So you got your technician’s license? You get to do such fun activities as: call out on simplex FM voice for no one to respond or talk to the 70-year-old+ “repeater guys” who are on every day from 6 am - 6 pm about uhhhh radios, grilling, ex-wives if you want… and then listen to the silence when everybody runs out of things to talk about in the presence of an “outsider” (someone who hasn’t been on the repeater every day for 10+ years).
Not interested? That’s fine, instead you can just listen to the activity on the repeater when they think no one else is around and hear interesting conversation topics like what the repeater guys would do if someone they were dating had an abortion including, but not limited to, “putting 2 between their eyes”.
Not interested in even that? Okay, if your radio is capable of digital operation, you can connect to a system of linked repeaters and make contact with a different set of 70-year-old+ repeater guys. Once you make contact and talk a bit (maybe even have a good time listening to their stories if you’re into that), you can look up their callsign and find their Twitter and find out they’re REALLY RACIST and that probably the only reason they spoke to you in a polite manner or at all is cuz you have a “normal-sounding” male voice.
If this is what the self-policing culture of amateur radio is like (at least where I am in the United States currently) then we need to give many, many more Baofengs to unlicensed zoomers immediately
Anyway, that has been my experience so far in a rural area in the US. It hasn’t been all bad (making contact with the International Space Station was cool) but yeah. I’m going back to a city soon, maybe it will be better there.
I really do want to get into this hobby and I love the technology (need to find the money sometime to do more packet stuff) but a lot of this type of stuff has been off-putting
Sorry to hear about all the negative experiences. It’s so cool you’ve contacted the ISS, though. I wanna do it at some point as well!
I’m also in rural, southern USA (North Carolina. Only gotta drive about 2 minutes up the road to see a house with a confederate flag flying!) and similar experiences to yours have driven me away from most local nets. Some of the wild stuff I’ve heard these boomers (and older) say has made it unpalatable to say the least. I recall when studying for the Technician’s exam, the study guide I was reading said “There’s really no specific list of things you can’t say on the radio, but basically don’t say it if you wouldn’t say it in front of your mother.” Unfortunately a lot of these guys would clearly say a whole lot of casually racist, homophobic, xenophobic, misogynistic, etc stuff in front of their mothers without a second thought.
One local net I was frequenting about 2 years ago had a woman show up and all the guys were just super weird about it. Like a video game lobby voice chat, but older and creepier. 🤦♂️
I agree we gotta start handing out cheap handsets and licenses to zoomers ASAP, lol. I’m a millennial (33) and would very much like for HAM radio to be more inclusive.
Get on HF. Yes, there’s still trash there, too, but you can also get on with folks who have a much more wholesome worldview.
I’ve QSOd to gobs of folks in the US, Japan, Indonesia, and even a guy in Rarotonga.
If SSB isn’t your interest there’s FT8, FT4, JS8Call, and SSTV.
Upgrade to General and get on 20m, tons of activity there right now—it was by far the busiest band during Field Day.
There are good folks are out there, we just have to link up.
You don’t have to have conversations with those people - start your own net on a repeater about gardening or robotics or astronomy, find other local people you’d like to work simplex with, ask POTA or SOTA contacts if you can come along next time.
You can change the hobby for the better, if you actively participate.
got my tech within the last year, was stunned at how not old-white-guy the class was. all age groups, balanced genders, mixed races. many seemed there for neighborhood emergency teams. the airwaves are dead most of the time i’ve turned the rig on, except during the net hour. i feared exactly what you’ve heard but thankfully haven’t run into it. yet.
That’s really cool, especially people getting their licenses to help their community. Hoping you don’t have to encounter the kind of stuff I have, ever.
The bands are usually dead here too lol… except for the repeaters during the day
I’m hoping maybe the clubs and the hams in my city will be better
I don’t ham myself but from watching channels like uxwbill and vwestlife on sloptube, I got the sense that 99% of radio guys are over 40, white and probably bigots
hope your city adventures serve you better.Would you lose your license for spreading leftist propaganda?
Would you lose your license for spreading leftist propaganda?
I’m not sure… as long as you aren’t broadcasting (something like a one-way signal, no communication, it has a specific legal definition but yeh) and are just talking to people it’s not explicitly illegal but you would probably get harassed and maybe have false complaints to government agencies made about you. Also in the US your callsign is associated with your legal name and address so people can come find you
My area is pretty good, but I went to a hamfest a few towns over and heard some awful stuff being spoken like the most casual thing in the world.
On mastodon, I see people organizing a few leftist nets out there. Might be worth checking for d-star or fusion nets that would let you dial in over internet.
