Why can't airline crew be expected to show up and wait just as pax have to show up to wait? It's like traffic--if you want less of it, move closer to work. Or drive in earlier or behind the peak.
If I told my boss "you know, it's completely unrealistic for you to expect me to leave my house 6 hours before that meeting 1000 miles away and get on a plane to arrive in time," I'd lose my job.
I'm obviously unsympathetic to the notion that crew should not have to show up in time to clear security just as the people who actually pay the bills (pax) do. Especially when the people who pay the majority of those bills (business travelers) are most likely not being paid for their time in transit.
You wish, sweetie. To be an airline crewmember (including a widebody captain at US), I'd have to take a pay and benefit cut. And most likely a union job. No thanks on both.
You are also incorrect in the assumption that you would actually make it past me (one need not hit someone to quietly and firmly refuse to stand aside). I'm not standing aside. I've gotten away with it in the past, and I am and have been willing to take my chances with the cops. They tend to be unsympathetic to prima donnas. They tend to be reasonable. And they will detain the accuser to get a statement in any case, so that's going to pretty much defeat the purpose in trying to jump the line in the first place.
Tell me, what are you going to do if somebody does not let you by? What do you suppose the cops are going to charge someone who refuses to stand aside with? (and it would need to be the cops, since the contract ID checkers and the TSA have no arrest or detention juice--and the TSA's authority does not begin until one actually "submits to screening"). Let me know, sweetheart.
To be fair, the exception to my thinking on this score is if the airline itself subsidizes a crew lane--by that, I mean purchasing the WTMD and the X-ray and funding the TSA staffing. If that's the case, I'm fine with it. But only in a dedicated lane. If it's being paid for with my ticket taxes, you can wait with everyone else.