Andy9o8

Then pity the poor college professors who are boxed out of dating all those luscious undergrads. Professionalism is what it is. Nobody forces an instructor to take the job. You take a teaching job, you act like a professional, and that includes disciplined demeanor toward your students. Wanna be a skygod who bangs the new arrivals like a stud on the Serengeti? Don't be an instructor. Or at least, FFS, wait until they're off student status. That argument works against your point. At a college, the no-dating your student rule not only helps protect students from sexual harassment or manipulation by their instructors, it protects the student body at large, by reducing the opportunity for students to sleep their way into a higher grade, more personalized attention, etc. The same applies to students at a DZ, as I discuss in my post # 9.

Good point. All the properly de-milled canopies are bleached and re-dyed lavender before they're released to the market.

As I've explained in other "helmet law" threads, most of the posters here are missing at least half the point when all they focus on is health insurance only. It's really not about protecting un-helmeted riders from themselves. It's about protecting everyone else's automobile (not health - automobile) insurance rates from the effect of allowing un-helmeted riders. Your auto insurance rates are based, in very large part, on the company's assessment of your risk that the company will have to pay out on claims made against you by other people with whom you get into an accident. And the insurance companies don't just look at you (like your age and driving record) in setting that rate, they look at everything that affects that financial risk in setting that rate. Including, among other things, whether motorcycle riders in your state are or are not required to wear helmets. Point being, if you (driving your car) get into an accident with a motorcyclist, there's a higher chance that his injuries will be more serious if he's not wearing a helmet than if he is wearing one. That means your insurance company bears the financial risk of having to pay out a higher amount on a claim by an un-helmeted rider than by a helmeted one. That, in turn, means that the auto insurance companies use that as justification to set everyone's auto insurance rates higher. So this really isn't about "nanny state" versus "personal freedoms", much as the use of simplistic slogans like that makes those who speak them feel good.

I do. Most tandem students are jumping as a once-off on their bucket list. But even whether they are or not - emotionally, they're ALL pretty ripe for being taken advantage of, between the pre-jump awe, the fear-factor of the ride and jump itself, and the post-jump euphoria. I don't think it speaks well for the general professionalism of the instructors or the DZs, or the reputation of the industry, if it gets presumed that every female tandem student is secretly viewed by her professional protectors as fresh meat on the half-shell, available to be plucked when they're highly vulnerable. I wonder how many of my fellow dads of daughters don't see my point.

I have occasionally represented my wife in a couple of business matters, and I think a traffic ticket. I was already married when I became an attorney. Thus: other than that, no.

The desire to find God is a powerful documented drive in the historical collective consciousness of our species. Dismissing it as a myth ignores the obvious. You're twisting my message, I'm sure deliberately. I acknowledge the desire. I dismiss the goal as myth. An old, weak debating tactic: vilify the opposition. Ineffective. So typical of you and your ilk.

I agree. To my view, it's a matter of both ethics and professionalism. In addition to what you point out, another aspect of the professionalism part is that it leaves open the appearance (or even the reality) of an instructor engaging in favoritism toward the student. In part, just as in any other kind of school, it's not fair to other students, who might not benefit from equally "attentive" instruction. Aside from that, it also leads to the possibility that the student (usually female) will be advanced too fast, into jumps that are beyond the safety cushion of her skill set - and the dangers of that are obvious.

A myth mythified as mocking another myth. The horror.

Considering the manner in which Oklahoma is recently wont to officially end lives, I'd think official representations of Satan in government buildings would simply be acknowledging the obvious.

I think both your and Gary's replies are quite reasonable and balance both sides of a slippery issue.

The article doesn't mention whether the pilot knew and willingly allowed Draves to jump. I'd think that unless Draves kept his rig well-concealed from the pilot until the last instant, it was probably quite visible while he was wearing it on the way up. This may (or may not) be a case of the pilot (also) getting himself into trouble, if (if) he was Draves's willing co-conspirator. And the pilot is charge with knowing the rules himself, not just relying on what someone tells him. So I'm not sure yet whether to be sympathetic for the pilot.

FWIW - What I've learned from practicing (on both sides) and reading a lot of industrial product liability cases in the US is: in the US, or with companies that operate in the US (thus exposing themselves to US-law liability), some industrial/product safety measures are developed and implemented purely proactively, but a LARGE number of them never are developed and/or hit the marketplace until somebody gets badly hurt or killed and some company or its insurers have to pay-out a few multi-zillion dollar verdicts. Numerous examples of this in the automobile, factory machinery and farm machinery industries, to cite just a couple examples. ETA: I'm not suggesting whether this might or might not apply to current wind tunnel technology; I'm just speaking generally.

Being over 50, I gotta laugh at this as well as the "noise" comment above, as I remember my parents generation saying the exact same thing about rock & roll. Old farts don't die off, they just get replaced.

A frog in a blender.

Tunnel crashes? Exactly what could go wrong at a tunnel that would endanger flyers? Honest question. What's red and green and goes round and round and round and round?

I've flattened a couple of squirrels in my life. Never a hamster.

Call a redneck!

"Back up!" "Shoot!"

This is what also find irritating. It's like comparing lettuce and poison oak. No, the US doesn't machine gun people accused of a wrong on a public street. Or stoned to death. There is a semblance of due process here. "Here", as in: IN America; but not necessarily BY America. Apologies for the thread drift, but: consider the not-insignificant numbers of (mostly brownish) civilians killed by American drones and bombs in other (mostly brownish) countries. Yes, it's a bit of a tangent, but it certainly clutters-up the moral high ground, don'it?

I would, but John's post #12 pretty much sums it up.

Illegally, for the most part.

I used to think mandatory first tandems (which some DZs require) were just a cash cow, but I'm coming to change my mind on that. This isn't the old days, when we started out on simple, docile mil-surp rounds. It's orders of magnitude easier to majorly fuck up under a square canopy than under a round. Anything to get a student past the almost paralyzing sensory overload that occurs on the first jump before he has to pilot a ram-air canopy to the ground solo is a good thing.

What do you suggest when someone with a CC permit must enter a legally defined gun free zone, such as a public school? See post #17.

And,.. What about the distinction between a decent society and indecent individuals?

It is obvious you still beat your wife.