XPost: rec.radio.amateur.moderated, uk.radio.amateur, free.uk.amateur-radio
Real-World Amateur Radio
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Change: can the RSGB adapt?
Posted: 16 Feb 2022 07:47 AM PST
https://mw1cfnradio.blogspot.com/2022/02/change-can-rsgb-adapt.html
Although it's hardly high-profile at the moment, there's an on-going
discussion about the RSGB over on Twitter.
For the most part, it's well-mannered, with only the occasional mindless defender of the society throwing that old cliche around: 'it's easy to
snipe from the sidelines'.
What I get from Twitter is that younger operators, who may or may not be
RSGB members, don't have such a 'Leave/Remain' polarity about them that
older members often seem to, spurred-on by fixity of mind that comes with
old age for many.
Does the RSGB have a future? In short: not in its current guise. It
doesn't seem to understand - and I hope it isn't because it doesn't care -
that we are no longer in the '£10 passage' days of Empire, where you could literally have your passage to colonise other countries paid for by the government. When you got there, work applenty awaited in order to stamp Britain's presence through development on any land unfortunate enough to
see it land there.
If that's too esoteric for you, let's look at how the environment for
younger people has changed over recent decades, and how these impact on
their ability to enjoy radio:
(1) Good, well-paid jobs are much more difficult to find than they used to
be. We are no longer rebuilding Britain after a world war, and all the mass-employment opportunities that brings. Real-terms salaries have
stagnated since the financial crash of 2010, and remain below the 2008
peak. A cost-of-living crisis threatens immediately to make things a lot
worse.
(2) Housing is in a total state of crisis. Most people now retired will
have seen house price-to-earnings ratio hover around the 3:1 level during
their working lives. Today, it is around 10:1. Mortgages are no longer
given away like sweets, and the loan-to-value available is often much lower than historically was the case. Even saving for a deposit, which is around £27,000 for a 10% downpayment on an average UK home now, seems almost insurmountable for many.
This can have both a positive and negative effect effect on ham radio. If
you can't afford a home, then you might decide to spend your income on a
good /p or /m set-up, or set-one up in your parents' home (the median age
of first-time buyers is now 34 years in the UK - it was only 28 years in
2007, and 23 years in 1960). Alternatively, you may well not bother with
radio at all, being perceived as something to do when you're settled in
your own home and/or later in life.
(3) Planning environment. Neighbours have always loved to complain. But
today, they can do so anonymously (so far as the person complained about is concerned) and quickly, via e-mail, to their local council. Intolerance of difference is on the rise, and people's access to large gardens that can actually accommodate antennas is lower than it used to be. Whilst
neighbours have every right to influence the decision-making process about someone who wants to install an antenna of any note, the reality is that
this, coupled to ignorance of technical matters amongst planning staff,
makes gaining permission far too difficult and prone to pub-talk prejudice.
At the moment, anything over 76cm is not permitted without consent.
(4) RFI. This has increased dramatically in recent years and, coupled to a regulator with little interest in pursuingmatters, means we either have to
put up with bands spoiled by solar PV, car chargers, USB chargers, plasma
TVs, etc, or else just go /p or /m.
Now, if you buy a smart phone, or a TV, or a commercial radio receiver, you plug it in and expect it to work with no funny lines across the screen, or interference on the channel you're listening to. And that is exactly what
we generally get. As mass consumers, we wouldn't tolerate spending that
much money and not getting perfect performance.
Not so with amateur radio. If you spend a typical £1300 on a transceiver
you can expect to be blighted by RFI that you can do absolutely nothing
about. Install anything other than the most stealthy of wires, and you can expect a visit from your local planning department.
So my basic argument for the future of a truly representative RSGB is that
it should, indeed must, start confronting these harsh realities. It can't change the economy, but it can chane planning laws and RFI control.
The median age of those at Board level in the society is now 70 years. We
can guess, probably not too wildly amiss, that they will tend to be quite well-off, and have a nice house, some in places where antennas can be
erected without much trouble. The problem is that without diversity, you
can come to believe that everyone else is living like this, and has the
same opportunities. But they don't. Clinging on to this belief can then translate into elitism - something that amateur radio has always suffered
from, but must ditch.
OK, so I ramble on again! Some of these things you may not agree with, or
not see as very relevant to amateur radio. But I think you may agree that
the days of getting a job, buying a house, cutting the grass on a weekend
and twiddling with your radio from time to time just isn't the experience
for an increasing number of people these days. We must change and adapt to people's reality, or the hobby will die even sooner than we expected.
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