Hello Klim,
I’m K. [Имя сокращено в целях соблюдения конфиденциальности], formerly a member of the 13.8% female component of the Australian skydiving community. I read your article «Russian skydivers – who are they» on the Blue Skies website and found it very interesting, especially the part about the falling rate of female participation in Australian skydiving (pardon the pun:) and it made me think back to when I was skydiving and why I left.
I started skydiving when I was 17 in February 2012 with a static line course and stopped in January 2014 on jump #305. During those two years I learned about and came to better understand my physical and mental capabilities and time. Facing the challenge of learning to free-fall and pilot a parachute greatly increased my self-confidence and forged the personality I have today.
The main reason why I stopped skydiving is because the men at the drop-zones were so disrespectful to women. I don’t mix with society in general and I didn’t mix much with the drop-zone community, so I witnessed the interactions rather than experienced them – guys would talk loudly and lewdly about their fellow female skydivers, showing no morals or respect. I think that may be a factor causing the diminishing rate of female participation in the sport, in Australia at least. We can sense a person’s demeanour and when a female first-timer comes for a tandem and experiences the male skydivers’ filthy language and crass attempted humour, it’s no wonder they often leave and never come back. (I’m not generalizing that all male skydivers are like this, but given the wide cross-section of society I’ve observed at the drop-zone, from doctors to rail-road workers, most of them are.) As for female instructors inspiring other women to learn to skydive, the few female instructors I met were not much better than the guys unfortunately, but I suppose that’s a sad case of «if you can’t beat them, join them».
Well, that got depressing pretty quickly! I should add that I’ve met a few guys who were genuinely nice people and have had many unforgettable aerial experiences over those two years. The skydiving experience changed me for the better and I will never regret it. I hope to read more Russian articles too; it seems strange that for such a large and diverse country we hear almost nothing about it except negative misinformation. Our media really has a problem, but that’s a whole other story.