I skimmed through the thread and noticed a few people talking about regulation, but I can say that September 11 specifically definitely had an impact on how much I fly and how excited I am to bring potential new pilots into the activity. For me, at least, flying went from being an incredibly fun and freeing thing to being something that could get me killed (by an F-16, not my stupidity) or sentenced to prison. And yes, I tell people that when they hear I'm a CFI and ask me what flying is like. So maybe I'm part of the problem. :wink2: In any case, September 11 took a lot of the fun out of flying and aviation in general.
Also, like someone else already pointed out, pilots can be jerks. I learned to fly in college, where my age and gender weren't barriers. In fact, I sometimes wonder if people realized I was a girl. But now? The pilots I do meet are 50 year old men...and not that there's anything wrong with that, but they do see this 30 year old woman differently than a bunch of 20 year old college students did, and they make it clear. Even in the thread I started here about being afraid to fly, a couple people suggested I find another female pilot to fly with. Why? Why should be gender even be an issue? Why can't I fly with the boys like I used to? Or is my age the issue? I'm sure a lot of pilots who start out flying younger like I did will come to that conclusion eventually as well. Pilots just aren't friendly and the crusty old pilot isn't doing the industry as a whole any favors if we want to reverse the trend.
I actually see your point.
I am very excited to be a pilot, and when I tell my friends I am learning to fly, they are are very excited about it.
But if I just met someone, I am not going to bring it up. Some people have a stigma associated with it. I don't want to be judged right off the bat.
I used to drive a 2001 Toyota MR2 Spider, and every week, someone would come up to me in the parking lot, and talk to me about my car. When I drive, and see people looking at it, they always looked up at me if they saw me looking back, they smiled.
I traded that in, and got a 2001 Porsche 911 convertible. Not a single person talked to me in the parking lot about it, and no one ever gave me a friendly look. They just thought I was some rich jerk, which was ironic, when half the people where I live bought fully loaded pickup trucks that cost more then my 5 year old car did.
Anyway, that is one thing that's changed. 30 years ago, if you were a pilot, you were respected and considered cool because of it. Today it does not create that kind of reaction. Not sure why (I have my theories, but that's for the spin zone).
As for suggesting you fly with a woman, I think that was just because people thought they might be more relatable. Sometimes, women are more comfortable working through things with other women. I don't think you should take offense to the suggestion (unless there was more to it that I don't know about).
