0302270239
DETROIT FREE PRESS
030227
Thursday, February 27, 2003
METRO FINAL
1C
MITCH ALBOM FREE PRESS COLUMNIST
Copyright (c) 2003, Detroit Free Press
PLANE TRUTH COSTS ATTENDANT HER JOB
Lisa Kesner is looking for a job. She used to be a flight attendant. She
worked for several years on the Red Wings' private plane, where she was
reportedly conscientious and safety-oriented. You know, the things you want in
a flight attendant.
That is, if you're a regular person, flying commercial. If you're a
multimillionaire athlete, flying private, you may have different expectations.
Kesner ran headfirst into those expectations in the spring of 2000, on her
first flight with the Tigers, her new assignment. "The minute they got on,
they were yelling, cursing, demanding beer," she says. "During my safety
briefing someone yelled, 'Who cares? We're all gonna die anyhow!'
"Next thing I know, we're up in the air and the players have porno sites on
their laptop computers. They thought it was funny. They'd call me over to ask
for a drink, and they'd have the porno tilted right at me. I didn't know what
to say -- so I just turned around."
Such behavior -- what we used to call being a lady -- quickly earned Kesner
the designation of "bitch." That's the polite word. We can't print some of the
other ones.
Kesner, an attractive woman in her mid-30s, didn't want to party with the
players. She didn't want to drink with them. She wasn't one of the "fun
girls," a designation she says players used for some younger, wilder flight
attendants. Kesner didn't condone players touching her or making sexual
remarks or drunken insults.
"I have a husband and two sons," she says. "These players thought girls were
pretty much there to be all over them. But I wasn't."
Smoking in the lavatory
Things got worse as the season progressed. One time, she says, she saw smoke
"pluming out" of the lavatory after a player exited. She warned them that the
flight was non-smoking. She informed the captain, which was her job.
"After that," she says, "they were furious at me. One of them told me to get
my 'ass' away from them. Another told me never to come near them again.
"They'd put pillow cases over the smoke detectors. I mean, that's dangerous.
They wanted someone to close their eyes and serve them beer and let them treat
them like garbage."
Why didn't she complain? She did, she says. But the pilot, who helped make the
assignments, was unresponsive. So were some management people. She continued
to be assigned to the back of the plane -- Section D, they called it -- where
the rowdiest players would congregate. She tried to endure it. She wanted the
job.
On the last road trip of the season, some players came on dressed in Hooters
Girls outfits. They told Kesner "not to stare at their private parts. They
thought it was hysterical."
That did it, she says. She covered her head with a blanket and refused to work
the rest of the flight.
Are companies afraid to hire her?
Now, a lot of us put up with things on the job. But in most workplaces, the
Tigers' behavior would bring a lawsuit, if not a whole bunch of them. Still,
Kesner was hoping only to return to the saner world of the Red Wings' flights.
("Those players were always polite and respectful," she says.) Then she
learned the company was being restructured. She was "let go." Most of the
other workers, including other flight attendants, were immediately rehired by
the "new" company. Kesner was not.
So she sued. She charged harassment. And a jury, after hearing from her as
well as the players -- one of whom said, "If I called her a bitch, it's
because she must have called me a bitch" -- decided she was right. A judge
called the players' behavior "shameful and disgraceful." The jury awarded her
$200,000 in damages.
She is yet to see that, of course. The Tigers and the Ilitch family are
talking appeal. It could take years. Meanwhile, Kesner no longer has her
income (she says it was around $50,000 annually if working both teams). She
sends out resumes. Nobody bites.
"I've been told other teams are afraid to hire me. They think I'm a
whistle-blower."
Now, I wasn't there. You weren't there. But even the Tigers admit their recent
teams have been dopey and out of control -- particularly off the field. It's
one reason Alan Trammell and Kirk Gibson were brought in. To restore decorum.
So I don't doubt much of what Kesner says is true. The jury didn't doubt it,
either.
But she's the one unemployed. The players are still out there, if not on
Detroit's roster, then on another. Wherever they are, they might want to talk
to an older coach or manager and ask what it was like in the "olden" days,
when players flew commercial flights, like normal human beings. Grabbing,
insulting, cursing or harassing flight attendants wouldn't get laughs; it
would get you arrested.
"Companies are leery of me," Kesner says. "They think, 'If I hire her, she'll
sue me.' It's maddening, but that's how it works."
Perhaps. But if the measure of an employee is how well he or she follows rules
and guidelines, it seems like the wrong party is looking for a job.
Contact MITCH ALBOM at 313-223-4581 or albom@freepress.com. Catch "The Mitch
Albom Show" 3-6 p.m. weekdays on WJR-AM (760).
THIS ELECTRONIC VERSION MAY DIFFER SLIGHTLY FROM THE PRINTED ARTICLE.
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