Frank (and to a certain extent, Red), you've been a good friend to me and to the U.S. Hawks for many years now. I hope that friendship is strong enough to tolerate some serious disagreement because that's what we appear to be facing.
The issue here is both complex and nuanced. People of good intentions can end up on either side of it. It reminds me of the same moral / practical tradeoffs involved with terrorism or kidnapping. One perspective (my own) is that you never negotiate with terrorists because you'll just get more terrorism. But there are other perspectives that consider negotiation a reasonable strategy to save innocent lives. It is a horrible choice to have to make.
Fortunately, this isn't terrorism or kidnapping. It's just run-of-the-mill internet bullying. But it does have its consequences. Joe's USHGRS idea could fundamentally change the way that many pilots gain access to sites. It could open up a whole new future where pilots are given access to sites based on WHAT they know rather than WHO they know. So for that purpose, it's worth some time to discuss it. I hope you'll give it that time in a calm and thoughtful manner.
Of course, we may be so far apart that there's no common ground at all. If that's the case then we should just agree to disagree and hope that the disagreement is tolerable enough that we can still work together on the goals that we do share.
So with that last thought in mind I'd like to pose a simple question. It's a question that I hinted at in my earlier post, but I'd like to be a bit more concrete now. I think it will tell us if we're anywhere close to a resolution or if we're so far apart that we shouldn't even bother. It involves a hypothetical situation, and like all hypothetical situations it has its flaws. Let's start by ignoring the flaws. Let's just take the situation at face value for now and we can discuss the flaws later. OK? Here it is ...
Imagine you're at Dockweiler having a fun day of flying with Joe Faust and a bunch of other pilots that you don't know very well. Everybody seems to be getting along fine, and toward the end of the day, one of the pilots tells you that the group is going to go to his place just down the road for a barbecue dinner. He's got a great sampling of micro brew beers that you'd love to try. There's only one problem. He tells you that Joe's not invited because he's black (yes, in this hypothetical world, Joe is indeed African-American).
Here's the 4 word simple question:
What do you do?As I said, there are a lot of differences between this scenario and Joe being banned from hanggliding.org. But I'm not asking about hanggliding.org. I'm asking just about this particular situation. I really want to know what you would do. That will let me know if there's enough common ground to bother going any further.
Thanks for your time.
P.S. Rick, you're right that there are a lot of non-USHPA flying sites and at least one non-doppleganger hang gliding web site in the world.
However, almost all of the flying sites that I chose to fly regularly (when I could fly at ANY site of my choosing) are controlled by USHPA. It's access to those sites for ALL qualified pilots that's at stake here. I couldn't care less about hanggliding.org other than getting the word out to pilots about alternatives so we can free up even more sites. That's what this is about and that's exactly why Joe was banned. And that's also why Jack obliterates all USHGRS references. It was never about Joe. It was (and still is) about crushing Joe's USHGRS idea. Really, if Jack had banned Joe for breaking any imaginary rules, why should that prohibit all other pilots (including you Frank) from even mentioning or discussing USHGRS? That's the smoking gun that betrays Jack's real motive behind this atrocity.
