14 DAY TRIAL // Good Charlotte rocker Joel Madden was forced to cover up the many tattoos on his arms before boarding a plane in London the other day. Within hours, word of this got out in the media, and British Airways, the company with which Madden flew, issued a statement saying that the employee to enforce such a regulation would be reprimanded for the sole reason that it does not exist, TMZ informs.
The strange occurrence took place as Madden was about to get on a plane to the US. He was told by a British Airways employee that he could not board the plane in the sleeveless t-shirt he was wearing, presumably because he might have caused fear and suspicion in the other passengers. Consequently, he was asked to cover up – which he inevitably did, as paparazzi photos show him at the airport, about to get on the plane, dressed in a hoodie with sleeves.
Now, the airline company is saying that, whatever measures the employee took to ensure the safety of the passengers, they were completely inappropriate and uncalled for since there are no regulations in place in this sense. Consequently, the employee, whose name has not been made public for the media, is being reprimanded for being overzealous and for what celebrity magazines have branded as “tattoo discrimination.”
“We don’t understand why the employee took it upon himself to enforce regulations that don’t exist.” British Airways is telling TMZ in an official statement regarding the so-called measure the employee took on the spot by telling Madden to cover up. Nevertheless, the company does not mention the kind of punishment that awaits the overzealous employee, or whether it plans to issue an official apology to Madden for the incident.
The rocker, on his part, took to his Twitter account to speak out about it, saying that he was extremely embarrassed about it, especially as “all the people were staring and laughing.” Moreover, he hints, he should not have been put in this situation since all his tattoos have a religious or sentimental value, as Nicole Richie revealed a while back as well. Also on Twitter, Madden says he plans to write to British Airways regarding the incident, so keep an eye on this space to see how this turns out.