Is this Offensive?

[UncleJoes]

I don't want to sound rude but it seems like every tech diver takes offense to little suggestions made by the recreational crowd.
Whether it be the ever hated Split Fin, redundant guages, BCD choice, etc.

I am just curious as I read some of the responses to "New to Diving" posts, what is the general opinion out there. Is it offensive to the highly trained tech crowd that we give a seemingly one sided answer, assuming that a new diver has little intention to cave dive (which by the way kudos to all of those that do this. That is a level of bravery beyond me)/ or has little need for a fancy tech computer.

There always seems to be a certain amount of hostility between the cliques as a post grows. Am I reading too much into things or is there a reason for my suspicions?

Please PM me if you think I am out of line. As I said I am not trying to insult anyone, I'm just curious.

 

[Teamcasa]

..I am just curious as I read some of the responses to "New to Diving" posts, what is the general opinion out there. Is it offensive to the highly trained tech crowd that we give a seemingly one sided answer, assuming that a new diver has little intention to cave dive (which by the way kudos to all of those that do this. That is a level of bravery beyond me)/ or has little need for a fancy tech computer.

Joe, Most of us know that there are members that rubber stamp their response to the same basic questions posed by the new members. Unfortunately, the new member is sometimes put off and simply drops out. However, for those new members that stick it out soon figure out who the rubber stampers are and begin to skip or simply ignore them and go on to learn and share a great deal here.

Other members just have fun! The thread below should help you get a sense of what I mean!

**Split Fins – Let the Bashing Begin!** Don’t miss post 47!

 

[Papa_Bear]

I don't want to sound rude but it seems like every tech diver takes offense to little suggestions made by the recreational crowd.
Whether it be the ever hated Split Fin, redundant guages, BCD choice, etc.

I am just curious as I read some of the responses to "New to Diving" posts, what is the general opinion out there. Is it offensive to the highly trained tech crowd that we give a seemingly one sided answer, assuming that a new diver has little intention to cave dive (which by the way kudos to all of those that do this. That is a level of bravery beyond me)/ or has little need for a fancy tech computer.

There always seems to be a certain amount of hostility between the cliques as a post grows. Am I reading too much into things or is there a reason for my suspicions?

Please PM me if you think I am out of line. As I said I am not trying to insult anyone, I'm just curious.

Good observation! Tech and Cave divers have paid or feel they have paid dearly in lives and time developing their techniques So they hold that as a holly grail, because deviation can cause major problems! If set ups are the same problems get solved safer and faster! But I agree a lot look at it as an exclusive club and "Don't need or want the input" but unless we listen we can't learn But it is a different world and when your a mile from the surface you are your own worst enemy! Whatever you do don't think of being claustrophobic Every Cave and tech diver faces the monster or will!

 

[Hyper-limits]

I don't want to sound rude but it seems like every tech diver takes offense to little suggestions made by the recreational crowd.
Whether it be the ever hated Split Fin, redundant guages, BCD choice, etc.

I am just curious as I read some of the responses to "New to Diving" posts, what is the general opinion out there. Is it offensive to the highly trained tech crowd that we give a seemingly one sided answer, assuming that a new diver has little intention to cave dive (which by the way kudos to all of those that do this. That is a level of bravery beyond me)/ or has little need for a fancy tech computer.

There always seems to be a certain amount of hostility between the cliques as a post grows. Am I reading too much into things or is there a reason for my suspicions?

Please PM me if you think I am out of line. As I said I am not trying to insult anyone, I'm just curious.

IMO some Tech divers are just trying to help, many of us have bought equipment that was totally useless and we don't others to make the same mistakes.

A lot of recreational divers just want to see reef and pretty fishes, do they need a fancy tech computer or backplate/wings, not at all. Even tech divers fight amongt each other about gear, DIR VS Non DIR/OC Tech vs CCR tech diver. I was a Rec diver for 15 years before I moved to tech and I was happy with my old Scubapro BCD, work just fine for the kind diving I was doing at the time. It always hard for me when I see a new diver buying gear he doesn't need or an expensive piece of gear that he could have got somewhere else for cheaper, As I said before some of us just try to help, a few others think they know it all and are being A*Hole on the board.

Cheers

Al

 

[wreckchick]

There are a lot of new divers that take advise from people that have more diving experience than them, but less than many members of this board and in addition, there are board members that have more experience in more hostile environments including caves, deep wrecks, cold nasty low vis, etc.

What those that have seen varied environments know to be useful has often come from very expensive gear-related and training related trial and error and in large part I believe that they are trying to keep the newer inexperienced diver from making the same expensive mistakes. In this same vein, there are configurations that work better than others. Not one person will argue that an octo in the pocket is an ideal solution.

Beyond that there are many, many misconceptions about some gear configurations that most people diving traditional set-ups aren't familiar with and may misjudge due to ignorance (in the dictionary version, not the insulting version). When people see someone giving inaccurate information about something that they know, it is very hard not to jump in and correct the misconception. What tends to happen is that the person being corrected gets defensive and attempts to shout over the one doing the correcting. From there it often snowballs into the board equivalent of a bar-clearing brawl while the poor OP has now slunk off to friendlier territory.

After you've been around a while, and seen the same arguments a million times over, you do realize who's who and what's what. I've made bets with myself as to how many posts it will take before I hear a certain poster's voice on that person's hot button issue and I'm rarely disappointed.

If you keep a salt shaker handy, there is plenty of good information here.

Rachel

 

[UncleJoes]

Other members just have fun! The thread below should help you get a sense of what I mean!

**Split Fins – Let the Bashing Begin!** Don’t miss post 47!

Thank you, I needed that laugh.

I never would have stuck it out to read that far into a thread, so thank you for pouinting that out

 

[Hyper-limits]

Thank you, I needed that laugh.

I never would have stuck it out to read that far into a thread, so thank you for pouinting that out

Same here, pretty funny stuff

Al

 

[Meng_Tze]

Also, a lot of 'experts' are not what they seem. There is a lot of fluf and smoke when it comes to 'internet' divers. You can usually pick out the gems easily by their tone, objective advise and courtesy.

 

[diverdwn71]

I took my DM class with 4 tech divers. They can be a wealth of information, but you just have to pick and chose what you want to do and which battles to fight.

 

[battles2a5]

Observation #1: The way I see it is that the tech and cave community (for the most part anyway) have boiled down the gear into what provides the most utility. No extra fluff, bells, or whistles that are nothing more than cheap tricks to increase sales (and, on occasion, create dangers). You are never going to sell a cave diver on the benefits of split fins, a lever on your BC that will make you go up and down, or the latest "tech" bc w/ 20 d-rings, straps and buckles everywhere, and a 100lb bungeed bladder. Technical diving (cave, wreck, deep) is inherently dangerous so every piece of equipment has to be purpose built, reliable, and free of safety hazards (there are enough of those out there, we don't need any more). So that is where I think a lot of the black and white feedback comes from. This stuff has been beat into our heads. We can't help it.

Observation #2: The casual SB visitor would probably assume that 95% of the diving community is using a BP/W, 75% are certified full cave, 50% regularly dive deep trimix dives, and the rest are either newbs or on their way to becoming one of the above. This really is not the case. You have a lot of very dedicated divers on this board who eat, breathe, and sleep diving. You also have a lot of people on this board who eat, sleep, and dive scubaboard and regurgitate a lot of the babble that they pick up from the other people slamming recreational dive gear. So don't look at the regular SB posters as a representative chunk of the diving community. Look at the diving mags, dive shops, dive resorts, etc. What percentage of the media, travel, and gear providers cater to technical diving? Maybe 5%? That's probably a more realistic number. Keep that in mind when you ask this bunch what type of gear you should buy.

Observation #3: If you think you are getting a cookie cutter answer you may have asked a cookie cutter question. If you are a new diver and have a question to ask, there is a good chance that is has been asked before. Search for it. If you have completed the search and have additional questions, include that in your post. For example, I read that x,y, and z are true about product x, but I am still wondering if "blank". You might get some more objective responses from some people. Although the zombie trolls will still chime in with the same answers, you might get some good info.

In Summary: This is the internet. Take anything you read here w/ a grain of salt. After some time, you will get to know who posts worthwhile information and who spouts off the same nonsense post after post. Hopefully you will be provided with some good info that you can put to use in your diving or purchasing decisions. Hopefully you will also be able to contribute to others' questions. But in the end, your diving is all about you. Do what you want and just have fun