Re: I Hate Stupid Boaters!!!!!
I commend you Capthook for maintaining your composure and ensuring the safety of your kids during such a traumatic experience. Speaking as a father and a boater your actions are something we can all learn from.
Now, speaking as an insider in a Federal Gov't (Cdn) emergency response organization (Coast Guard) I have to tell you that our organization, and I know most in both our respective countries (US & Can) are run by bean counters. No not professional sailors, career officers or otherwise, but the spindly necked pocket liner bean counting accountants, risk managers and management trainees w/o a lick of operational experience. That being said you have to understand what they see (usually we tell them different but they don't listen because they've never been trained to listen) sorry, I digress, what they see are numbers on a spreadsheet or a nice neat pie chart. Every incident that gets reported via our national reporting system to either the local authorities, Provincial or Federal police gets consolidated and reported. These events are classified for their type and extent injury, loss of life, property damage/loss etc. The bean counters I referred to earlier will use these statistics to assign resources to the front line responders to keep them, in touch, with their jurisdictions. So the short of it is you "should" report this event to the appropriate authorities so there is a record, even if nothing comes out of it. If you don't report it the numbers get skewed and the bean counters don't know enough to read between the lines on the spreadsheet (even though we tell them they should).
I know a lot of us (most probably) just turn a blind eye to events such as this or take matters into their own hands (which can go awry quickly). I guess it's apathy that leads us away from reporting it but does that really do any of us any good in the long run? Probably not 'cause the bean counters won't give the front line responders 'nuff gas & stuff to keep themselves out on the water where "WE" all know they should be!
So simply report the event, even if well after the fact, you'd have some sort of record of treatment for your son to substantiate your side of the story. Get a copy of the report for your records. Hopefully if we all finally say "We've Had Enough" of these freakin' idiots on the water and drive up the incident reports the bean counters will asign more resources to help ensure our safety on the waterways. Well, we can dream/hope anyways.
If that doesn't work I know a couple of big strappin' fellas who'd just luv to take that jerk behind the boathouse for a lil' hmmmmm? friendly chat!
