Working a Virgin Atlantic has its perks, like the discounted flights. But that’s it. I am a former employee and loved my job. It was always my dream to fly and because I had tattoos and some archaic discrimination ruling I couldn’t work for an airline. Since Virgin relaxed their policy, I was able to apply and was damn good at my job. I loved it. You look at me though and I don’t fit into the cliche looking cabin crew member. 6.3ft, broad, covered in tattoos, and straight and male. All these things weren’t cabin crew material. When Lucky Generals launched the campaign for Virgin Atlantic ‘be yourself’ at long last I could fly, it dropped down barriers and restrictions and made Virgin incredibly diverse and free. Fast forward 8 months and being white, male and straight most definitely goes against you. I received a complaint about my manner on a flight I was working. A fellow female crew member became overtly flirty with me. Constantly coming into my cabin to chat whilst I worked, offered up back massages whilst I worked, tapping my bum, prodding me in the side, the list is endless. Me being who I am, I returned the flirting but certainly nothing sexual. I was just having a laugh with her which she did with me. What transpired once we landed in San Francisco is, some other crew members had persuaded her to complain about me, claiming sexual harassment. She was in her probation period and I would out of it so pratting about on the plane whilst we should have been working probably would have been a simple telling off. I admitted my faults to Virgin and took extra measures to rectify it but the crew member didn’t acknowledge anything at all and carried on as normal. She has consequently gone off with PTSD since I announced I was going to press. That is very suspicious as she knows now the truth will come out. She was cohered and pressured into complaining about me, making complete detrimental lies up to protect herself. On my return to London I was grounded pending an investigation. They said for all parties involved and their emotional stress associated to it, we will be grounded presumed innocent. What happened was I was grounded and presumed guilty and the fellow crew member remained flying without a single break. She was presumed innocent. They looked at a young female and then looked at me and said ‘surly he is guilty, look at him, his tattoos etc etc’ For the next four months I was interviewed at length four times, with each interview being manipulated and twisted into me being guilty. The female crew member was only interviewed once and all questions were leading, and how I made her feel. No questions about what she did to me or how she made me feel. Before they even started the process they had already made their minds up. The transcripts that I have which I will be publishing are evident of that. I received no welfare checks from my manager until week 4, and that was because I checked, whilst the female crew member was checked in all the time. I expressed via email, calls and interviews that I was emotionally distressed, it was causing huge upset at home with everyone and I was privately seeing a counsellor to maintain my mental health. I had a union rep on my last three calls and he himself as a neutral can see how they were playing it. The female crew member accepted my friendship on instagram once my gross misconduct was confirmed, her knowing it was me, and her instagram images following the alleged incident show her living her best life, and these where her own words. Even to the trip in San Francisco where she claims she was so upset, but posted lovely pictures of her enjoying cocktails. May I add with the crew member who coherently pressed her to complain about me. When I submitted this into evidence for my appeal it was brushed aside saying young people will always post happy pictures and hide their upset behind fake pictures. You couldn’t make this up. No matter what evidence I gave them they still believed her side. When she complained to Managment in San Francisco, it was after an all day drinking session for her and for the management who managed to drink a litre bottle of vodka between the two of them. They then returned to the hotel and took the statement and somehow claimed to remain sober. The fsm on the flight lied about asking me to take some rings off before we took off, and instead claimed I refused out right and that I said imagine the damage it could do when restraining a passenger. I would never ever refuse this and most definitely not use in a restraint. I am a gentle person and never in my 40 years been in any conflict and I am former prison officer. The crew member who complained even gave me her phone number, sat in front of me in the bus to the hotel and stood with me in the queue of the hotel. All of this post the incident but she claims to management she did all of this to save any kick off. Management believed that as well. What really has happened here, is they didn’t expect it to get this get, they didn’t expect me to protect myself and argue back and they aren’t dealing with a 19 year old kid fresh out of school. I have life experience, 25 years of work ethics and a moral compass. I am a dad of two beautiful girls and the last thing I am is this person she lied about. A friend of mine, a crew member then over heard a story about me whilst working on a flight, she knew all the info about what happened and what I had allegedly done, and all this information came from the crew member who complained about me. We are bound by NDA’s whilst being investigated, I brought this information to the managers and they interviewed my friend, and then somehow throughout the call, they tried to twist and manipulate her in to saying she only knows this information because I had told her. Which never was the case. On this call, my friend advised that she was seriously worried about my mental health and three weeks prior to this call I attempted to take my own life because of her lies and Virgins humiliating treatment of me. The manager three hours later after this call, sent me an email saying her decision was to sack me. Three hours after hearing Virgin and the girl made me attempt to take my own life. The ‘Be Yourself’ campaign is a complete marketing PR stunt that is slowly backfiring on Virgin, they are attracting people like me from all walks of life, different morals, work ethics and years of experience and they don’t know how to handle us. We aren’t some kid out of school who can be pushed around. We expect to be treated with respect and if we aren’t, we have the sense to complain about it. No bullying should exist, especially in the workplace, and this is exactly what has happened to me. I worked incredibly hard for Virgin Atlantic and I was living my dream job, but it was all taken away from me due to lies. She was always presumed innocent and I was always presumed guilty. Their treatment of me is barbaric and humiliating and people need to know.