That's taking it to ridiculous extremes. Given the facts at hand, and the reactions of the other passengers during the removal of the family, the pilot is an idiot and so is the stewardess who would't serve a meal. United's staff refused to serve a hot meal from first class to a non-first class customer, which is of course their company's right, however they easily could have made it a complete non-issue by giving her the meal and showing some fucking compassion for a disabled child.

In what very likely was a understandably frustrated attempt to PERSUADE the stewardess to reconsider after being told no, the mother indicated that a meltdown was extremely likely to occur. This isn't some petulant bratty child just whining about not getting her way here. The girl has full blown autism. The mother wasn't threatening to have a meltdown herself. But instead of taking the rational, logical, economical, efficient and humane course of action, the pilot diverted a flight and wasted who knows how much cumulative time and money of all those involved, both on the flight, and on the ground.