll. Yet it has been demonstrated repeatedly that older workers are absent less frequently than younger workers and are less likely to contribute to rapid turnover.
Looking at aging workers from the employer's perspective, we can perhaps partly understand why many companies are reluctant to hire older employees, especially for professional or managerial positions. It can cost a considerable amount to hire someone for a responsible position and bring that person up to speed, and employers don't care to spend such resources on someone they perceive as unlikely to remain for long. And some employers assume that older applicants want non-demanding employment or part-time work only.
A number of steps have been taken to encourage older workers to remain in or return to the workforce. A few years ago, the government removed the Social Security earnings limitation so that an individual can now earn any amount through work without experiencing reduced Social Security benefits. Also, changes in retirement plans and the rules governing them have altered many plans so much that the capacity to accrue benefits is no longer cut off at some arbitrary number of years.
We hear much about increasing opportunity for older workers. One pamphlet distributed to seniors proclaimed: "There's good news for workers age 50 and older. You're becoming an increasingly hot commodity." In practice, however, many seniors see this as a good news-bad news situation––with the good news being that jobs are there, at least in some areas, but the bad news being that most of the jobs truly available to seniors are of entry-level caliber.
It should be interesting to see how this all plays out as significantly increasing numbers of Baby Boomers age into their 60s and discover that "ageism" is not only real but strongly entrenched as well.