[greenlander]

Fortunately, FAA regulations also seem to require the flight attendants to sit in their seats during takeoff and landing.

Once the flight attendants are done "policing" the isles and get in their seats, I just take out my Kindle and start reading again.

So far, I haven't caused any aircraft crashes... and my fellow travelers have never called me out on it: apparently they also think the rules are stupid.

[look_lookatme]

And what's so difficult about following the rules and being inconvenienced for 20 minutes?

The amount of entitlement in this HN discussion is nuts.

[gnaffle]

Yep. At least some HN members will get the same attitude back at them in the form of their users bragging to others about how smart they are since they managed to bypass the company firewall or some such thing, and saying "so far, I haven't caused any security breaches, so it can't hurt"..

[enraged_camel]

I think you chose a bad example. Company firewalls exist to manage risk and liability for upper management, not to provide any type of real security. If a security incident happens, management wants to be able to say they did their due diligence and paid for the "best" firewall on the market.

[gnaffle]

Would say that a company would be equally well protected by having all computers on their network with reachable IPs, with no filtering whatsoever?

[Karunamon]

Following the rules simply for the sake of following the rules only does not make you better than anyone else, or noble, or good, or any other such thing. It makes you obedient.

[CamperBob2]

Following stupid rules empowers stupid people.

[look_lookatme]

Stupid is as stupid does right? Also when the going gets tough, the tough get going. And don't forget rome wasn't built in a day. A quitter never wins, and a winner never quits.

[CamperBob2]

Hacker News is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get.

For the record, I don't really advocate disobeying or even arguing with air crewmembers. That's a well-considered holdover from maritime law that probably goes back a thousand years: their boat, their rules. However, if nobody pushed back, the annoying parts of the rules would never be fixed.

[BlackDeath3]

It does sound a bit contrived, but I agree. Following rules 'cause they're rules doesn't set a good precedent.

[greenlander]

I spent a large part of my career working for a small company in Silicon Valley that became a Very Big Company.

One of the things that the CEO liked to do for a while is have a "lunch with the interns” during the summer. He’d chat with them and give them an opportunity to ask questions. As the manager of a lot of interns, I was also invited, and I often went. I was (and still am) on a first-name basis with the CEO.

One time an intern asked, “what do I need to become the CEO of a company like this?” The question made me laugh, because I already knew the answer. The answer is that there is no answer. You must have a vision about what you can do, and you must believe it. If you allow every idiot in the world to draw a box around your behavior, you won’t accomplish anything.

I know that the Kindle (with wifi off) isn't going to crash the airplane. Amazon knows that the Kindle isn't going to crash the airplane. So why should I respect the opinion of the flight attendant? The flight attendant is, after all, a flight attendant because they would have never had make it through differential equations without sleeping with the professor. So why should I give that ditz any respect?

This isn’t about ‘entitlement’. Take all that crap your professors at the university told you and put it in /dev/null where it belongs. Reframe the issue in terms of what is right and what is possible.

If you want to be truly successful, you must learn about breaking the rules. (And by “truly” successful, I mean truly successful. If your goal is to accumulate $800K in your 401K and own a house in Sunnyvale, California outright… well you can do that by following all the rules and following Company Policies.) Write your own rules in life.

Perhaps I already answered your question, “And what's so difficult about following the rules and being inconvenienced for 20 minutes.” And if you don’t feel that I did, it means that you’ll never find the answer.

Maybe you’ll find success. Or maybe you won’t. But the feeling will be liberating. There is no man like a free man.

[PhasmaFelis]

> The flight attendant is, after all, a flight attendant because they would have never had make it through differential equations without sleeping with the professor. So why should I give that ditz any respect?

I was with you until this smug bullshit. Using your Kindle during takeoff isn't entitled at all, but thinking your college grades make you a better person than a hard-working wage-earner is both ludicrously entitled and plain stupid.

Lemme clue you in here: The flight attendant knows your Kindle won't crash the plane. The gas station attendant knows your cell phone won't blow up the pump. They do not get to make the rules; they only get to follow them, or else lose their jobs. By all means, go about your business once the attendant is settled in for takeoff; but respect them while they're trying to do their job. They probably work harder than you, for less respect and less pay.

[austinz]

Thank you for proving the parent's point about entitlement. "So why should I give that ditz any respect?" Seriously? "There is no man like a free man"? As if reading your Kindle during takeoff is going to turn you into a Randian ubermensch ready to disrupt every industry in the world?

[BlackDeath3]

Sometimes, people actually are entitled. Something to think about.

This isn't to say that the engineer is necessarily correct and the flight attendant necessarily incorrect, and I don't agree that the "sleeping with the professor" statement can necessarily be applied in general, but following rules 'cause rules are rules is not really something to aspire to. It's unfortunate that for many, blind conformity seems to be the order of the day.

[austinz]

I agree with you. I think the rule is asinine as well, I'm glad it's dead, and I think we should be pushing back against stupid things. And following rules for rules' sake is a stupid thing.

But I don't think that meaningless platitudes or misogynistic stereotypes are a good justification for entitlement. Someone who's read the literature and understands why there's almost no way consumer electronics can affect a modern airliner's avionics might be more entitled than someone who thrives on 'breaking the rules' and thinks flight attendants are stupid 'ditzes'. What happens when that stupid ditz says something that turns out to be right?

[BlackDeath3]

>Someone who's read the literature and understands why there's almost no way consumer electronics can affect a modern airliner's avionics might be more entitled than someone who thrives on 'breaking the rules' and thinks flight attendants are stupid 'ditzes'.

I'm not really sure that we disagree here, although you seem to suggest that there is some mutual exclusion between people who are informed and people who enjoy breaking stupid rules, which is silly.

>What happens when that stupid ditz says something that turns out to be right?

I don't know, what happens? I didn't suggest that flight attendants are always wrong, nor that stupid people are always wrong (nor that flight attendants are always stupid). Though I think that my issue here is less about being factually correct and more about providing adequate justification for why you're correct.

[CamperBob2]

Try to exercise some abstract thinking once in a while. It will improve your programming skill if nothing else.

[look_lookatme]

I don't even understand what you are saying here. All you are doing is spewing anecdotes and platitudes.

You want to be successful I guess? Good for you. I don't know how that's germane to this discussion. Also don't assume everyone here went to university. And don't assume anyone shares your idea of what success is.

Now put your fucking Kindle away like everyone else or find a different way to get to where you are going. It's that simple.