Illinois Woman Claims Request for Diet Coke on Flight Left Her in "Tears of Humiliation" From Discrimination

Tahera Ahmad, a Muslim chaplain and director of interfaith engagement at Northwestern University, says she was 30,000 feet in the air when a request for a soda turned left her speechless from discrimination

“The flight attendant asked me what I would like to drink and I requested a can of Diet Coke,” Ahmad wrote on her Facebook page Friday. “She brought me a can that was open so I requested an unopened can due to hygienic reasons. She said no one has consumed from the drink, but I requested an unopened can.”

That is when Ahmad says the flight attendant responded that she could not give her an unopened can, adding, “So no Diet Coke for you.”

ust moments later, Ahmad says, the same flight attendant brought a male passenger seated beside her a beer – in an unopened can.

Ahmad asked the woman why she was refused an unopened can while others were clearly allowed, according to the post, in which the flight attendant responded they were unauthorized to give unopened cans to passengers on the plane because they may use it as a weapon.

“So I told her that she was clearly discriminating against me because she gave the man next to me an unopened can of beer,” Ahmad wrote. “She looked at his can, quickly grabbed it and opened it and said, ‘It’s so you don't use it as a weapon.’"