In defense of Casual Divers

[fire_diver]

Yep, yep... indeed...
However... there are a great many people who just don't want to hear or acknowledge or learn "the truth," especially if it requires that they rub two brain cells together. They are content to be sheep; they cling to "ignorance is bliss" with uncommon tenacity! I gave up trying to understand that mindset a long time ago... it's one of those things that's just there, and attempting to overcome it is a low percentage game. (Do try, but don't be too disappointed if your efforts are in vain. These folks want to be ignorant.) What amazes me is that some of the worst offenders have reached high station in other areas... MD, PhD etc. They just don't want to be bothered with all that mundane stuff like diving safety - that's what they're paying the peons to do. (There is a whole other discussion on the mindset that high rank/status/education exempts the holder from the laws of physics, but let's not get into that here)
When these folks want to dive, then, what's the safest way? They want to be led, and they want to be followed, and they're willing to pay folks to do it. I reckon the best we can do is take their money and keep a very close eye on 'em.
Rick

I agree with your statement 100% Rick. I don't have a problem with people who want to be hearded around underwater either. My gripe (and possibly others' as well) is when we who have the required skills to execute our own dive, are forced to be hearded around also. Then our frustration is pinned to the weak divers. We were all new, unskilled at some point, but it really SUCKS to spend money on a diving vacation then be treated like that.

Even as the OP said, that (the dive op he works for) will watch divers for the first few dives, then let the better divers do their own thing. But we may not be in that location long enough for that to be usefull. We have plans to visit inland sites or go shopping with the spouse while in that far away exotic local. I understand the dive wants to cover thier own *****, but I don't like that type of treatment. I don't really have a workable solution, so I guess when I dive outside the US I will just have to take what the dive op gives me.

FD

 

[Thalassamania]

Walter, that sums it up about as well as can be done.

 

[Diver Dennis]

I do agree that training is not what it should be but even the best training, the once proficient skills that you might have possessed when you came out of your OW or AOW course will fade if you only dive a few times a year. That is the real problem with vacation divers in my opinion.

 

[Walter]

Good point Dennis, but it's even worse if one never learned adequate skills in those courses.

 

[mania]

Can I add one more question to Walter's list wich i think is thebest list of question I have seen...

How often do you dive for your own pleasure and what sort of dives?
If the answer is - at least once a week go for this guy. I think it's crucial that instructor is still diving - it means he loves this sport and this is his hobby not the way to make the living. And I know instructors who haven't been diving for many, many years. All they do is diving with students.

Mania
PS. Walter can I translate this list and post it on Polish diving board????

 

[Diver Dennis]

Good point Dennis, but it's even worse if one never learned adequate skills in those courses.

Yes Walter, I agree. Starting out with poor skills would make even a quick refresher dive for vacation divers useless and working with regular divers difficult for the DMs and instructors, not to mention buddies, that have to dive with them.

 

[BKP]

The only people who are thankful for you are those in the dive industry. I would prefer if I never saw another vacation diver. If that means a much smaller dive industry, great. It's far too large considering the number of people who actually want to invest time and money into it. As far as the people who start out undertrained and only dive a couple of times a year, do yourself a favor and stop diving all together. You really are an accident waiting to happen. Why does it sound so unreasonable to you vacation divers that perhaps diving is a sport that requires more than a trip to Cozumel once a year to maintain the skill to do it safely?

What an elitist pile of crap...

Perhaps all the twice-a-year snow-skiers should stay home because someone, somewhere, might/will break a leg or run into a tree, because they haven't spent twelve weeks in skiing-camp, or live in Aspen...

Perhaps all the sky-divers (including myself, who was a newbie 25 years ago), should never even give it a shot, because there's only a few hours of ground instruction, and somewhere, someone is going to mispack a chute and bounce, and only let those that have invested "the time and money" in their own Cessna jump...

Perhaps we should all sit home on our thumbs, where it's safe, and only watch all the self-absorbed 'experts' show us how to do it "right" instead of trying to improve ourselves until we *do* get it right...

Accidents happen... no one wants to injure or kill themselves or anyone else, in this industry, or any other. Experts have accidents as well... @#$%@# happens.

Most of us LOOK to the 'experts' to help us over the humps... most of us are more than willing to recieve constructive criticism, advice, and help when it's offered. I thought that's what this board was about...

Stay in your caves, and you won't have to suffer the 'vacationers'...

I RARELY go off on a rant... but you are a piece of work...

Thank GOD my original instructors were there to instruct, as opposed to condescend... I'm an instructor in my own field, bud... and there's more to it, then tossing off every newbie that hasn't YET gotten it...

okay... flame off...

 

[TheRedHead]

In my students case, she was handed a reg upside down. She went to breath and got some whater. She didn't have enough air in her lungs to clear the reg and she flipped before she could ever think of using the purge or even turning the reg over.

I wasn't referring to your student, but the mother you described sitting in 30 feet of water with her husband and child and for some unknown reason freaked out and bolted to the surface. Maybe she was perfectly comfortable in her OW class, but there are people who are not comfortable and make themselves do the skills. I think that would be a lot easier in a three day class than in a four week class. We had a woman in our class with those issues and she dropped out after a week. It it had been a quickie class, she might have become a certified accident waiting to happen.

 

[fire_diver]

Anyway, I'm on my way from one catergory to the other it seems

Welcome to ScubaBoard! I think that the very fact that you are here with a desire to improve means you are out of the first group.

FD

 

[Jarrett]

Most of the warnings you find here are from people who did something bad and learned from it and are trying to stop others from having the same "learning experience", or from people who have had to do rescues or recoveries on people who's "learning experience" was a little more intense.

Some of the people who say "don't do this or you're going to die" have recovered the bodies of people who have done "that" and died, or know people who are now permanently disabled because of it.

More fear. I wish what you said was the reality of the situation, but most often its not. More often the preaching comes in the form of posters like Loosebits up there. "Casual divers suck and they should go away" seems to be underlying sentiment and I believe that's what the thread starter meant to convey.