this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2024
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How about "people supporting my hobby"? People buying better gear (be it climbing gear, better bikes, airbrush kits for models, or whatever) show manufacturers that people want improved gear which ultimately raises the baseline quality of gear in general.
Real life isn't a video game where we each have to progress up a skill tree to "earn" better gear.
Maybe try engaging with the newbie with the fancy gadgets and making a friend who shares your hobby?
But how am I supposed to feel better about myself when I see someone who can spend more money on my hobby than me?
You can be the guy who shows him how to actually use that fancy equipment he spent so much money on.
People buying stuff also makes for a healthy secondary market. 90% of my brewing gear is 2nd hand.
A lot of my camera gear is second hand too. It's a great way to save some serious $$. As an added bonus, some of my "used" gear was very lightly used by their previous owner.
There was definitely a dude into photography in my old neighborhood. The pawn shop was absolutely filled with incredibly cheap lenses with clearly very little use.
Thank you for this comment. I've seen nothing but negativity on Lemmy all day
Yeah, it's feeling a bit like Reddit lately.
I interpret it differently. I have seen plenty of people putting up huge barriers of entry for themselfes before trying out a new hobby. They like the idea of a new hobby and try to hold themselves hostage with a huge investment, or in sad cases overspend because they go in badly informed. "Once I have spend so much money it's impossible I won't be able to motivate myself to keep going" oh no, it required more effort than buying stuff, I gave it away... I think persistance is indeed more important than the best gear. Get going and borrow/second hand what you need until you know you have the routine to make better equipment worthwhile. Get to know fellows who can help you make informed decisions after a few sessions. The climbing shoes in your basement don't help climbing halls to stay open. The table saw you never use doesn't help wood demand and availability in your area.
Oh yeah my mom is just like that. She wants to try out stuff, but doesn't because getting into any hobby is "expensive" and she won't put the cost upfront before knowing if she'll like it or not. And she ends up doing nothing. She's retired and does absolutely nothing. It's heartbreaking. And I can't event convince her that if she wants to try out something, she could either ask for stuff on christmas/birthdays or go for a cheap, janky setup first and upgrade later.
You certainly aren't wrong. Persistence is almost always more important than "the right gear", but we shouldn't hold it against people just joining our hobbies who buy nice gear and try to be their friends (unless they're assholes about having the best stuff ofc). If they do end up getting into it fantastic! You have a new friend who likes the same hobby. If they don't, maybe they'll give you some of their better gear because you were cool and tried to help them get into the hobby.
My main point is to just be welcoming to newbies of all stripes. We were all in their shoes at one point so we know it can suck when someone is being elitist and unhelpful. Be the guy who helps out the new guy because you were the new guy.
OK but that is not what threads like this are about, that's just post hoc justification for emotional responses
There's also the flip side of this - clueless beginners buying needlessly expensive things (not to them because they're beginners but in general), in turn telling manufacturers that there's a market for needlessly expensive things. But hopefully the people with more sense outweigh them so that the market regulates itself.