Jim,

Email is a terrible medium for communicating tone. It’s difficult to accurately project and/or discern emotion via email. Often a writer intends to be sarcastic in a humorous way, but it is received as demeaning and derogatory.

Some of us military types grew up in a flying environment where one’s skills and judgment were under constant review. Public post-flight reviews (to give you an idea of the mindset, we called them ‘critiques’) were mandatory, and all aspects of a mission were evaluated for mission effectiveness and safety. For training missions, the guiding principle was (still is I’m sure) ‘safety of flight is paramount.’ For operational missions crews might assume higher risks to get the job done, but compromising safety for a training mission was , um, not in accordance with official guidance.

Despite our government’s current effort to the contrary, you can’t write a rule book that prohibits EVERY sort of dangerous behavior/mindset/inclination. This, of course, is especially true in an organization where such behaviors/mindsets/inclinations would be advantageous, depending on the mission. There are many things you can do with a USAF aircraft that, while not specifically forbidden, would be considered dangerous -- even negligent -- on a training mission. The problem is you can’t simply throw away a pilot you have spent millions training for behaving stupidly on a single flight. And sanctioning via official means (reprimands, courts-martial, etc.) usually kills any chance of promotion, so you may as well count on a person so sanctioned to punch out (of the service) at the earliest opportunity. Understanding this, the leadership chooses to use peer pressure to modify behavior rather than more official means. It turns out the peer pressure idea works better anyway.

In a community so inculcated with the ‘safety culture,’ engaging in behavior not officially prohibited, but considered unsafe, was grounds for public humiliation during a post-flight critique with the crews of all aircraft involved, and maybe even during a monthly safety meeting in front of the entire wing. Such public humiliation served several purposes including (but not limited to):

- It provides a teaching moment to show how easy it is to make bad decisions

- Those experiencing such public humiliation rarely repeat the offending behavior

- Those observing learned the hazard of engaging in such behavior

I don’t bring all this up to suggest ritual public humiliation as a means to make all Lancair pilots identical automatons of safety. I only wish to point out that while public rebukes may come across as pompous personal puffing (and some may be), often it is simply a matter of habit – and old habits are hard to break.

My suggestion is for both sides to attempt tone deafness. Those posting their disapproval of others should make every attempt to post opinion backed by fact and data, but absent the vitriol. If the subject behavior/idea/mindset is heinous enough it will speak for itself. Humor is often an effective tool to use in such cases, but beware the problems noted above. If you want to be funny, be sure it’s funny and not mean spirited. You might find them trite and silly, but adding an emoticon to your text can be an effective means of deflecting hurt feelings. (I can’t wait to see how some of these guys react to this one… :-P)

Those on the receiving end of a critique should assume the best of intentions on the part of the poster. Speaking for myself, if I offer an opinion about another’s judgment or behavior, I do so with the sole purpose of avoiding injury or bent airplanes. My guess is the vast majority of those posting negatively have the same goal. In other words, as difficult as it may be, when you’re getting spanked try to get the message and ignore the tone.

One thing I would point out to those who truly have the best of intentions (improving safety) when critiquing another: If your message bounces off the defensive wall sure to go up after you deride his/her ego, your best intention to ‘help’ a person will come to naught, because even the best, most obvious message is wasted if the receiver doesn’t get it

Even if everyone completely disregards this rambling missive, Jim, please don’t quit the forum because you are unhappy with the tone. I have learned some very important lessons while observing the (often unpleasant) dissection of another person’s behavior. I’ve learned some of the most important lessons of my life after being shown (always unpleasant) how I’d behaved stupidly or irresponsibly. Yes, it hurt, but I am forever grateful to the @$$holes who pointed out the error of my ways.

Respectfully,

Mark Sletten