With the recent and frequent plane crashes, folks online have taken to dark humor in posting plane crash memes. In some of the posts, they joke about not flying unless their pilot is a DEI hire or that they know it is going to be a bad flight when they see that their pilot is a 30-something-year-old white guy.
The jokes making the rounds on X, formerly known as Twitter, and other social media platforms are a tongue-in-cheek reaction to the growing backlash against corporate diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, particularly in high-stakes industries like aviation. Given the frequency of plane crashes (which, despite how it feels, are still statistically rare), it’s an especially sharp bit of gallows humor.
This all stems from the recent dismantling of DEI initiatives across multiple industries, with some corporations scaling back commitments under claims of “efficiency” or “merit-based hiring.” The backlash against DEI and recent blanket firings of federal employees (many of whom the government is trying to rehire after mistakenly firing people in important roles) has fueled fears that without these initiatives, the pipeline for diverse talent shrinks. Not because marginalized people aren’t qualified, but because systemic barriers are real.
But plane crash memes flip the script: If DEI hiring is a problem, then why does it suddenly feel safer to know a pilot was a diversity hire? The implication is clear: these initiatives never produced unqualified professionals, they just ensured that talent pools weren’t homogenous. And if that makes some people uncomfortable, maybe it’s worth questioning why.
Until then, the internet will continue to do what it does best—joke about life’s most terrifying scenarios, preferably before takeoff.
Here are 20 darkly funny plane crash memes that highlight the DEI debate:
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Soon you’ll have to pay extra to have the plane land right side up
— Joel Jeffrey (@joeljeffrey) February 19, 2025
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Do not do things like this pic.twitter.com/oCxgEyWRZ5
— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) February 18, 2025
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