I went to one club meeting in my area about twenty years ago, I wanted to get my Technician license, and they welcomed "walk-ins".....so I went. I was the youngest person there at around thirty, yet everyone seemed cordial. although, one older guy spent the "meet and greet" period complaining that he was emergency communications, had several amateur radios, but was not allowed to put up a tower in his yard. Later, I find out that his yard was the common yard are for his apartment complex, which really opened the one up-manship in the group. In my case, I kept quiet as I had a large yard, but no tower, and was just getting started, having bought an Icom IC-T4H dual band radio for home use and some model of Alinco for my car. When the Icom was mentioned, it only drew compliments on buying a decent first radio, and I did pass the test.
Fast forward to working in radio and communications (satellite, microwave and telemetry systems as well), I now see the flex more with higher end radios, those who buy APX8000XE's and then non-affiliate scan their local fire department, or those that have issued radios and yet claim they are personal. That goes with the bigger trucks, houses, and anything else.....to include broadband bandwidth connections, etc. This is a bit of a caution to those that may be entering the hobby, or as a profession, if you are one of those braggarts, it is being noticed. I often wondered how my own experiences could have been different had the attitude at that meeting been different? what if everyone was showing of their gear and looking down on my Alinco, or Icom?
