With the battle flag of "divers' rights" fully unfurled, the same marketing gurus who orchestrated the recent losing campaign to prevent regulation of marine life feeding in Florida have announced a new damage control campaign aimed at limiting fallout from the Florida decision. From comments released over the last several weeks, it has become apparent that pro-feeding forces have decided to pursue with renewed vigor a strategy that entails portraying their campaign as a valiant effort to protect "divers' rights" from what they characterize as an unprecedented and unjustified assault by government. The recent statement by the Executive Director of DEMA (Dive Equipment and Marketing Association) that the Florida rule if passed will, "threaten the rights of dive operators and dive-related businesses all over the world" summarizes this mindset and strategy, restated and emphasized at every opportunity by operatives of this vocal minority. Are DEMA's stated concerns for "divers' rights" in this regard a sincere expression of concern for the average sport diver? Or is the real issue here DEMA's unspoken but obvious fear that as regulatory agencies worldwide move to minimize the impacts of diver damage to sensitive marine resources, DEMA will have to relinquish much of their previously uncontested control over what can, and cannot, be successfully marketed to the diving public? LACK OF PUBLIC SUPPORT By tying the Florida issue to one of the most cherished of American values, civil liberty ("SAVE YOURSELVES -- HERE COMES BIG GOVERNMENT!"), DEMA is trying to overcome a fatal liability of its ill-advised but cherished "interactive diving" promotional campaign - lack of public support. To date, virtually every industry-independent poll on this subject has shown that a convincing majority of sport divers oppose the practice of divers feeding, grabbing, riding or touching marine wildlife. Why? Because common sense, along with a fundamental respect for both the welfare and possible threat posed by wild animals, tells most reasonable people that it is unwise and environmentally harmful to do such things. Just why, in the eyes of DEMA, the regulation of marine wildlife feeding in Florida constitutes an unjustified and dangerous precedent in terms of "divers' rights" remains unclear. No rationale has as yet been presented that would justify the implied DEMA position that divers should - in contrast to the remainder of society - be immune from regulation aimed at promoting public safety and environmental protection. After all, no one likes regulation. But, in a nation composed of many millions sharing common resources, regulation is a necessary part of democracy that most of our society understands the need for, accepts, and lives with. Just what "rights" does DEMA claim are unjustly "violated" by the proposed Florida ban, and why are such "rights" different from the rights of other particular groups? Is it a violation of fishermen's "rights" to impose size or bag limits on what may be legally taken? Is it a violation of motorists' "rights" to impose speed limits on our highways"? Is it a violation of smokers' "rights" to tell them they can't light up on a public bus or subway? Recent statements by leaders within the DEMA-led movement to preserve shark feeding in Florida would seem to suggest that it is indeed their position that divers are somehow different than the rest of society, and should exempt themselves from and resist to the last any attempt at government "control". This is certainly the view espoused in a recent (9/24/01) letter to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission from Spencer Slate - the current President of the Florida Association of Dive Operators and a key player in the DEMA-led two-year fight to preserve shark-feeding dives in Florida, in which Slate stated, "I submit to you, Commissioners, your sacrifice of our way of life, by voting for the (marine life feeding) ban on 6 September was a threat to the freedom of every American. We will not stand by and let this ban happen…you are guilty of directly attacking our way of life…You know you made the wrong decision for America and for American freedom." DIVE MARKETING GROUP OR ANTI-GOVERNMENT MILITIA CULT? If such sentiments represent a basic philosophy that DEMA is now trying to sell to the diving public, should sport divers now seek alliances with other groups professing such views, perhaps forming coalitions with anti-government militia cults who secretly meet and drill in the woods of Montana with the ostensible goal of also protecting their "rights" from a presumed hostile government? Where does DEMA find it written in our constitution or laws that anyone has a basic "right" to do whatever they want for personal profit or pleasure, even if such actions damage natural resources, endanger the public, and/or infringe on the "rights" of others (in this case, the rights of all divers to safely enjoy the beauty of the natural undersea world without looking over one's shoulder for an incoming shark or barracuda expecting a handout)? Although DEMA continues to defend their promotion of wildlife feeding tours by asserting that there "is not a shred of evidence" supporting the idea that any such negative environmental impacts accrue from these activities, such a position directly contradicts the expressed professional assessments of this situation by a large number of scientists, wildlife managers and leading conservation groups. Moreover, such a stance is also entirely misplaced. If DEMA contests the legitimacy of such concerns, why hasn't that organization (as must any other for-profit industry seeking permission to alter natural environments and/or commercially exploit natural resources in today's world) taken on the responsibility and financial burden of providing regulators and the public credible, scientifically verifiable "proof" that these activities in fact have "no negative impact"? WHO BEARS THE BURDEN OF PROOF? In lieu of such studies (which do not and will never exist), DEMA has instead provided Florida officials and the press with a parade of self-proclaimed (but unknown to mainstream science) "experts" on everything from ecology to shark behavior, whose anecdotal observations and opinions made in person or in absentia have added much color but little if any substance to the DEMA case. Even worse, DEMA has steadfastly maintained the unprecedented and indefensible (in today's world) position that it is the PUBLIC rather than DEMA who should rightfully bear the "burden of proof" in this matter. The continuing DEMA-led campaign to thwart the efforts of Florida's duly authorized regulatory agencies to protect marine resources and the safety of other recreational users of the marine environment has become an increasingly ugly blot on sport diving as a whole. These actions and words of DEMA and their supporters speak volumes to the need for change from within of a sport that has of late become increasingly dominated and led out of control by the selfish interests of a greedy few. The choices facing the sport are clear: increased government regulation, or far more responsible self-regulation than has as yet been provided or promoted by DEMA itself. | 
