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1.媒體來源:

經濟學人  The Economist

2.完整新聞標題:

Many airlines shamelessly exploit female sexuality

許多航空公司無恥濫用女體 物化女性

3.完整新聞內文:

大意就是說亞洲的航空公司只用外表選人，跟能力無關，根本身體歧視。有物化女性，父
權之嫌。

EVERY December, more than 1,000 female high school students, some as young as
15, take part in a “bikini competition” held in the eastern Chinese city of
Qingdao. The event, hosted by Oriental Beauty, a modelling agency, provides a
platform for aspiring flight attendants to show off their bikini bodies to eag
er recruiters from the Chinese airline industry. Those deemed the most attract
ive are invited to join a fast-track flight attendant trainee scheme, which ca
n open the door to a dream job at one of China’s big airlines.
Many Chinese and other Asian airlines shamelessly exploit female sexuality. At
 China Southern Airlines, air hostesses must be 25 or younger and must not hav
e “X or O shaped legs”. Stewardesses at Japan Airlines need to have “good s
kin complexion”. Indonesia’s flag carrier, Garuda Indonesia, which Skytrax d
eclared had the world's best cabin staff in 2016 (not a single Western airline
 made the shortlist), refuses to hire older, married women. VietJet Air, Vietn
am’s low-cost carrier, requires that its female flight attendants be under 30
 years old, be between 1.60-1.75m tall and apply “bold makeup”; the airline
made a name for itself a few years back when its bikini-clad flight attendants
 were filmed performing sensual mid-flight dances to the delight of ogling mal
e passengers.

If any airline in America or Europe today were to adopt such discriminatory hi
ring practices, it would doubtless be greeted by a deluge of lawsuits. A fligh
t attendant's job is to ensure passengers’ safety and security. A pleasant de
meanor and an ability not to spill coffee on passengers' laps are also handy.
But the fact remains: sex sells. For some passengers, the aesthetic qualities
of flight attendants are an integral part of the overall quality of service.
Some Western airlines seem to recognise as much, even if they are reluctant to
 admit it publicly. Ryanair started selling in 2008 an annual charity calendar
 featuring its most glamorous female flight attendants, all skimpily dressed a
nd in seductive poses. Despite being popular among its passengers, a public ba
cklash ultimately forced Michael O’Leary, the airline’s boss, to scrap the i
dea in 2015.

Others carriers' hiring strategies can be open to interpretation. Swiss Intern
ational Air Lines stipulates that its flight attendants must be of “a normal
weight”, ostensibly for safety reasons. There may be a legitimate reason why
cabin crew cannot be overly obese: the aisle of an aeroplane is sometimes just
 51cm wide. But in what some might consider a Freudian slip, its online recrui
tment page explains: “We don’t require a particular body mass index, but ins
tead look at the candidate’s overall appearance.” A company spokesman says i
t wants cabin staff who are well-groomed and who have impeccable manners. The
cynical might be forgiven for seeing in such vagueness a license to cherry-pic
k the most comely.

Female cabin crew, it goes without saying, should be chosen for their abilitie
s not their allure. But beyond basic equality, there is also a darker side to
the sexualisation of women working at 30,000 feet. According to a recent artic
le in Vice:

The International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF), who represent over 600,
000 aviation industry workers worldwide, say the most common complaints they h
ear from cabin crew relate to "physical contact and inappropriate advances." M
ost of these are anonymous and don't mention the airline, as many flight atten
dants are fearful of losing their jobs for speaking out.

As one airline employee puts it, the dark force that drives such assaults is
“the pernicious trope of the flight attendant as a sexual conquest”. Beauty
pageants and semi-nude calendars are part of the problem. Modern passenger jet
s have come a long way since the 1960s. Time for the attitude of the airlines
that fly them to follow.

4.完整新聞連結 (或短網址):

http://tinyurl.com/jk8xg8w

5.備註:

亞洲航空選空姐的標準本來就很變態

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