'Rapping Flight Attendant' on Southwest: Please Don't

Just when you think things on board an airplane couldn't get more annoying, here's this YouTube hit showing some offensively self-regarding Southwest male flight attendant asking for "audience participation" from the passengers so he can sing the safety instructions in rap. And some knucklehead passengers encourage this character by clapping out the beat. (The clip is evidently at least a month old, but it keeps getting rejuvenated online).

We have far too much "performing" in this culture, if you ask me. Does the pitch-challenged Susan Boyle warbling that execrable Les Mis anthem not provide enough noise bouncing around in our heads?

Coerced "audience participation" is one of the lowest forms of performance, even lower than street-mimes and that "Grandma" clown at the Big Apple circus who's going to get knocked on his smug kiester by an angry audience member one of these Christmases.

An airplane is a confined space, crammed cheek to jowl with a captive audience. It is not like the set for the nitwits on American Idol.

So I am begging you, do not let this spread. Please resist the urge, you flight attendants who want to recite doggerel, juggle, do interpretive dance, try stand-up comedy, or, God help us, force us to listen to you sing. Please just read the safety instructions, fasten seat belts, and shut the hell up. Oh, and I'd like a cranapple juice, please. "Hey yo up there acting like a goose; stop that crappy rappin', get the dude a juice."

Word.

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