Pilots are trained to be balanced and have plan B and C.
Hmm, sorry Cliff, but IMHO pilots
were trained to think outside the box and plan accordingly. It seems to me that the current generation of magenta line P2F/P4T pilots would make the average nazi proud: "Befehl ist Befehl" (orders are orders) is the motto that has taken over from the "safety first" mentality.
When your employer, rubber-stamped by the hopelessly incompetent authorities, shouts "JUMP!" then the only things you as a pilot have to ask are; "how high, how long and what's minimum rest?"
Just like the financial services industry nearly collapsed in 2008 due to 'self-regulation,' this of course is a crash waiting to happen but the airlines and authorities don't care because they have given themselves a 'stay out of jail card' in the form of "pilot error." The only 'authority' you have left as a pilot is to accept the blame if, God forbid, it all goes horribly wrong one day.
Having suffered from a serious bout of insomnia myself, I can only say that I now fully understand how chronic sleep deprivation (read: fatigue!) can be such an effective torture method, and that this very convenient side-effect from the EASA FTL's will turn the entire pilot workforce into docile lambs.
I've tried it all; flying turbo prop commuters, low cost and now long haul. The deflationary Tsunami of ever lower T&C's and ever more lethal FTL's is continuing it's devastating path, and from a 40 year old pilot's perspective there just does not seem to be any more high ground left to escape to.
There is only one escape left: GET OUT WHILE YOU STILL CAN, and leave the industry to the dumb idiots paying for 500 hours on a 737.