Comment by socalgal2
5 days ago
This "high power distance" culture contributed to several airline crashes in the 80s and 90s because people under the captain wouldn't dare to question the captain's decisions.
One in particular: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Air_Flight_801
Malcolm Campbell popularized this theory. It's not entirely without merit but as ever the reality is more nuanced. NTSB:
> The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the captain's failure to adequately brief and execute the non-precision approach and the first officer's and flight engineer's failure to effectively monitor and cross-check the captain's execution of the approach. Contributing to these failures were the captain's fatigue and Korean Air's inadequate flight crew training. Contributing to the accident was the Federal Aviation Administration's intentional inhibition of the minimum safe altitude warning system at Guam and the agency's failure to adequately manage the system.
*Gladwell - Malcolm Campbell died long ago
This has been a pretty common reason for accidents all over the world. It's one of the most important reason CRM (Crew Resource Management) has been so instrumental at preventing accidents in aviation.
CRM is basically a system of cockpit communication and coordination techniques developed to prevent accidents caused by poor teamwork or hierarchical barriers between pilots - like requiring pilots to ask for input from co-pilots in difficult situations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crew_resource_management
Assuming the "power distance" is pre-existing - I find honorifics make it much easier to challenge someone in authority. If you start with a Mr/Mrs Blah or Professor Blah and then present critcism.. it typically comes off better. B/c you are showing you're not too chummy and you're strongly implying you respect them (at least somewhat).
Ex: You're in a lecture and you tell your professor "Professor X, I think on slide 10 there is a mistake". This comes off much better than "Hey Bob, I think there is a mistake on slide 10"
So at least personally, if appropriate, I default to using honorifics b/c it makes people feel better. (Unless they for some reason want to be seen as your peer - which does happen rarely)
Yeah in my personal experience I like honorifics for the same reason. Not possible in English but in the other languages I know I make it a point to address everyone (except family and friends) with the higher honorific. Especially restaurant staff or other service workers. Sometimes I wish English had an easy way for me to convey "I respect you" as subtext.
>Sometimes I wish English had an easy way for me to convey "I respect you" as subtext.
I find that sir/ma'am plus politeness (please, thank you, etc.) works nicely.
While there is the chance that you might misgender someone with that, that's not very common (at least for me) as long as you, you know, pay attention.
That said unless they have a note tattooed on their forehead with their preferred term of address, I can only use non-language cues to determine the appropriate term.
On the rare occasions where I use the wrong term and am corrected, I am fastidious in adhering to the requested term(s).
None of that's is rocket surgery, just simple respect for other humans IMHO.
That sounds like pop science. I find it funny culture is used to describe why things fail in Asia, but when things fail in the West, it’s because of that individual person‘s actions.
Kind of makes sense when you think about it, since if the person is describing it in English at least there's a good chance they are from the West.
Relevant:
Nathan Fielder's show "The Rehearsal" on HBO recently released season 2, the entire season is about airline cockpit dynamics between the first officer and the pilot.
Also: PIA 8303 https://www.dailyo.in/variety/pakistan-flight-crash-pia-flig...
BTW, the magnificent Admiral Cloudberg has an article on this one:
https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/insanity-in-the-air-the-...