While I agree with you to some extent:
I am also sensitive to how a situation like this can make some people overly sensitive, seems to me from what the author wrote that there was some racist behavior by the couple in the plane, just not too sure about the captain’s motives though, (there may be details here we don’t know) just seems to me that the captain wanted to settle things as quickly as possible and avoid a he said/she said scenario which would have possibly made things even more complicated.
(You could argue that he felt it was easier to pick on the author cause he’s a minority or because he figured that an entitled white woman was going to be harder to get her to do anything)
Having said that, the captains was rude/probably wrong to handle the situation like this, but it seems to me that Hanlon’s razor (Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.) might apply here.
