Family and Friends opinion on you having a scanner?

[VE7CFF]

I'm an Emergency Social Services volunteer with my city. Always have a scanner with me. Helps when called to an evacuation etc. and need more info from the fire dept. when incident command not yet set up.In Canada, scanners are legal as long as not used in the commission of a crime.

73

 

[slicerwizard]

we could start this. it will be 100 men to every 2 women. lol. not good odds if u r a man.

That's ok, we'll load it up with fembots.

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[Ghstwolf62]

Mine don't like it but when anything in the world happens they call/come over right away and want to know what's going on. LOL

Others coming in either think its cool or look at them funny. The biggest thing is a commercial radio I have which has police and fire programmed into it with transmit inhibit enabled. They see that and get all weird and believe it or not think I talk to the cops on it. Have to explain what inhibit means and that its illegal for me to transmit on any PD or FD freq.

They still look at me funny though as if they don't believe I'm not talking to the cops all the time.

 

[DJ11DLN]

we could start this. it will be 100 men to every 2 women. lol. not good odds if u r a man.

Count me out and make it 99:2. Been with my G/F for 9 years now, she had zero exposure to scanners prior to me jumping back into the hobby a few years ago. Now she wants one. I told her no problem, you have a birthday coming up, LOL. Lucky me!

And I will admit it: I'm nosy. I like to know what's going on around the area. Scanners have saved me from blundering into some incident or other more times than I can count. Not only saves me grief, also keeps me from becoming part of the traffic problem for the people working the incident.

 

[majoco]

What people don't realise is that we are all bound by the 'secrecy of correspondence' act, or whatever it's called in your country. It covers everything from reading other peoples mail to using something that you heard on your scanner to 'gain a pecuniary advantage'. You can tell someone that you listen to the police or similar on your scanner but you're not allowed to tell them what you heard. Some countries ban them altogether, some countries won't let you bring a cellphone in. A few years ago I had an ordinary BC band transistor radio confiscated at the Luxor, Egypt airport and given back next day as we left - with the batteries taken out!

 

[PrivatelyJeff]

Tell your family that you dare the government to do something, and you'll take a few pigs out with you if they come at you.

Family: dad had some back in the day because of work (EMS supervisor) but dropped it because he has to hear it all the time at work, doesn't want to hear it at home. Mom, sister et al., "cool, whatever, shouldn't you you pay your bills first?".

Friends: "You just want to snoop on everyone!" I tell them eff off.

 

[goodmore]

Most just think I'm a nerd. But I have tried to educate them. I tell them the kinds of emergency calls I hear and the amount of them. I really don't think the average person out there knows:
How many car accidents happen daily
How many over dose calls happen daily
How many domestic calls happen daily
The people responding to these calls are day to day heroes in my book. I don't throw that term around very much. But I'm grateful that people out there want to help others. That volunteer fireman or firewoman responding to a fire in zero degree temps should have listeners out there spreading the word.

 

[bigcam406]

ive been a scanner nut since the mid 80's, and my friends at the time couldn't understand what was so addictive about the hobby. one night we were hanging out at a local donut shop and I heard an alarm call from just down the street. we took off in my car and found a high end jewellery and fur store rammed with a stolen van and we witnessed the guys loading up the van before the police got there. the van was stolen from my friends automotive paint supply shop earlier in the night. the van took off but we stayed and gave the police all the info. they thanked us for the info and asked me how I knew what was going on. I showed them my portable that was in the car. the cop said "well, that came in handy". later on we were listening and they did a high risk takedown on the highway west of the city and arrested 2. I had to go to court and testify as a witness. years later, still have a scanner in the car, my daughter thinks im nuts, as she thinks im trying to pick up alien activity of some sort. as for my friends, they have owned scanners for years as well.

 

[ShyFlyer]

I've never caught any flak from anyone over my scanner habits. Then again, I'm not really all that "hard core" about it either. My ex actually thought it was kinda cool that I had one in the car.

 

[jonwienke]

In my experience they tend to find it annoying background noise (especially fire tones), until something "interesting" happens.

 

[n1das]

My wife is completely cool with me being a scanner nut, a GMRS licensee, and a licensed ham. I keep her informed on what's going on in the area. I'm an electrical engineer by training and work as an Electromagnetic Interference/Compatibility (EMI/EMC) Engineer so my work goes right along with my hobby activities. I've been an electronics hobbyist since I was a kid and built my first scanner in 1977 during my freshman year in high school. The scanner was a Heathkit GR-1132 VHF-Lo/VHF-Hi/UHF 8-channel crystal scanner. Since then I've owned many scanners over the years.

While my wife is not a ham and has no interest in becoming one, she loves using commercial radios with me on GMRS for when we are out doing things with family and friends. If nothing else she recognizes the value and coolness of having radio communications as an important tool. We've integrated our use of 2-way radio into our daily activities. Listening to local stuff with a scanner is simply an extension of that. She likes going to the hamfests with me too. Our latest set of radios we use are the Motorola DTR series of 900MHz FHSS digital on-site business radios. They work excellent and we know that there is no scanner on the market that will readily monitor these. We can "hide" from scanner listeners too. The DTRs are part of my "exit" strategy from GMRS for when the FCC someday makes GMRS license by rule and a bubble pack only service. She likes using the Motorola DTRs way better than any analog radio because they just simply work and work excellent.

Friends of ours are also into 2-way radio including selling Part 90 commercial gear and are scanner listeners too. There is no issue with what they think of me (us) having a scanner.

Have fun!

 

[Ghstwolf62]

Count me out and make it 99:2. Been with my G/F for 9 years now, she had zero exposure to scanners prior to me jumping back into the hobby a few years ago. Now she wants one. I told her no problem, you have a birthday coming up, LOL. Lucky me!

And I will admit it: I'm nosy. I like to know what's going on around the area. Scanners have saved me from blundering into some incident or other more times than I can count. Not only saves me grief, also keeps me from becoming part of the traffic problem for the people working the incident.

Definitely on the last part. I ran a scanner in my semi for years as I traveled around the country. It allowed me to know ahead of time regarding accidents, road closures and most importantly weather issues.

Listening to Wyoming SP for instance saying how bad conditions were forty miles ahead or name your state often allowed me to shut down somewhere of my choice to get out of it instead of being stuck literally on the road or having no place to go at all.

Other things like tornadoes or warnings about them were usually put out on SP channels too.

It was a Godsend I can tell you.

 

[K9DAK]

I started scanning back in 1976 after my Uncle (a Lake County Sheriff's Deputy) loaned me a Regency handheld for a few weeks. I got hooked, of course and acquired a Radio Shack PRO-4A at a local garage sale, including the four crystals I needed! My parents were indifferent, but my friends thought it was cool. After I got married years later, my wife (now ex) tolerated it, and my kids loved it. I subsequently gave my PRO-92 to my son when he moved to Canada. When my daughter came to visit me at my new condo, I had the scanner going and when she heard it exclaimed "there's a familiar Daddy noise!"

New wife got hooked on scanning within a couple weeks of being together... we now refer to ourselves as Gladys & Abner (think Bewitched). Of course we're both suffering severe withdrawl since May last year when Lake County Sheriff and our local PD switched to encrypted TGs on StarCom21. But that's a different thread...

 

[awd]

My interest in radio communications started out when I was a kid and would take little FRS walkie talkies to my friends' houses so my parents could communicate with me when I needed to come home for dinner. I also found it interesting when my brother would use his portable CB to talk to/listen to truckers when going on road trips in my mom's old suburban.

When I started a few years back working for my current employer (county government), due to my job I would pretty often be around a 2-way radio scanning public safety channels, which is my current primary scanning interest. I got hooked at that point. Later on, I purchased a scanner to install in my vehicle and am starting to dabble in SDR.

As for friends and family's opinions, I think they all think it's a little quirky but I think they appreciate it when I know to avoid or watch out for certain events in the neighborhood or on the highway.

Now I just need to find out my next "thing" in the word of radio comms.

 

[n1das]

I get told all the time that what I am doing will land me in jail. Mainly when I mention listening to mil-air. They all tell me that stuff is all classified and I need to delete that stuff and forget all that I heard I just laugh, and they say stuff like everyone I listen to no matter who it is keeps logs of everyone who is listening to them so if something happens they can look at who was listening and go question and or arrest them.

LOL! Hilarious!

When it comes to stuff like this, I simply let people think whatever they want to think because they will anyway and nothing will ever change that.

You could have some fun with them by challenging them to turn you in for listening to stuff they think you shouldn't be listening to and will land you in jail. Tell them to specifically cite what law(s) back up what they are saying is illegal. Nothing beats fact checking them in real time.

Have fun!



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[mciupa]

Seeing as I had scanners before I had my own family, my wife is cool with it.

If I'm in a room at home alone, I listen out loud. As a courtesy, when the rest of the family is around. I put on headphones, but don't crank up the volume in case they want to ask me a question.

Close friends have scanners, so their opinion of them are same as mine, we love them.

Casual acquaintances are usually impressed when they find out what can be monitored. Very few ask if it is also a transceiver.

 

[Tired_Yeti]

So far no one know I scan. My wife knows I have a scanner but has no idea what it is. At this time, I only scan at work. I work in a highly secured facility (24 hrs armed guards kinda thing) and I monitor the radio traffic when I eat lunch in my car. That way I know if something is going down inside and I need to rush back in. So I really only monitor 1 freq and even my coworkers don't know that I'm monitoring.
No biggy.


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[eaf1956]

I don't own a single scanner!

 

[pb_lonny]

I don't own a single scanner!

"Current scanners:BCD 996XT,BCD996P2
BCD536HP (2)
Ham Gear: Icom 7000, U82, V82, V8, IC 2820 and OMG a YAESU FTM400DR"

???

 

[iMONITOR]

I think people worry way too much about what others think of them, or what they're doing, what they like, or dislike.

I blame it on social media. So many people are so worried about their 'friends' count, etc. It's ridiculous. Be yourself, do what you want, ignore all the naysayers.