Newsgroups: rec.radio.amateur.misc
Subject: Re: DXers
From: emd@ham.almanac.bc.ca
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 92 20:44:58 PST
Distribution: world
Organization: Robert Smits
Keywords: rude? never!

oo7@ut-emx.uucp (Derek Wills) writes:

> zslf08@trc.amoco.com (Steven L. Farmer WA5RPF) says:
> 
> In article <BXTJVB2w164w@ham.almanac.bc.ca>, emd@ham.almanac.bc.ca writes:
> [stuff deleted...]
> > DX'ers are pests. They are noisy, rude and inconsiderate. (And that's not 
> > even mentioning the cheats who use lists).
> 
> You simply don't hear the dxers who refrain from boorish behavior.  We are
> most assuredly in the majority, and it's a mistake to generalize from the
> rudeness of a few to insult all of us.  Our world has an ample supply of
> bigotry already.  Please don't add more.
> ---------------------
> 
> Steve is right.  You hardly ever hear Real[tm] DXers on the air.   They
> lurk, listen, tune around, pounce, then repeat ad lib.  I spend perhaps
> 2 mins out of every hour actually transmitting, and the rest listening.
> 

What I dislike most about DX'ers in general, not just the rude and/or 
crude ones, is the effect thay have had on ham radio in general. Instead 
of encouraging people to reach out to each other, to learn about 
different customs, cultures and ways of life, dxing (and its attendant 
cousin, contesting) encourages many of the bad things in ham radio. A 
"win at all costs" attitude often seems to be coupled with a complete 
disinterest in the other ham except as a trophy for the wall. The whole 
Dxing/contesting crowd has infested ham radio with over zealous, overly 
competitive hams who will seemingly stop at nothing to get that little 
pasteboard.

> What I find inconsiderate is the people who get on 20m SSB in the morning
> to discuss the weather with friends in the next state, right on top of a
> DX station that you can only hear for half an hour at that time of day,
> and then many dB below the chattering.  It's so depressing to tune the
> band for Asian stations, and have to listen to OFs ragchewing over their
> first cup of coffee.
> 

Why? Two OF's (your generalization, BTW) ragchewing over coffee are 
probably a lot more entertaining than hearing another UR 59 QSL via the 
buro contact anyway. You want to prevent two hams from talking to each 
other because they're taking up space on the band that you'd rather use 
to get a pasteboard card from some guy in Asia - and that you'll probably 
spend a couple of minutes on in total ?

It's exactly this sort of egotistical reaction from DX'ers (who regard 
everything not DX as somehow not worth bothering about) that makes me 
regard DX'ers as pests who are ruining our hobby.

> I would love to see a band plan that restricted same-continent QSOs to
> one section of the band, leaving another part for intercontinental QSOs.
> I'm not optimistic that it would ever work, of course.
> 

Neither am I. The same DX'ers that ignore band edges, etc under the 
present rules would surely ignore these as well. Or are you proposing 
DX'er free zones? :-)

> Anyway, as Steve says, it is ridiculous to judge a whole class of people
> by the excesses of the few.  I wonder what has happened to logic when I
> read the periodic posts that say "all the people causing trouble on 14313
> are Extras, proving that the cw tests are meaningless".  It's like he
> Europeans believing that all Americans are rich, simply because the only
> ones they see are the ones rich enough to travel to Europe.
> 

The excesses of the few are natural outgrowths of a sub-culture within 
ham radio that encourages contests and awards based on the NUMBER of 
contacts one has with other hams, instead of the quality of the contacts. 
That rudeness, intolerance for non-DX'ers, and a willingness to violate 
the rules grows out of that sub-culture shuld not surprise anyone.

> Anyway, the Real DX is done on cw, so nyah nyah.
> 
Who said anything about mode? I've had some very nice ragchews on CW.




Robert Smits  VE7EMD Ladysmith B.C. 
Ph (604) 245-2553 e-mail: emd@ham.almanac.bc.ca 
PACKET VE7EMD@VE7KIT.#VANC.BC.CAN.NA