‘Taliban Not In Charge’: US Passenger Slams Airline For Scolding Her For Being Braless

Lisa Archbold, an American woman, said she was threatened with being kicked off a US Delta Air Lines flight because she was not wearing a bra. She and her attorney demanded a meeting with the company’s top boss on Thursday to protest what she thinks is a discriminatory policy, according to a report by AFP.

Lisa Archbold said she wore baggy jeans and a loose white t-shirt — with no bra. Shortly after she boarded the plane, a female gate agent temporarily escorted her off the flight and demanded she cover up even though her breasts were not visible.

“It felt like a scarlet letter was being attached to me. I felt it was a spectacle aimed at punishing me for not being a woman in the way she thought I should be a woman as she scolded me outside of the plane,” Archbold, 38 and a DJ by profession, who was flying from Salt Lake City in conservative Utah to the famously liberal San Francisco, said in a press conference with her attorney Gloria Allred.

She claimed that the Delta agent said her attire was “revealing” and “offensive” and that airline policy was not to allow passengers dressed that way to travel.

She said that the agent told her if she put a jacket over her t-shirt, she would be allowed to continue her journey. Attorney Gloria Allred said she had written to Delta on behalf of Archbold demanding a meeting with the company’s president to discuss the discriminatory policy.

“Male passengers are not required to cover up their t-shirts with a shirt or a jacket. They also do not have to wear a bra to board or remain on a plane and women should not have to wear one either. Last I checked, the Taliban are not in charge of Delta,” she said.

Allred said US federal rules allow airlines to remove passengers who present a safety or security risk to the plane or its passengers, but that was clearly not the case with Archbold.

“Neither her breasts nor any other woman’s breasts have ever tried to take over a plane. Breasts are not weapons of war, and it’s not a crime for a woman or girl to have them,” Allred said.

The attorney said there were currently no plans for a lawsuit and that all she and Archbold wanted was a meeting with Delta’s president to ensure assurances their policies would be updated.

In response to AFP inquiries, a spokesperson for the company said: “Earlier this year, Delta representatives contacted this customer with an apology”.