The Big Secret...

[pants!]

Show me the law that says it's legal to walk down the street...

AFAIK it's legal for a business to discriminate amongst their customers for any reason, unless that reason is legally prohibited (ie, race, gender, age, etc).

 

[adurso]

Originally Posted by Heffey
is it legal to discriminate against a customer because they lack a c-card or have the wrong c-card?

Yep


I would love to see the actual law if possible.

Ron

It is the absence of a law prohibiting something that makes the something legal. Most criminal laws prohibit behavior, not authorize it. There is no law that states a business must serve a customer, a business can refuse service to anyone, anytime for any reason or none. A business is private and not governed by anti-discrimination laws. The only remedy a disgruntled customer has is a civil suit or taking their business elsewhere....

 

[naclydogg]

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The course consists of one night in the classroom, one night of practice in the pool with limited visibility diving. You are required to make 2 dives in two different water hazards. You will receive a **** Distinctive Specialty certification card. The balls you recover will remain with ***.

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Would you buy golf balls from an uncertified golf ball diver?

 

[Heffey]

We have one guy in town that is going to stop recognizing one agency's C-Card because...well he's not sure but thinks of them as being the competition,even thou the nearest store is an hours drive away.

Ron

Well Ron,
That is some pretty bass akwards thinking. Fight the competition by driving your customers away. Nice.
Jeffrey

 

[drdiver1952]

AFAIK it's legal for a business to discriminate amongst their customers for any reason, unless that reason is legally prohibited (ie, race, gender, age, etc).

My ex father in law owned a dry cleaner. He had a policy that if he damaged your clothes, he would buy them. He also would launder or dry clean shirts which a lot of shops in the town wouldn't do at that time.

A guy would bring his shirts in and then complain that the dry cleaner had damaged them in some way. My fil knew that he hadn't but he bought the guy's shirts a couple of times just because of the policy.

Then one day the guy came in with some shirts to clean and my father in law said, "Sorry, we can't do these shirts."

The guy was surprised and said "You don't do shirts anymore?"

And my father in law answered "Yep, we do shirts, we just don't do yours."

 

[redacted]

Well Ron,
That is some pretty bass akwards thinking.
Jeffrey

Not at all uncommon in LDSs. Many are really more like a hobby than a business.

 

[Goose75]

Show me the law that says it's legal to walk down the street...

AFAIK it's legal for a business to discriminate amongst their customers for any reason, unless that reason is legally prohibited (ie, race, gender, age, etc).

I was once told by an apartment manager that as a white Christian male I didn't fit into any of the protected groups and it was therefore completely legal to discriminate against me. The moment that I claim a protected group, they would have be restricted by law. I've never run across anything to refute her claim.

By the way, this wasn't in conjunction with being mistreated. During a conversation she was explaining what she learned during training on discrimination.

 

[Ron Brandt]

Well Ron,
That is some pretty bass akwards thinking. Fight the competition by driving your customers away. Nice.
Jeffrey

There are days when I wish we could go back to the old days of sporting goods stores doing scuba. No agency affiliation,no discrimination,just business. Show that you are qualified to dive (note I did not say cerifyed),get your air fill and away you go.

We had one store in town that sold camping gear,ski's of all kinds,golf clubs,bicycles, scuba gear and air fills. Instructors from all agencys used the service and the store benifeted from the business the instructors brought in.

Ron

 

[Don Burke]

I was once told by an apartment manager that as a white Christian male I didn't fit into any of the protected groups and it was therefore completely legal to discriminate against me. The moment that I claim a protected group, they would have be restricted by law. I've never run across anything to refute her claim.

By the way, this wasn't in conjunction with being mistreated. During a conversation she was explaining what she learned during training on discrimination.

That is a common misconception.

The fair housing laws mention no particular race, just race. They mention no particular religion, just religion. They mention no particular sex, just sex.

I had this beaten into me when I was in real estate. A substantial portion of initial training and continuing education addresses what those laws actually say.

Title 42 of U.S. Code, primarily in Chapter 45, is where you will find the words.

 

[Stoo]

Can anyone (ANYONE!) pose even 1 semi-valid reason to require certification?

A valid argument can be made that a certification sets a minimum standard... a verification that the person diving has at least satisfied some level of training and therefore, presumably, has some idea of what diving is all about. Further, you could make the argument that the certification is not so much about keeping some "self-taught" diver from killing himself, but it might reduce the likelihood of him/her killing someone else. Imagine if charter operations didn't care about certification. You sign up for a day trip on your own and get buddied up with some guy who jumped into his backyard pool for an hour with a borrowed rig, and pronounced himself a "diver" after surviving a 10' for 40 minute profile!

I taught diving for over 20 years and I am the first to admit that there is no particular skill required to be a competent basic level diver. Also, much of my diving is done in Tobermory, an area with high diver traffic, with cold water and some fairly deep wrecks. Watching some charter groups dive there, it has frequently amazed me that more of thes folks don't die on any given weekend, given the number of "near misses"... freeze-ups, bouyancy problems, ear problems, out of air etc. The conclusion I came to many years ago, was that diving must be simple and easy and inherently safe given the sports good safety record.

Diving is a bit like driving... most of us manage to thrive in spite of our short comings, just like most people driving cars are marginally competent, but through good luck, "and the grace of God", the carnage on the highways remains at an "acceptable" level... and no one would seriously suggest we should do away with driver training or licensing (would they?).