Jennifer Aniston, still a celebrity after all these years, has been paid $5 million to be part of an advertising campaign for the Dubai-owned carrier Emirates, the New York Post has reported.

The first ad came out this week, a piece of video that shows Aniston caught in the nightmare that is flying without a shower or a wet bar, apparently standard in Emirates A380 first class.

I wonder if Aniston knows the ads are being interpreted as attacks on U.S. commercial aviation, at least by The National, in Abu Dhabi, and one industry analyst quoted by the newspaper.

As others have noted, Aniston brings a sort of rom-com feel to the ads, which would seem to indicate she hasn’t lost her comedic charm.

But it does prompt us to reconsider the notion about celebrities taking easy money from advertisers without having a clear sense of how their pitches will be used.

Aniston may never fly commercial, and perhaps she is ignorant of the air war being waged between the Big Three of Mideast Airlines (Emirates, Etihad and Qatar) and the biggest U.S. airlines (United, Delta, American).

But those who follow this sort of thing will count Aniston as having sided with the Gulf airlines.

Over the past few years, the major American carriers (as well as many in Europe, too) have complained of what they believe are unfair advantages that the government-owned Gulf airlines have. Among them, that they never have to worry about pleasing Wall Street or investors, or deal with a union.

The Gulf troika of airlines insist they do not take government money, that they are self-sufficient. They also suggest U.S. carriers are hypocritical about not taking into account federal bailout money.

The rhetoric has heated up as the Gulf airlines expand, often at the expense of European and American carriers.

This blog entry appears to be a fairly even-handed overview of the battle, which is still simmering.

Anyone who has flown one of the U.S. big three airlines, especially inside the country, knows the experience is often excruciating and dehumanizing. I wrote about one such experience in 2012, and I imagine it hasn’t gotten any better.

Back to the Aniston ad.

It is, of course, not a representative comparison of how the overwhelming majority of people fly (including those on Qatar, Etihad and Emirates places).

What is being compared are first-class amenities — particularly a shower and a wet bar. And how many of us are going to be flying first class anytime soon? To be in business class is to believe we have died and gone to heaven. Or to have the extra 5-7 inches of leg room found in a “premium economy” seat.

Read to the bottom of this story in The National, and note that many of those who tweeted on the Aniston ad pointed out the economic realities (“maybe if I win the lottery”).

Having flown coach, on an intercontinental flight on both Gulf and U.S. airlines, I cannot say the differences are extreme.

In nearly all cases, if you want a flying experience that is less painful, minute to minute, you want to be on a big plane … you want to cross an ocean … and you certainly don’t want to land in the same country from which you took off.

Where U.S. airlines get their reputation is from their domestic flights and, yes, those are often horrible, especially in coach.

Not that Aniston is likely to know anything about that.