Abstract
The calamitous performance of airlines and airports in Summer 2022 has transformed a season that was widely touted for the post-pandemic return to travel, into a showcase of the new norms of customer abandonment in 21st-century capitalism. This essay explores the quietest approach by mass media to the abysmal conditions of air travel as sloganized by the phrase ‘pack your patience’, arguing it should be understood as part of a broader turn towards the shifting of affective burden to customers in a period of sharply diminished service.
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