DIR- Generic Diver attitude! Be careful, experienced divers...

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because your a decent human being ?

Clearly I'm not! I spend every day of my working life keeping other people alive. It's stressful sometimes. I refuse to take responsibility for other people during my recreational time (nearest and dearest aside). That said, if an incident were to occur, I would do my very best to help, but I am not the arbiter of how other people choose to dive and I'm not going to get in to arguments with strangers about their dive kit configuration.
 
If a gear configuration looks strange, I will generally say something. However, it will more be in the context of a question rather than say that XY or Z is WRONG. The content of my comments and tone will also be influenced by my relationship with the person and my perception of their expereince.

Not too long ago, I was recreational diving on a private boat with a guy who I was unfamiliar with and his friend said he was a dive master. He had very nice gear, I noticed - top of the line BP/W, fancy computer etc. I immediately noticed that he set up his BC backwards with the din filling pointing away from his head. I said something like " oh you set the tank up to have the reg pointing the opposite way". He said something like "yeah". I was cool with a backwards set up and even commented that I personally knew 2 EXTREMELY experienced divers who choose to set up that way.

The we helped him put his tank on and the hoses were all screwed up. We tried for a little to sort it out, un hooked the reg from the tank, moved the first stage and rotated it, but it was still wrong. I then realized that he was completely wrong, his regulator hose configuration was standard and we had to spin the tank 180 degrees in the BC. He was totally wrong about how he sets his gear up backwards, but was so clueless that he didn't even understand my original comments , which I offered when I initially saw him assemble the BC backwards.

So yeah, I try to pay attention to other people's gear and will comment when something looks strange.
 
Clearly I'm not! I spend every day of my working life keeping other people alive. It's stressful sometimes. I refuse to take responsibility for other people during my recreational time (nearest and dearest aside). That said, if an incident were to occur, I would do my very best to help, but I am not the arbiter of how other people choose to dive and I'm not going to get in to arguments with strangers about their dive kit configuration.
were differentiating between gear set up and safety issues -gear set up choice- im in agreement
 
"Dive and Let Dive" is a silly statement, even though well-intended. It implies we are each little islands, unconnected, with no mutual consequences of our actions
You do you. After 50+ years of diving, I've learned not to give my opinion unless it's asked for. Even here my opinion is considered "silly", but on a dive boat no one wants to listen to a know-it-all. If it's bad enough, the Captain can and should make that call. It's his boat. I've been mocked enough without asking for it. I've been chided for having a long hose and also for diving without a bladder. I've even had people complain about my dive boots... twice. Every time I thank them for their input and go dive, all the while making a decision to never be that guy.
 
You do you. After 50+ years of diving, I've learned not to give my opinion unless it's asked for. Even here my opinion is considered "silly", but on a dive boat no one wants to listen to a know-it-all. If it's bad enough, the Captain can and should make that call. It's his boat. I've been mocked enough without asking for it. I've been chided for having a long hose and also for diving without a bladder. I've even had people complain about my dive boots... twice. Every time I thank them for their input and go dive, all the while making a decision to never be that guy.
If I see a new diver that has poorly distributed weights and is obviously overweighted, I will approach ask delicately. I've done this on a dive boat in Belize where I helped a woman shed 8 lbs and in Cuba on a shore dive with a young teenager (I asked the father). After a dive, both appreciated it.

But someone with experience who was a goat rodeo? While few of you on here actually know me, but your perception is probably fairly correct that I'm not good at asking delicately, so the best I can muster works with new divers, it probably won't with experienced divers who are set in their ways. So I Joey Swole it.
 
I will approach ask delicately.
I used to. Now I take the nunya approach. It's nunya bidness. Like it or not, I dive and let dive.
 
...I am not the arbiter of how other people choose to dive and I'm not going to get in to arguments with strangers about their dive kit configuration.
Fair enough, and I largely agree. I'm not out to regulate someone else's good time, and I hope other folks will grant me that same courtesy.

But I'll counter our shared perspective with a true story.

I and @Rollin Bonz were at a quarry and during our surface interval, we noticed another fellow setting up his gear on the dock. (For the sake of the story, I'll call him George, but if you do some digging, you can find the guy's real name.) George was diving SM. Hey...we primarily dive SM, too! So we went over to say hi.

When we walked up, we both noticed that George's configuration was kinda unusual. His lower boltsnaps were on bungee, and they were awfully high up the tanks -- at least halfway up, if not even further. IIRC, there were a few other odd-looking things, too, but those two items are what stick in my memory. I didn't think it looked very safe or put-together, but George was kinda short and was diving LP85s, so I figured that maybe he knew something I didn't.

We made conversation and asked George questions about his setup, but he didn't have good answers. He'd just been SM certified and had a solo card, he said, but beyond that his replies were mostly made of hemming and hawing noises and blank looks. He seemed defensive. So my buddy and I gave up, wished him a good dive, and politely withdrew.

Once we were out of earshot, we conferred and agreed: George didn't have his shiznit together, and we were going to steer clear of that particular trainwreck. But we didn't say anything to anybody else and just went on with our day, as did George.

As time went on, @Rollin Bonz and I saw George at the quarry quite a few times, but we never actually crossed paths again. We'd be over at our usual station, assembling our gear, and we'd see George walking around in the distance; his gear would be sitting on the dock, with those weird bungeed boltsnaps up way high. We'd just shake our heads and let the guy do his thing.

And then one day, George went on a solo dive. He went to 100-plus feet in black water, did some kind of line-laying exercise, and got himself tangled up. He died with nearly full tanks.

In retrospect, I think George's gear configuration was a sign. Did his configuration cause his death? Probably -- almost definitely -- not. But did that weird setup demonstrate that George didn't have the knowledge or skills to make the dives he was trying? I think the answer is yes.

So should we have said something? Dunno. I can't see as it would've done any good. Based on our limited interactions with George, he didn't seem open to discussion, so telling the guy he was doing things wrong probably just would've annoyed him. And since neither I nor @Rollin Bonz are instructors, telling the quarry's management -- "hey, this guy is diving solo with an unusual gear setup!" -- wouldn't have carried any official weight. But I kinda wish there had been some way to say something to somebody.
 
OP I don't think your intervention was necessary. Let the boys be boys. It is not like a spear gun fight like in SeaHunt was likely to occur.
I agree. Hazing and a few brutal smackdowns when I got to my unit is the reason I made it home from my deployments. Fresh out of the OW course I had my first dive that wasn't part of a course and I saw two sidemount rigs all set up. All I did was look at it from several feet away and then I heard a voice in Spanish tell the DM guiding my group "dile ese gringo que no toke".

I have always been good at pretending I didn't know when a Mexican in Mexico was talking **** right to my face but I had a knee jerk "y no toke mio tampoco". Everyone on the boat started laughing including the captain. I'm still friends with them.

Sometimes you put two alpha males together and they don't fight but if you keep em seperated, they can't be friends. Sometimes they fight and still become friends.
 
I realize some are taking a live and let live approach here, but if you're diving with me, and I'm doing something unsafe, please say something. Just kindly don't call me a dumbass, even though I might be acting like one.
 
I realize some are taking a live and let live approach here, but if you're diving with me, and I'm doing something unsafe, please say something. Just kindly don't call me a dumbass, even though I might be acting like one.
I agree. If you look at someone and tell yourself "this person is headed for trouble if nobody says anything" and then proceed without saying something to them, it can only mean you wish them trouble.
 

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