[CW] Use of AR

[SX-25]

Little by little we have watched deterioration in so many areas of endeavor due to attitudes placating
poor performance. Under the specter of dumbing down amateur radio we have seen a proliferation of
sappy, grandfatherly comments like "it's not commercial so just let the kids have fun." You do not boil a frog by dropping him in boiling water; he'll jump out. So the way of the New Millennium is to drop the frog into water at room temperature and gradually increase the heat. That is how we've arrived at the pathetic state of CW skills we now watch; little by little...a degree at a time.

I can't regale you with tales from my years of glorious high security military greatness. But I can relate this discussion to something more commonplace. 

     My wife started taking ballet lessons a couple years ago. Ballet is a highly disciplined art form and very demanding and very complex. She has no intention of dancing professionally. She just wants to do it because it is meaningful and worth doing. The ballet world long ago adopted the colors of pink and black as "their" colors. This is why professional ballet dancers usually are often dressed in pink or black. Their shoes, pink or black. Their tote bags that they carry their stuff in, pink or black. The conformity is important not only from the desire to belong in the ballet culture but also to indicate an attitude of respect for the endeavor and its  rich history and traditions. You can be a ballerina without owning anything colored pink or black...but the love of ballet compels its participants to desire conformity; to be a part of. Those who devote hours each week to ballet may never go beyond dancing in their living rooms, but I assure you, each and every one of them is as focused and dedicated to doing it as perfectly as you would find any  member of a world renowned ballet company. Some ballet maneuvers are very difficult to do correctly. One in particular, I understand, is easier to perform if you let your foot remain in its natural perpendicular-to-the-leg position. But THAT is NOT the proper way to do the maneuver. The proper way is to turn your foot at an angle and inward and is somewhat uncomfortable to do properly. But every participant strives to do it the proper way because to do it any other way has cheapened and corrupted the achievement.

     Before the days of the give-away ham licenses, hams wanted to conform. Figuratively, those achieving a license 
wanted to "wear pink or black." It mattered not that we were not commercial or military operators; but it mattered. We wanted our performance to comply with the established and respected practices and traditions of this great institution. This meant sending good code, taking the time to learn the correct protocols and prosigns BEFORE GETTING ON THE AIR and not accepting ignorance and poor habits with insipid acquiescence so commonplace today.

     I too am hearing lots of "KN, " "AR" improperly used as well as atrocious fists. The bad habits have proliferated in the rush to make every newcomer feel welcomed, no matter how little effort they put into it. A professional operator does something for the money. However I personally believe an amateur is a far nobler status for, then, something is done purely for the love of it. Then if you are doing something for the love of it, why is it not worth treating it with the same respect and honor reserved for anything that is loved? Shouldn't the message to these space cadets who are making things up as they go be the same as a ballet teacher telling her student to buy pink or black shoes? Maybe if we all adopted that spirit of pink and black we would notice a renaissance of respect for our avocation that now appears to be gasping and wheezing.

ZUT WA9VLK




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