Avoiding Saluting an LT; What do you do when you see this?

Sir, age has nothing to do with being a professoinal, you earn your rank just like they did so its just rude of them.

I disagree your not saluting the the person your saluting the rank whether the NCO was SNIFF lipped or having a bad day he should have saluted he should not o be dressed down in public he should of been pulled aside somewhere in private and been told exactly that right then and there.

the enlisted problem is lack of pride in their profession, and on the officer side the problem is entitlement. With all do respect to all the officers here, none of you were born noblemen, and I didn't enlist in hopes to own private land, so when I salute an officer I'm not bowing down to his/her authority or class. We are members of the armed forces and we should salute/greet and return salutes/greetings with pride. As per our customs and traditions the lower ranking service member will initiate the salute/greeting, officer or enlisted. I made sure all my marines understood that saluting and giving the proper greeting of the day was our way to say we were professional warriors to each other, so I expected every single one to initiate salutes and greetings with pride. I never saw issues with saluting as lack of discipline, its a lack of leadership and pride.

Get used to it. It happens a lot.

LT, do push ups for not correcting the NCO. You are an officer in the US Air Force. If you let him/her get away with this it will reinforce in their mind that they can get away with this type of behavior. To add insult to injury, any junior enlisted who saw this automatically thinks it is 'ok' to do this as well because the NCO did it.

It's not only that, when I was in 8th Infantry Division in 1975, I went to Division HQ to see the Division CSM. I was the Division Soldier of the Year. We were leaving his office and going down the stairs. There was a gaggle of Sr Officers and Enlisted waiting inside the door, Yep, it was almost 1700 and Retreat was about to be played, The CSM was livid, he shouted, I am going upstairs to get my boss and we are ALL going outside to salute the flag...The building emptied quickly. It's not only LT's it's military courtesy as a whole.

Unless you were on a static post and he knew you were there it seems he saw you and recognized you as a commissioned officer. If at that point he did not render the hand salute he is in violation of the UCMJ. You should have addressed the NCO to let him know you were onto his petty little game. If you approach this in a non confrontational manner and he did not see or recognize you, or he went out of his way to leave a note on a friends car, or whatever, no harm no foul. If he did avoid you on purpose it puts him on notice that you will not put up with that unprofessional behavior and if it happens again he can expect a different outcome.

I have a theory LT and that is "some people just don't get it". It applies to everything in life.
Smoking weed at 6am to take the edge off and get the kids ready for school? Sounds crazy, but we see it.
Walking 100 yards out of your way to avoid a salute? Ridiculous. Even more so when you think about this: -He either saw someone else salute and did not want to, or had vision so sharp that he recognized the shiny bars and had to take evasive action. Or, he possibly recognized you from afar and was scared that you were going to actually ask him for some advice!
Whatever the reason, it is weak and not demonstrative of honorable service. He shamed himself.
The next time you catch someone doing that (and are 100% certain) you should meander over and engage them in a few minutes of idle conversation. Then smile and walk away with the victory.
Here is the deal: The military is about tradition, discipline, courtesy and honor. You take away those things and you have a mob.
Good luck to you Sir.

Had some great ones over the years...the I need to go a different direction, shift a box to the other hand or even putting on chap-stick to avoid to look at the ground. It is almost comical to see what some people will do to avoid a simple salute.

Hello LT,

I actually find this quite common.  Not only that, but I've seen it go both ways.  Enlisted members avoiding an officer so they don't salute, and officers avoiding entire groups of enlisted.  We've actually had conversations about this in my workcenter.  I'm no expert, but I can take my guesses to why this is happening.

#1: The individual suffers from social anxiety.  I personally fall victim to this.  Any time I walk by someone (or greet them), I get irrationally nervous.  Make that person an authority figure, such as an officer, and the feeling multiplies ten-fold.  It's natural, and it's something I've been working on my entire life.  Though I would never go out of my way to avoid saluting, I still go through a state of panic every time I do salute an officer.  I find this reason to be the most likely, simply because I know many people who suffer from social anxiety worse than I do.

#2: The individual has an injured shoulder and would rather not explain why he/she didn't salute.  It's certainly not likely, but it happens.  An Airman in my workcenter recently went through surgery on his right shoulder and was unable to salute for at least a week.  And, naturally, he was questioned every time he didn't salute.

#3: The individual may have been under the impression that you didn't want to salute either.  And to make it easier for both of you, he took a separate path.  Some enlisted get tired of saluting, so they assume that officer can get tired of it as well.  In rare cases, they are correct (which could explain the officer avoiding the enlisted). 

Having been in for 2 years, these are all from personal experiences with other Airmen.  I don't find avoiding an officer excusable, but I understand their reasoning.  Please don't take it personally, sir.  Most of the time the individual does not mean any disrespect.  Simply pulling them aside, preferably at a later time and away from his troops.  Respectfully find out why he took a different path, and tell him that you find it unacceptable.  Usually just expressing your opinion on the matter will fix their behavior.  However, if it continues, then you should take further corrective action (e.g. talk to his/her supervisor).

Hope this helps, sir. 

I certainly didn't post about it online. Here's what you do:
Is the Airman in question a direct subordinate? If yes, then correct them. If no, move on with your life. You may even be mistaken, maybe the NCO had other things in his mind than saluting you.

Well it IS the Air Force after all!
Just kidding ...

I was taught in Boot Camp that if an Officer was across the street from you or more than whatever distance away from you, saluting was not required. I got yelled at in Boot Camp for saluting Officers across the street from me more than once.
Fast forward a few months when I hit the Fleet. I was walking up the pier to my ship, when a Captain from another ship was walking down the pier. He was over on the other side of the pier from me so I didn't salute him. Man did that piss him off.

I have experienced just the opposite. I've had PVTs cross the street just so they could salute me. I've seen a group of PVTs intentionally spread out into a long line so that I had to salute each individual instead of the group. I had one E5 that was virtually a stalker looking for opportunities to salute me. He would pop out from the corner of a building with a "good morning, sir". One time he even saluted me as we passed on the sidewalk, then sprinted around the building so he could pass me again. It became like a game. He'd try to salute me as many times as possible during the day and I would try to avoid it.

Capt (Join to see) what you found there wasn't an NCO in my book. You found a rare species called a "dirtbag". You can inform his chain of command if you like, but you can't change a dirtbag. Hopefully, he will ETS and take his dirtbaggery elsewhere.

We use to line up for our new ensigns and ltjg and even LTs and pass it so we were about 5 to 10 feet apart so they had to salute each one lol

Did you ask the NCO why he is taking the longest path to his car? Maybe he needed the extra steps to bump up calories burned on his Nike Fuel Band lol. Nothing wrong with asking a question about something that seems out of the norm. Know not assume, and that needs to be applied to everything. He could be the greatest NCO but not in your eyes if you assume he is some bag nasty avoiding to salute you.

Ive never avoided nor have I had anybody avoid me for the sake of not wanting to give a proper greeting to one of higher grade, thats just nasty.

There is another reason someone may change path to avoid a salute that has not been mentioned yet.  I know that I have taken a longer path to avoid disturbing group actions among a distributed group of enlisted personnel.  For example, I crossed a street once to prevent walking near enough to a group of Soldiers on work detail who were receiving instruction from their NCO.  If I had continued on course the NCO would likely have stopped, saluted, given the greeting of the day, and potentially lost the focus of his group for a moment.

I've had battle buddies that hated 2LTs with a passion. They told that a few rubbed them the wrong way so they avoid being around them so they won't get disrespectful. I've met 2LTs that were full of themselves, but I never avoided saluting them. I understand that fresh LTs have about the same level of experience as a PFC. I understand that it takes a certain amount of patience to deal with them. I just curse out my steering wheel and step out of my car like everything is ok.

Any lieutenant is worthy of a salute,  because to not do it dishonors the rank,  the person and the services.   IMHO