Something ugly going on. The company needs to sort it. It sounds to me like the company has allowed these people to carry a very unpleasant burden for 24 years.
I know I have been 'nobbled' on several occasions.
It is one step away from insanity to intentionally poison your pilot, but it happens. Those tending to do it are the older, embittered females with a grudge, real or imagined, or the young aggressive 'why are you paid more than me? We all do the same job'-type males with a real problem about 'overpaid pilots'.
At one point it looked as if we were getting some facts and then it turned out that the (newly registered) poster who claimed to be a F/A on the flight and claimed to be giving the 'facts' was (ab)using PPRuNe to pursue a grudge against the captain.
Although I have been flying for many years, and have come across a few people who warranted a healthy chat on the ground, I can honestly say that I have never even come close to having to consider a diversion to deal with a problem of this nature. Further, I cannot recall anybody else I know having to do this.
From the quotes above and others, it would appear that this is a more endemic problem in some companies than I and probably many other people would seem to appreciate. If so, then it is clearly a CRM issue with significant adverse aspects with regards to the safety and regularity of certain flights.
Why would you want to "let sleeping dogs lie", if as you state you have "been nobbled on several occaissions" yourself? It sounds like in some quarters there are potentially serious safety issues that are clearly not being addressed. CRM is not something that should break down to the level where aircraft are diverted to offload offending crewmembers as a matter of routine to be dismissed.
It seems there is a conflict between an open safety culture and some disturbing allegations of totally unacceptable and certainly unprofessional behaviour. If you are going to advance the argument that this should be quickly swept under the carpet, and kept "in house," then it might be better the results of such actions are not plastered across CNN!
This isn't a rush to judgment, it is a concern of some of the darker aspects being suggested in this thread. If this flight had diverted to remove a crewmember or passenger who was unwell it wouldn't likely have lasted a day in this forum or made the news. If it had diverted for an unruly or violent passenger, it probably wouldn't have grown beyond a page or two. The reason that it has, is because there is clearly more to this issue than simply a normal diversion that didn't inconvenience everybody too much.