<< People bring cameras and most if not all of them are NOT hassled. Most people don't sit around an airplane recording it's registration and other info about the airplanes and take pictures of it from a million different angles. I understand this can be a foreign concept to many spotters and plane enthusiasts who live and die for airplanes, but take it from a guy who is not much of a "hardcore" spotter, this type of behavior is not exhibited by the average individual. That being said, spotting is not illegal, it can simply appear suspicious to the average individual. >>
What on earth could be the harm at the Open House? Can you answer that question? Give me a scenario and maybe I'll buy it.
If not, then that should've been the response to the person complaining in the first place.
I am not going to suggest that a situation "not" be "handled", but first you need a "situation".
I consider myself a citizen (and bunch of other things) ahead of "plane spotter", but we're a country of laws and those laws are based on rights that are not entirely centered on how close one can come to an "average behavior" standard. Thats best left for authoritarian societies.
Now, on an AFB, I can appreciate different rules will apply, but I disagree that "spotting" is suspicious to the "average individual". This is not nearly the case. Generally speaking, anywhere/anytime anyone has ever been approached by authorities of any stripe in the US [apart from cases where aggressive spotters are on private property and the like], the authorities are generally contacted after scores or dozens or hundreds of people (by definition then, well past the average) have noted the activity and whatever they thought, passed the situation by. More accurately, those rushing to the authorities to report "spotting" activities might be described as the "average" ignorant/busybody/paranoid types (albeit some may be well intentioned).
No one was bashing the guy that apparently has to "do his job", as it seems to have been presented to him, but it makes little sense here, and I think thats what was annoying folks.
I don't personally have a problem with being approached or questioned or called to account by authorities that have legitimate concerns, and for common sense purposes I will submit to it even it seems they don't, but to be held to account to any single person's irrational concerns in a large public gathering of thousands of people seems particularly unreasonable.
Is it asking too much for the person of authority responding to the "complaint", to determine from the "informant" what the offense was? If nothing can be conveyed that is innately suspicious about the alleged behavior, all we are left with is a Bureaucratic/knee-jerk cover your butt response, that is a waste of everyone's time. I wouldn't consider the questioning out of line otherwise, but at an Open House air-show, I think its pretty silly. The fact that the guy could've badly mishandled it, but managed not to, is not a virtue in my opinion. An Open House is intended (I think) to have good community relations (or encourage recruitment). So not doing something particularly obnoxious or unjustified (because he could just as easily done so) is not a reason to be glad.
<<My personal opinion is that if you cannot deal with this kind of "scrutiny" might as well never leave the house.>> :borat: Yeah, well, thats not going to work.
I have very few problems with authorities. No convictions, A 100% clean driving record, and its not because I was never pulled over or done anything wrong, but rather because I do my best to respect and obey the law, and rules, wherever I find them, and I don't give people doing their jobs grief - even if I disagree with them. When I do have a problem, I go up the chain of command after the fact, and it works out well, most of the time.
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