A lot of you guys are pointing to his mentioning of his ife experience as him whining about needing to be treated better because he's not like other airmen.

You're missing the point entirely.

He's using that information about himself as an example of the possible level of a sense of responsibility an airman can have. He's using it to show that any e-4 or below is capable of doing a job and deserves a certain amount of respect.

Yes, there is a chain and something like that probably does need more than just a vocal, "Yeah, i've been tasked to get permissions to do this job," but the offense is not in being denied. It's more of the lack of respect when being denied.

It's not coddling to give someone a decent response. It's not whining to people don't want to be treated like a second-class person. Just because a majority of us are used to being treated like children it doesn't mean that it makes sense, or is correct, that we accept that as the norm.

Him being denied because he doesn't have the rank to request the permission, that's fine. There's no qualm with that. That's not the point. It's the implied lack of competence attached to being "just an airman" he's taking issue with.