Tolerance

What use is an F-call? Tolerance has many definitions, one is: a fair, objective, and permissive attitude toward those whose opinions, practices, race, religion, nationality, etc., differ from one's own. It's not a new concept, it's been around since the end of the Middle Ages. For some reason this week I had a wide spectrum of contacts within Amateur Radio, some great, some dissapointing. I had a debate on the merits or otherwise of the NBN, an email from a 14 year old F-call who is being ignored on air, a few posts from an Amateur friend in the transgender community and an email vociferating refugee payments. I find it curious that we as a community have a medium that ignores lines on a map, stronger still, encourages us to share experiences with amateurs around the world while having members act in an intollerant way toward others. I think that debate is good and required, but in such a debate it might be smart to use the same tennents we use on air. Listen more than you talk. Now you might ask yourself what on earth does this have to do with having an F-call? As we attract more people into the hobby we need to work to keep our community healthy and happy. I think we should encourage those around us to learn from the long history that Amateur Radio represents and perhaps encourage tolerance, as it is clear to me, has been the backbone of Amateur Radio since day one. Why does it matter? For one, your Amateur Radio signal goes outside the boundaries of this country. Sometimes it's heard across the planet, even into space. Sometimes your utterances will make it into the ears of people who have laws and customs completely different from yours. As you know, having an Amateur License is a privilege which works because there is global cooperation on the matter, but if we abuse our privilege, we'll soon learn how fragile cooperation becomes. The melting pot that Amateur Radio represents is a wonderful community. It has people from all walks of life with differeing opinions, life-styles and experiences. What attracted me to Amateur Radio was that those differences don't matter, we all have one thing in common, being Amateurs. I'm Onno VK6FLAB