I think the reason for frustration is that the club can foresee serious problems coming from as Lethal put it 'keyboard warriors' and they have done a very good job to prevent this from happening.
The last thing the club, or the people involved in the incident want is a shitfight over who is to blame, which I would suggest is a very possible outcome of allowing anonymous, non-members to discuss the incident on the forum. This would result in three things, people feeling threatened that the judgments they made and actions they took are being questioned by 'keyboard warriors' that of course know everything (not to mention feeling like shit), the media jumps on the forum and starts quoting some of the bullshit appearing on the forum and finally, the whole review process is compromised as everybody becomes extremely defensive about the situation thus we miss out on a big opportunity to make spearfishing safer because some idiots want to have a wank off over the incident.
What we need is an honest, open and supportive process to assist all people involved and ensure that all the facts come out, which I think the club deserves a lot of credit in successfully achieving. I am very confident that a comprehensive investigation of the incident is progressing (as discussed in Tuesdays meeting), and already new measures are being discussed and taken to make comps and day to day dives safer. No doubt these will be shared with other clubs and other divers when appropriate.
tvolke wrote:
If this happened to a diver not in the club I can guarantee it'd be posted and everyone would chat about it, just like it happens with any topic of interest that makes the news.
This is probably correct, but remember some absolutely critical things. Most importantly everybody involved in the incident is protected by anonymity, thus comments are less likely to be seen as personal (not to mention those involved will quite probably never hear or read them). Also remember, people were relying on the forum to get up to date information about the victims condition, they do not at the same time need to read how keyboard warriors would have prevented the incident or saved the day. There are plenty of other other important reasons, it is still a police matter, insurance claims are being processed, etc.
What happened on Sunday, the circumstances in which it occurred and the responses that people made is the business of the people involved on the day and nobody else. Outside the people that were there, it will be an impersonal analysis of the 'clubs' role in the incident and what the club can do differently (or the same) in the future to prevent or manage incidents. Who did what, saw what, said what, is completely irrelevant.