Can We Still Fly Safely With Muslims?

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At 34,000 feet, political correctness is a safety hazard.

Since FlyDubai Flight FZ1073, a question has been drifting down airplane aisles. Passengers glance at the name on a boarding pass, the bearded man in the next seat, the pilot rolling past the gate, even a flight attendant in a veil. Few say it aloud, but many are thinking it: Is this person one of them? Families who once boarded without a thought now study the faces around them, and Muslims who have done nothing wrong feel the stares.

We now know that the FlyDubai Indian captain was stabbed in his own cockpit by a Muslim. Imagine he had grown suspicious of his co-pilot and refused to fly with him. The airline would probably have disciplined him, and social media would have branded him a bigot and — wait for it — an Islamophobe. Instead, he trusted his co-pilot, who then stabbed him and tried to crash a plane carrying 174 people, 27 of them children. The “Islamophobe” label would have cost the captain his reputation. Political correctness nearly cost him his life and the lives of many innocents.