A United Airlines flight attendant allegedly told a female passenger who was wearing a Pride month lesbian t-shirt that her choice of clothing was “deeply offensive.” There is, however, a slight complication to this story, and it might not have anything to do with the crew member being homophobic.
On Wednesday, United Airlines passenger Skye Smith posted on X that a flight attendant had called out her t-shirt as “deeply offensive,” and when she laughed nervously over the comment, the flight attendant didn’t back down and instead replied: “Seriously.”
But here’s the context. In her full post, Skye explains: “My flight attendant just made sure to let me know that my ‘lesbian as s**t’ shirt was ‘deeply offensive,’ and when I laughed nervously, she went ‘seriously. Happy Pride from United, I guess.”
Was the flight attendant homophobic, or was she just reacting to the curse word on the shirt? The internet is divided.
my flight attendant just made sure to let me know that my “lesbian as shit” shirt was “deeply offensive.” and when i laughed nervously she went “seriously.” 🤩 happy
— skye lorekeeper (@skyesmithdotjpg) June 17, 2026
pride from @united i guess
“Anything that has ‘s**t’ on the front isn’t really appropriate to fly in,” one person replied. “No matter the preceding word. It could have said ‘Christian as s**t,’ and she’d probably say the same thing.”
While someone else wrote: “Any t-shirt with any profanity on it is deeply offensive if worn in public. No different than a ‘F@&$ Joe Biden’ shirt. Not appropriate for wearing in public.”
Others, however, suggested that the flight attendant should toughen up, and if she couldn’t handle profanity, then she shouldn’t even be a crew member.
“If the profanity offended her, then she is weak in spirit and should not be a flight attendant,” one person responded, while another wrote: “Yikes! Imagine being so frail that you can’t handle a cute phrase on a t-shirt.”
Generally speaking, flight attendants really don’t care what passengers wear, but airlines do have dress codes that can see someone thrown off a plane for wearing an item of clothing that wouldn’t be an issue in other public spaces
United has its passenger dress code tucked deep inside its Conditions of Carriage, specifically, Section 21 (Refusal of Transport), subsection H.5, which states that the airline can refuse transport to “passengers who are barefoot, not properly clothed, or whose clothing is lewd, obscene or offensive.”
The policy has been significantly eased in recent years, given that at one point, United would refuse to transport non-rev standby passengers if they were wearing leggings. The airline changed its policy after a high-profile incident in 2017 when it was accused of sexism.
The problem with United’s current policy, though, is that it’s really open to interpretation. What might be considered “lewd, obscene, or offensive” to one person might not cause the slightest rise of an eyebrow in someone else.
Unfortunately, the question then comes down to whether the gate agents or flight attendants on any given flight consider someone’s clothing to be in violation of this policy.
If that were the case in this incident, Skye should probably consider herself lucky not to have been booted from the flight, or, at the very least, ordered to cover her t-shirt.
In 2021, American Airlines found out the hard way how difficult it is to police this kind of policy when crew members ordered a two-time cancer survivor to cover a sweater celebrating her recovery.
The offending shirt exclaimed: ‘F**K Cancer,’ which fell foul of AA’s dress code. Roslyn Singleton of North Carolina was told she had to cover the shirt if she wanted to fly.
In a statement issued at the time, American Airlines conceded that “in this instance, our team should have taken the broader context of the message displayed on the customer’s shirt into consideration when explaining our policies.”
The same people who are shocked by this particular act will react in the same way when THEY encounter someone wearing a “MAGA” cap or a “Trump” shirt. Both sides are conveniently offended when they wish to be.