Why does it seem so easy to become an expert in determining airline safety?
As long as the public is of the
opinion that you are an expert in anything, you are an expert, its as simple as that.
Working pilots are highly reluctant to offer a public opinion, and are probably forbidden by their employers from doing so. When the latest disaster occurs, this leaves a vacuum for sound bites that the "Aviation Expert" Geoffrey Thomas
et al would love nothing better than to fill, further enhancing their public credibility as an expert. They become the go-to guys, because they will always provide an "independent expert" comment for a desperate media. Twitter & other social media increase the speed of, & heighten the hunger for information.
Pilot unions & associations are the only public voice pilots have and are dismissed as seeking improvements to T&C's under the guise of safety. Advertising spend determines the required editorial slant about the evils of the greedy unions in the major media.
We have moved well beyond (possibly, it never existed) a fact & reason based public mind, to one based almost entirely on opinion, an opinion that can be influenced, moulded & persuaded. He who has the biggest megaphone controls the narrative, and therefore opinion.
PR 101.
Unfortunately it will take a lot more smoking holes in the ground before the captured regulators are forced to behave as regulators, not clients.