You have touched on many good point, the most important (IMHO) being
risk aversion. This is everywhere in society nowadays. People are
completely accepting of the fact that the government should protect
us, from cradle to grave, so much so that the notion of flying a
personal airplane behind a piston engine and a PROPELLER sounds
nonsensical to many (most?) Americans. Flying might be dangerous --
and personal risk and danger are verboten in a society that mandates
bans on "second hand smoke" and requires seat belts in golf carts.

I call it the "pussification" of America. It's very, very sad, but
it's what happens when you have an ever-expanding, all-knowing, all-
caring, omnipotent central government.
--
Jay Honeck
Port Aransas, TX
Pathfinder N56993
www.HarborInnPortA.com


On Jan 27, 12:40*pm, VOR-DME wrote:
In article
,
says...



You make several good points. *I agree 100%, although the whole pie --
not just some parts of it -- is shrinking.

That's sad. * I see so many multi-million dollar boats down here in
Texas, I know it's not a shortage of rich people. *It's...something
else. *I wish I could identify it, and fix it.
--

To be sure, flying one s own airplane to get somewhere does not appear to
be a very up-to-date passion. Though not a wholly sufficient answer, the
morass of the commercial flying experience today has certainly done its
share in taking the shine off of air travel. When I was 15, my first flight
was in a DC-8, and my second, later the same year, was in a Grumman Tiger..
I was one of the only ones in my high school class to have done either.
Though aviation was of course far from new, the experience of flight was
new and exciting to almost any individual. Today most people in developed
countries have flown by the time they are 15 - months! And they cried and
yelled the whole way. The way we are treated today adults too are crying
and yelling the whole way! Have we managed to regulate out of existence
man s age-old dream of flying?

But wait a minute! If we are treated so badly on airline flights, shouldn t
that spark an even greater desire for people to fly their own planes? To
some degree it has, and the bizjet market, while hardly booming, is opening
up to a broader demographic. You no longer need to be a billionaire to get
an occasional ride in a Falcon or Challenger. But the passion is no longer
there. Not for most anyway. And even in this context you are still just a
passenger.

A few contemporary social concerns come into play. Flying an airplane is
not a very "green" activity. This may mean little to many contributors
here, but we should not underestimate the effect the "green revolution" is
having on every aspect of our lives, and ultimately on our thinking.
Secondly, I cannot prove it, but I believe the post-911 security craze has
heightened the general public s feeling that airplanes and flying are
dangerous. We take safety concerns more seriously every day, and the
intense scrutiny on safety of air travel has probably played its part.
Another issue is the cost. Flying has always been expensive, but many
people have less spare cash today for a passion like aviation, particularly
in light of the two preceding considerations. And those who do have the
cash are wary of spending it on anything that could be construed as an
ostentatious display of wealth. There s a lot of "rich-bashing" going
around these days, and flying your own plane is a great way to feel
yourself in the crosshairs.

Then there s a self-sufficiency issue, which may be the most important.
People of my generation take pride in doing something for themselves. If
you are not satisfied by the services you are being offered, do it
yourself. I laugh to myself flying over congested roads, thinking of people
sleeping for days on their suitcases in airport waiting areas while their
airline tries to come to grips with the bureaucratic mess of resuming
service after it snowed four inches - somewhere in another state! My
15-year-old nephew by contrast, far from flying in a Grumman Tiger, spends
his days and nights on X-Box, on line with his friends, playing tough war
games, shooting each others helicopters down. In real life, however, he
would not have a clue where to look if the car didn t start, would not be
able to find a circuit breaker in his own house (and doesn t know what this
item is) and refuses to fly even commercial flights because he feels it is
dangerous.

I m sure I ve only touched on the issue, and I may be mistaken on parts of
it, but I believe our society today is not at all conducive to the
interest, passion and overall satisfaction in an activity like flying. *Do
children today still have dreams they are flying? Can society really wear
us down to where this age-old yearning no longer has meaning, and ceases to
exist?