Originally Posted by
turtle
If I were you, I'd give up on the EAA. Here's why.
Flying is very structured and regulated. Building an experimental doesn't change this by much. A mid-air collision because a pilot didn't follow the law, hurts just as much, regardless of what you are flying. An aircraft in a 'transponder required area' that wanted to 'stick it to the man' by not having it calibrated is a hazard to all flyers. Most builders are pilots. While they'd argue whether an AN bolt is superior to a grade 8 bolt, they all know and accept that they have to follow the rules they are given.
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You completely trivialize what it is to fly and the privileges of the PPL, and by doing so, belittle every PPL holder and owner of a 'little GA plane'. You seem to be very anti-authoritarian with terms like 'police state' and how it's your job to break the law. Calling people shills, narcs, slaves and brainwashed is not a way to make friends with adults. Anti-authoritarian and piloting are mutually exclusive. Basically, your beliefs are at odds with 99% of pilots, builders and any organization that represents them. They would also make you an extremely poor pilot.
While there is always room for improvement in any club, you need to decide if a small program change would placate you or would you still be unhappy sharing space with 'slaves' you obviously disdain?
As I read through your first post, Chopper Girl, I wanted to say the same things that Turtle said, but he (or she, I don't know) said it better. Ordinarily I don't like ad hominem comments about others, but there're a couple of lines from Top Gun that seem to fit you. Iceman is talking to Maverick:You're everyone's problem. That's because every time you go up in the air, you're unsafe. I don't like you because you're dangerous.
Later, he says: Maverick, it's not your flying, it's your attitude. The enemy's dangerous, but right now you're worse. Dangerous and foolish.
For very good reasons, primarily safety, aviation must be highly regulated, and having discussions with those who know more about those regulations than you do is valuable. I go to the local monthly EAA IMC Club meetings, yet I keep up with the regulations on my own, and I've been an IR pilot for 42 years. I've been flying for more than 44 years, I was once a CFII, a SE charter pilot, and I've got more than a few hours in my logbook. I've taken more checkrides than you have fingers. You think I don't know how to fly in the clouds legally, how to stay out of trouble with ATC, how to live? I absolutely do, but all of us are students in aviation, no matter what our experience or training. It is impossible to know everything that there is to know about aviation.
Actually, if you can't change your attitude a bit, I'd just as soon that you don't learn to fly, that you don't build an airplane, and that you stay out of the sky. It'll be a whole lot safer for the rest of us, who understand the need for and abide by the rules and regulations.
Cary