American Airlines STILL has woman-only subsite - tell them what you think

MANN veterans will I hope remember this story, published almost a year ago today. Well, American Airlines is STILL publicizing woman-only special services at http://www.aa.com/women.

Today, AA had to cancel 1,000+ flights to check the wiring on their planes, leaving huge numbers of travelers stranded or scrambling for alternate transportation. This is, as they say, bad press. Does AA really need to be exacerbating their customer-relations problems by *continuing* to vend out a set of services and discounts that excludes half of the human population (and probably a majority of their customers) because of one indelible trait? No.

Personally, this issue really gets under my skin. AA is a common carrier that is blatantly saying "We like having women on our planes so much we'll give them discounts to fly on them!" Do they do this for any other group of people typified by a born characteristic, such as skin color, eye color, etc.? No, they don't. Men as a group can be gleefully discriminated against-- not by denying services explicitly to us but by granting special treatment to everyone *but* us. Same old song and dance, anyway you slice it, men are the 'bad smell' in the room, or in this case, main cabin; they don't mind men flying planes, servicing planes, managing planes, it's just that well, they rather like the nice perfumy smell of ladies about, and so... well, you understand, right?

No, I don't.

What's funny ("funny"?) about this is that most people on the Bd. of Dirs. of AA are men! Men once again screwing over men... just lovely.

Contact information for American Airlines is as follows:

Customer service web-mail form here. (Update 4-10-08 9:30 AM ET: It seems the webmail form is not loading. Perhaps between the irate passengers and us, they decided to take it down. No matter, we still have their direct e-mail addresses and fax number. Don't let a little thing like an inaccessible web page stop you from exercising your First Amendment rights!)

Bd. of Directors listed here. The Chmn and CEO is Mr. Gerard J. Arpey whose bio is here. I think he should hear about this matter directly, don't you? Contact him at gerard.arpey-at-aa.com and be sure to cc Investor.Relations-at-aa.com and customer.relations-at-aa.com.

Fax number: (817) 967-4162

If you prefer phone, here are a few ways to call in:
(817) 963-1234
(817) 967-2000
(800) 433-7300
Dial 00, then say "yes" when asked about speaking to an agent.

AA's listed investor relations number is 817-931-3423. Will YOU be buying AA stock any time soon?

And finally, snail mail:

AMR Corporation - Investor Relations
MD 5651
P.O. Box 619616
Dallas/Fort Worth Airport, Texas 75261-9616

American Airlines Customer Relations
P.O. Box 619612 MD 2400
DFW Airport, TX 75261-9612

Note that since AA has canceled so many flights today, it is likely their phone lines will be jammed with irate stranded passengers for the next two or three days. That's OK, that is what e-mail is for. And fax machines. And you can always call tomorrow or Friday-- businesses just LOVE getting tons of customer complaints at week's end, especially right after they have had major operational problems! Timing is everything. :)

And remember, these people live in their wallets-- tell them why you don't think their discriminatory policies are good for business and how AA can ill-afford, and the airline business in general, to treat customers in such a blatantly discriminatory fashion. And customer-favoritism *is* discrimination-- just the shinier side of the "bigotry coin", but the same coin nonetheless.