Chuchinchow
You may choose to call criticism a near-pathological hatred but that's your interpretation. I, and clearly others who use this forum, also have what you would call a near-pathological hatred for BA, after a series of incidents during which we were mistreated, lied to, and severely inconvenienced, by ground staff and a sales manager.
Their service in the air, before I decided to stop flying with them, varied from generally good to very mediocre, and the state of some of their aircraft on which I had the misfortune to travel would have been a disgrace to many third world carriers.
As to why people continue to fly with them, it may be that there is sometimes no choice, as happened to me a couple of weeks ago when I needed to fly on a route that only they served. As it was, they announced the strike before I made my booking, and did me a huge favour. The flights I would have booked on were cancelled. Any last chance they might have had of winning me back has been scuppered, for ever. One might argue that the strike is not BA's fault, and whilst there is some validity in that, if their so-called management had taken a different line with the rabble-rousers at an earlier stage, the strikes may well have been prevented.