Posted by seahunt on May 15, 2002 at 14:29:13:
In Reply to: Re: Response to the OMS thread posted by Kendall Raine on May 15, 2002 at 08:40:08:
Excuse me if I don't make an adequate distinction, but it is the contentiousness and fixation on details of gear, that I so associate with DIR.
Don't get me wrong, fixation on details of gear and minitue of methodology are fine and in ways I find them both the interesting and educational, for little while. The contentiousness is OK as long as it is polite, which this has been. I even agree with you, that Tecdiver has not backed himself up adequately. Still, this kind of contentiousness never existed in diving before and I find it just strange and perhaps a bit disquieting.
Diving just used to be a friendly sport. It had no gear obsession and it was not contentious. It was just about a diver and the skills of the diver, in the ocean. I and many other divers still look at it that way. Because of the nature of California diving, that is especially true here. Now I see divers getting defensive.
What I see is ideology, the same object that people are fighting to the death about all over the world. There seems to be this extremely chauvinistic ideology based on the idea that if you don't dive like me you are wrong. People just seem to like to fight over ideologies more than anything else. It would be nice if we could work with shades of grey, but when the issue becomes ideological, that is just not allowed. Just look how it works in national politics. It becomes a matter of you are for us or against us.
There is no question to DIR pioneered nastiness as an ideology of diving and brought ideological arguements to a new high in diving. Even without the nastiness, it is always the loudest voice that is heard and it seems that it is ideologists that do all the yelling. I cannot but get a little nervous thinking about surfing and how it would once was just a friendly sport. Now it has the reputation for viciousness. Excuse me if I see gear obsession and contentiousness as just another part the same ideology as DIR, but it simply is. Blame DIR. It to contributes to the deterioration of what is diving, because it is not about diving, it is about personalities and the ideologies they embrace. Ideology in diving is just used to feed a person's arrogance by allowing them to claim that they are right and anyone that disagrees is wrong. No matter what, a lot of good divers and a lot of good people got burned on this board based on disputes centered around ideologies of gear and technique. Truth is, while you may or may not be associated with DIR, due to your obvious chauvinistic, contentious opinions about diving, you have embraced the same ideology of my way of diving is right and yours is wrong. As such, I'm going to paint you with the same brush. It's too bad, but like it or not, you contribute to the competitiveness of the sport and you are quite willing to be very unforgiving about anything you don't like.
If you disagree, look back on how you responded to my statement that California divers are the best in the world. In general (shades of grey) it is true and most reasonable people easily understand my point, but no, you had to ram your ideology down my throat and prove me wrong. In simple terms of ideology, you were right. In the real complex world you were wrong. Pick which one you think is more comfortable.
My opinion is that ideologists screw up the world for people that are willing to embrace more diverse and complex views that more accurately represent the complex world we live in.
Enjoy the diving, seahunt