What is the fundamental reason that prevents scuba diving from becoming popular?

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Bit of a thread-jack here....and maybe this has been discussed elsewhere on SB...

I noticed quite a few posters were calling SCUBA a sport. What? It's a hobby, right? Obviously it can be a profession too.

In general, a sport basically has 3 things...athletic effort, rules to compete, and competition. SCUBA has one of those, maybe two?
 
A number of the last posts are in line with what I post a few weeks ago about the WtF ratio. If the amount of WORK required for an activity becomes too much in relation to the amount of FUN gained form the experience, then participation will suffer.

My argument earlier was that the amount of FUN had decreased because of the rapid and significant decline of the health of the reefs and other diving experiences, but the idea is the same. If the reward of your diving is great enough, you will tolerate much more effort to get that reward.
 
I would also like to point out that there are two issues at play here--1) what gets people to get the initial training and 2) what keeps them participating.
 
Bit of a thread-jack here....and maybe this has been discussed elsewhere on SB...

I noticed quite a few posters were calling SCUBA a sport. What? It's a hobby, right? Obviously it can be a profession too.

In general, a sport basically has 3 things...athletic effort, rules to compete, and competition. SCUBA has one of those, maybe two?
Big past discussion here. Look it up and it gets more confusing. For me it's an activity. No way a sport. Free diving in competition is.
 
It wasn't on my radar until my husband suggested it back in 2010. I didn't see the ocean for the first time until I was 25, and the only body of water I'd been in prior to that was a swimming pool and a creek. I wonder how many people really know it's a sport they CAN get into. And it's expensive to dive. If you're willing to dive cold, green water with low viz you probably need a drysuit. And if you're like me, and only dive warm, blue, good viz, it's expensive to get to that water if you're landlocked. Those are some pretty big obstacles to overcome.
 
Ice hockey.
Very geographic dependent. :)
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I went "a little" against the grain.

In 1975, when I saw "Jaws", most of my friends said some variation of "I am NEVER going in the water again!". I said "I have GOT to learn how to dive!"

For me, though I saw that I would need three things at the same time:
I would need the money to afford the lessons and gear,
I would need the time to take the course, and
I would need to be in a location that I would be willing to dive in. For me, that meant someplace with warm water.

Over the years, I often had times where two out of those three would line up, but it wasn't until roughly 20 years later, in the mid 1990's that all three did.

I was a part of a team that was doing the modeling for a new Air Defence System for NORAD (Trying to figure out what information we would need the system to give us and where we would need this system to reach out to, to get this information.) This meant that I would be doing a number of month long trips to Tyndall Air Force Base in Panama City Florida. On my first trip, I noticed that a Dive Shop just off base was offering OW and AOW courses that lined up with the dates for the second trip to Tyndall. I paid for the courses by using my "Per Diem" which was intended for my meals for the month and instead, I ate PB&Js all month long.
 
Who gave you an idea that scuba diving is not popular? There are entire economies based around scuba diving tourism all over the world.
 
There 2 fundamental reason for this. One, is that people are detached from Nature and very few try to get back. They are happy to be detached and to be afraid of snakes and spiders and sharks and sunburns and so on. Hence, they do not want to see what's hiding underwater. In fact, most people do not want to see anything that is not worth being seen. And everything worth being seen is shown to them by tour guides. So, if nobody puts you in a tour bus to show this thing to you, then this thing is not worth being seen. So lots of people stay at their Sheratons for a week or even 2 and never get out except maybe on a bus tour to see a waterfall which is worth being seen because it is in a booklet and everybody goes to see it. Some will go on a snorkeling tour because you have to do it once in your lifetime and they said it is safe and there will be no snakes and later they will tell stories about some creepy creature they've seen below and how they even saw some fish.

Two, is in logistics. Most people grow up and live in non-divable areas, so to dive means to travel. And most people do not travel. And if they do they go to Vegas or to Disneyland or to Disneyworld or to Ocean City or to Myrtle Beach. Or they hop onto a cruise ship. They have short vacations and most have average paychecks so they want to have what they believe is the most fun for their bucks, so this must be something all inclusive. And even if they got tons of money it does not matter. The CEO of one of the companies I worked for was an all-over-the-world diver but for him this was mostly vanity. He almost never described what he saw or why he liked this and that; he collected diving destinations like Paris Hilton collects shoes. Another CEO went to Disney every summer for 12 years in a row and maybe he still does, I do not know cause we lost touch. I can sympathize but to each his own. I know some diehards who live in trailers and survive by doing odd jobs but they spend every dime they get on diving in their local quarry and maybe save enough to drive to Palm Beach or NC once a year. To each his own and this is fine with me. I do not want more divers cause reefs and boats will get too crowded (and some already are) and I do not want fewer divers cause this will cripple the industry.
 

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