Virgin happy to score points at the expense of Qantas’ ‘eat meat or starve’ policy

With Qantas’ snub to vegetarian, kosher, halal and gluten-free passengers still exciting plenty of media interest yesterday, rival Virgin was only too happy to point out it doesn’t share the contempt of the “national carrier” for anyone who doesn’t like eating animals. Virgin continues to offer vegetarian meals to all business and economy passengers, it said yesterday.

While the nature of the meal you get on board might not outweigh flight availability and price for most travellers, the latest insult by Qantas is all part of what might be called the Joycification of the airline, in which a creeping contempt slowly extends across all facets of the company — first to its workers, and then to customers — that reduces the Qantas experience to a succession of impositions, insults and inconveniences provided by overworked, underpaid and wholly unappreciated staff.

Given Virgin can still offer vegetarian meals, there’s no clear reason why Qantas has to nickel-and-dime passengers by offering such a steadily diminishing range of fare (the term is used generously) in its own cabins, beyond a desire to make flying as unpleasant as possible.

Possibly that’s Joyce’s strategy for reducing pressure on an airline he’s stripped of workers.