Should we name and shame?

[gatbusdriver]

It has come to my attention that some people find it acceptable to name and shame crews on this forum (please see thread about some European cowboys!!!!!).

I personally find it disgusting that people find it acceptable to post the enough information to identify a sprcific flight, and hence crew, and then make some very damning accusations. Then we all get to see the ensuing witch hunt.

Surely on forums such as pprune it would be sensible to maintain the anonymity of the crew involved.

By all means post about what you see, and create an interesting and informative thread, just don’t identify the crew.

I am now worried that it is open season, and that many threads won’t start with a title, it will be all the flight information.

If you see something that is unsafe speak up. File an MOR.

[Flap62]

You say "name" and shame. Where in any of the posts does it mention names and even though it gives flight details, how prey are we going to find names from that?

[Avman]

FULLY AGREE gatbusdriver !

We all see things that we may question. However, more than not, we are not aware of all the FACTS. I fully support the use of PPRuNe to raise questions (I have plenty of my own), but not as a means of questioning individuals' professionalism based on personal opinion and devoid of pertinent background facts.

[gatbusdriver]

I don't want this thread to deal solely with the IB thread. I just want to find out if people find it ethical.

Flaps62......do you not think that giving all the details of the flight is naming and shaming? Lets say you give all the details of a flight I do one day. It wouldn't take much for all the pilots in my company to look at the master roster and work out who the crew is. Let alone the management etc

[DingerX]

again, I posted this in the main thread, and I'll put it here:

the original poster did not "name and shame." All he said was "yesterday" and "Airline XX at KXXX". The original thread title only made reference to the airline as in "Airline XX are YYs".

In the discussion, questions of fact arose. I - completely unrelated to the original poster - used what little details were provided, and dug up the appropriate information in very little time, and reported on the entire exchange, including the elements that the original poster was most likely unaware of.

There was also concern that calling the entire company a bunch of YYs was considered inappropriate. I assume that a moderator changed the title of the thread so as not to insult everybody.

Personally, I do not think that the original poster was trying to identify the crew, but the circumstances were so particular that people with no privileged access to information could easily figure it out.

So, read the thread in question, in its entirety, bearing in mind that the situation shifts away from semi-anonymity relatively late. Excluding the trolls on both sides (and those who apparently can't read), is there a qualitative difference in the discussion after confirmatory ATC recordings surface? Does anything improve, deteriorate or does it just not matter?

[gatbusdriver]

Hi Dinger

I started reading the thread from its infancy.

There was enough info to identify the exact flight number and date, without much effort. Which was exactly what happened.

Initially you could establish BOS, date and airline involved.

Regards

GBD

[Avman]

Dinger,

Just how many flights do you think that particular airline have out of that airport on a single day?!!

It might have been different if it had been say a Continental flight at Newark.

[DingerX]

I was just replying to this:

I personally find it disgusting that people find it acceptable to post the flight number, departure/destination and date, and then make some very damning accusations. Then we all get to see the ensuing witch hunt

.
The thread title has all that information, and it is powerful stuff, which I think we can all agree will attract attention to the crew. The problem is, it didn't originally have any of that.
Those guys really can't respond — I mean, it wouldn't be a good idea: they could get into an argument, for example, about a difference between "snow on the upper wing surface" and "snow adhering to the wing surface", and find themselves in deeper trouble than before.
But, on the other side, what should one do in a similar situation, where one believes (rightly or wrongly) there is a specific safety-critical practice and one observes people who "don't get it"? Suppressing date, location and any hint of the guilty party would have mitigated the impact of the statement, and the interest of the discussion (and no, the interest does not lie in the holier-than-thou and "spanish cowboys" comments). But in this case providing any one of those would generate enough information to get flight number, dep/dest, and date.
So what would be your ethical guidelines in a similar case?

[Airbus_a321]

In my opinion, we never should NAME AND SHAME anybody in this forum so to identify a specific flight or even a specific crew - that's unacceptable, unprofessional.
EXCEPT:
all the error-free PILOTS here in this forum, from a high sophisticated country and a high sophisticated airline where mistakes, wrong decissions etc. do not exist
O.k. allow them and give them the fun to blame, shame and name all the NON-ERROR-FREE colleagues.
Those, and only those who never did any mistakes in their daily business may have the first shot.