EasyJet, the low-cost British airline, ignited a social media firestorm over the weekend after it posted a Holocaust-themed ad on its official social media account featuring a flight number tattooed on a customer’s arm. The company deleted the post, which was captioned: “You never forget your first flight.” “Never forget” is a common refrain invoked when discussing the horrors of the Nazi genocide of European Jewry during World War II. The Nazis rounded up Jewish people from countries that it occupied during that time and assigned them numbers, which were tattooed on their arms. EasyJet apparently was unaware of the negative connotations of the post, which features a happy customer who tattooed the flight number on his forearm. Jon Siva, a Twitter user, took a screenshot of the post before EasyJet deleted it. “No easyjet. Please no,” Siva tweeted in response to the post, which quickly went viral. “This is why corporate social media channels need to vet and authorize content before being distributed,” Siva tweeted in response. Another outraged Twitter user remarked: “They were not thinking. Really bad judgement.” EasyJet released a statement which read: “While this is a genuine picture of a customer’s tattoo celebrating their first flight with us, we understand the concerns raised and as a result decided to remove the post.” In 2009, EasyJet apologized after an in-flight magazine featured a photo spread of fashion models who were seen posing against the backdrop of the Holocaust memorial in Berlin, triggering outrage. In 2020, the airline apologized after it touted its flights to Italy by referring to the country as the “land of mafia and earthquakes.”
