OMG!!!

What has happened to communication? What has happened to simple, plain, spoken language? I realize that language is a fluid and moving reality. I am aware that each period of time is marked by its unique adaptation of language. New words are created, while others lose favor. Dictionaries need to be routinely updated to keep up with the changes in usage and understanding of vocabulary. But… What has happened to uncomplicated, simple, coherent language?

A few years ago, I was speaking to a group of parents. They were shocked when I began to explain the meaning of the letters: POS, WTF. Their teenagers were using a new language… a new vocabulary. This method to communicate to each other was a natural response to the new technologies being offered. While the use of acronyms is certainly nothing new, I would suggest that we are experiencing a major change in way we will communicate for years to come. IHMO, some of us, like me, if we are unwilling to acquire this new verbiage, are on the verge of experiencing that classic piece of celluloid eloquence from “Cool Hand Luke”: “What we have here is a failure to communicate.”

Each organization has its own unique acronyms. The military has both its unique official and unofficial abbreviated vocabulary… including everything from NCO to FUBAR. The sphere of business likewise, has its share of acronyms: CEO, CFO, and TGIF. Each vocation, each hobby, every activity has it own unique abbreviated language. Certainly included in this list is Amateur Radio. We have our own formal and informal abbreviations… everything from QNI and QSL, to XYL and 73… Oh, I almost forgot… the ARRL.

However, NOTHING prepared me for what I was about to experience when I began the required studies for membership in the Wayne County, Michigan, ARPSC. OMG!!!!!

One of the identified problems that became clear as a result of 9/11 was that a multitude of government agencies were not communicating and cooperating with each other. The conclusion was formed that if there had been a single, centralized, and shared database, not only might have the attacks been prevented, but our response to the catastrophic disaster could have been greatly improved. As a result, the government responded with yet another agency tasked with the job of creating a system which would enable many different agencies and jurisdictions to better cooperate in the event of a large scale attack or disaster. That agency was The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which in turn, through the already established Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) created the Emergency Management Institute (EMI) which provides online education to all interested parties.

OMG!!!! So, I needed to take a couple of tests. No big deal… that is, until I went to FEMA’s EMI website. OMG!!!! If the desire of DHS was the creation of a simple, uncomplicated system which would facilitate the synchronization of multiple agencies, resources, and assets into an expeditious and effectual apparatus from which to respond to a crisis… In the famous words of the “Lost in Space” ROBOT: “Danger, Will Robinson. Danger… This does not compute.” Nowhere have I ever encountered such a multitude of snarled, intertwined, convoluted, incongruent nonsense. I have no idea how much time and tax payer dollars were wasted in the development and production of this project, but dare I say that if we are trying to reduce the over $14 TRILLION national debt… Never again should we allow a government agency to try to simplify ANYTHING!!

If we thought that a well north of 2000 page Health Care bill was a monstrosity… Well, it is a pimple on a gnat’s backside in comparison to the thousands upon thousands of pages of unintelligible, organizational dung known as the NIMS and the NRF. These projects appear to be more interested in job titles and flow charts than getting the job done. They demand that cooperating organizations use plain English, yet all of the administrative and operational documentation is filled with incoherent alphabet-soup gibberish. Nothing proves my point more clearly than in the overuse of acronyms... ICS, NIC, HSPD - 5, 7 and 8, NGO, IAP, EOC, ICP, MACS, MAC, DOC, PIO, JIC, JIS, CSG, DCO, DSCA, EMAC, ESF, IMT, DRC, HSEEP, IMAT, JTF, NCTC, NDMS, NJTTF, SFLEO… ad infinitum. One of FEMA’s EMI study courses features an Appendix with 34 different acronyms; another 22.

I will complete my studies. I will do what is required for membership in the Wayne County ARPSC. I will gladly play along, and fulfill whatever specific assignment that I may be asked to accomplish. However, I can’t imagine that I will ever be convinced that this organizational monstrosity created by the government will in any way whatsoever be the cause of a prompt and proper response to a crisis.

We all witnessed the appalling and illogical response of the government to the BP Oil Spill Crisis in the gulf. The basics principles outlined in NIMS and NRF which call for local control and simplicity were clearly not applied to this crisis. Why would we believe that things should be any different in the next disaster? We have all witnessed the alarming failures, the nonsensical strategies, and the unconstitutional invasions of privacy that are commonplace within the daily work of the TSA. Why should we think that FEMA will operate differently?

And yet, one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to me as a Ham came from a TSA Agent. I was traveling with my 2 meter Go-Box through Detroit Metro Airport, and as you might well imagine, my equipment caught the attention of the Airport Security. Two Agents pulled me and my gear aside and asked me to “open” my box. As they peered inside, the older of the two looked up and with a smile responded, “Looks like we’ve got a MacGyver here.” I’m not sure if it was meant as a complement or insult, but it proves my point.

At the end of the day… what matters most is PERSONAL preparedness, not GOVERNMENTAL preparedness. It seems to me that at the very heart of Amateur Radio beats the rhythm of personal preparedness. Those of us in the Amateur Radio community must always be ready to guard and preserve the very thing that enables us to respond “when all else fails”, and that is NOT some mutant Godzilla (think: HSPD -5… think: NIMS and NRF), whose gigantic size and inherent clumsiness ultimately becomes its greatest weakness. But rather, it is the importance of the individual Ham Operator and his quirky, homebrew, MacGyverish compilations of antennas and radio gear.

So… After having completed over a dozen EMI courses, my conclusion is this: If FEMA, and the NRF and MIMS gets any praise at all… it should be from their basic guiding principal that all emergency response begins at the lowest possible level: the individual. In that one point, I couldn’t agree more.

SPAMMUNITION

Everyone knows what spammunition is. It is ammunition used by the military and police for training purposes. You say you’ve never heard that terminology before… that it doesn’t make any sense. Well, I agree with you. But some ham radio ops do not… Taking into consideration the derogatory way in which they use the term, spamgrams, which is given to commonly sent / received radiogram traffic, such as those which wish hams a happy birthday. Or, perhaps those messages that are friendly reminders of upcoming license expirations.

I may not have the strongest signal in the pile up, but I think I know what the term spamgram is intended to imply. It is intended to somehow suggest that many of the radiograms relayed on traffic nets are nothing better than the annoying unsolicited emails that we receive each day that promise to make us rich, or young, or attractive. I would like to point out that there is a clear difference between a lie that promises to make me into a 20 year old stud, and a stranger wishing me a happy birthday.

I will admit that I haven’t been around this game very long, but I’ve been around long enough to, on a couple of occasions, get sucked into the drama that some would like to create concerning that which is a prevalent part of the normal daily load of radiogram traffic. And to be honest with you… I just don’t get it. Some guys really get fired up about it, and you can color me stupid if you want, but I just don’t get it.

I have had more than ample opportunity to listen to what most hams call rag-chewing. Most of it is harmless and generic chatter between stations. I would guess that the ARRL probably has data on this, but my unscientific observation would conclude that most rag-chewing is about ham radio stuff… antennas, radios, nets, antennas, contests, tuners, amps, antennas, towers, power supplies, antennas... mostly, antennas. Next in line would probably be the weather, then ham festivals… then the last 10% would be a mix of just about anything you can imagine.

My first point here is that it is all voluntary. Every discussion, every subject… it’s all voluntary. I may participate. I may just listen. Or, I can keep scanning for something different. Whatever the case may be, each station voluntarily decides what they want to do.

Likewise, it is the same with how any ham chooses to respond to the National Traffic System. I’ve both received and passed hundreds of radiograms, and not one time… I repeat… never has anyone forced me to participate. I can or not participate at my pleasure. It is all voluntary.

Secondly, none of the voluntary rag-chewing does anything to help protect and preserve the limited and precious “air spectrum” that we are allowed to use. On the contrary the passing of radiogram traffic is directly connected by a calculation that bean-counters in Washington D.C. measure in dollars and cents to a value that is placed in direct competition with other businesses and organizations for “radio spectrum”. And, as I understand it, the economic law of supply and demand is forcing that value higher and higher as more and more people are vying for the same limited space.

So, it would seem to me that, if for no other reason, those who currently oppose “spam-grams” would do a great deal of good for themselves and our common enjoyment of this hobby, if they would “join” us instead of opposing us. It is kind of like those who oppose hunting because they love animals… It has been proven many times over that the best thing they could do to protect animals is to buy a hunting license. Do you want to promote animal conservation? Buy a hunting license. The largest source of money that is used for the protection of animals comes directly from license revenue. So as distasteful and contradictory as that may seem to some people, the logic cannot be denied.

So, for those of you that hate spamgrams, if you love ham radio… if you want to preserve the hobby… the most logical, albeit personally repugnant thing you can do is create and send as many spamgrams as you possibly can. Nothing else you can do for the preservation of Amateur Radio will be easier done or reap as much personal long term gain. It is quite simply the most logical thing you can do.

My third and final reason for sticking my neck out on this issue is, for me, the most important of all. And that is the “spammunition” argument. Day after day, those who serve us in the fields of law enforcement and the military train again and again for the day when it becomes necessary for them to actually unholster their weapons.

They create elaborate test ranges to simulate the kind of blind chaos that may very well be the deadly reality they face on the streets and upon the battlefields. They drill… they train… they shoot up box after box of ammunition because… they all know that the day after day boredom that is so very typical will certainly be shattered by the cacophony of the live-fire gun battle. It is not a matter of if… but when it will come. And, their lives depend upon how consistently they trained for exactly this type of moment.

The reality is that the officer who used up the most spammunition gets to go home at the end of the gunfight and hug his wife and see his kids grow up. No one who escapes a real life gunfight goes home and says to his wife: “I really regret all that ammunition I wasted on the firing range.” And mark this: When the time comes that you use your skills – skills honed by the night by night boredom of a typical Traffic Net – to relay life saving information out of or into a disaster area, you won’t be thinking that all those repetitive ARL SIXTY YOUR BIRTHDAY messages were illegitimate or wasted.

There is no deception in radiogram traffic. Is not the vast overwhelming majority called Routine? However… and this is my most important point of all… it is not a matter of “if”, but rather “when” the time will come when “all else fails” and the Amateur Radio National Traffic System will be the ONLY system still standing. And this simple truth will rule that day: The ham radio op that handled the most spammunition will win.

I have made friends with stations all over America. My hope would be that none of us will ever have to use our traffic handling skills in a time of crisis; however, though no one talks about it… we all know that the time is coming… and when it does, we will be ready. I have learned their voices… I have learned the cadence and the style of their sending traffic… I have learned to interpret their accents and dialects. I have learned how to pick their voices out of the noise… out of the static crashes. I am ready… and so are they.

For those of you that enjoy handling traffic… Do everything you can to handle as much as possible. Make a point of seeking out difficult conditions in which to operate. Don’t wait for band conditions to improve. If possible, intentionally make your job more difficult. Every once in a while, move off frequency a bit as you receive traffic. Hunt out a distant station to which you can relay traffic. If you hear a difficult relay taking place, copy it down as if you were the receiving station; you may need to act as a "stand in the middle relay"... be prepared. Plus it is good training. Don't be afraid of delivering a message that turns out to be an SK. This too is good training. What kind of messages do you think you might very well have to deliver in a real life disaster situation?

Do everything you can to be the best you can be… and be certain of this: the day will come when your traffic handling skills will be highly sought out… most likely by the very ones who were the most critical of our Traffic Nets. And it will be then… that you will smile a little private grin… and then you will do what you trained to do: you will be a public servant. You will, with integrity, professionalism, promptness, and accuracy, serve the public good.