There are some recent threads regarding personal responsibility and the newer diver and that is what caused me to start this thread.
If you are a new diver and only dive in tropical locales on vacation you are an underwater tourist not a diver and you should hire a DM to be your buddy (and only your buddy) on every dive.
There are quarries, lakes, whatever reasonably close to most people. If you are a diver, new or otherwise, you will take advantage of these to learn to dive in addition to your tropical dives while on vacation. You are a diver and are responsible for yourself whether you are new or not.
This is taking personal responsibility for your own actions. You can't change the way the dive industry is operated. You can't change PADI or the practices of tropical operators. You can't learn to dive and be considered a diver if you only dive a few times a year on vacation.
If everyone either put in the time actually diving or simply hired a personal DM as buddy many of the needless accidents we hear about would be avoided without hoping that someone else will make up for your lack of personal responsibility.
Personally, I think it's silly for people to think of themselves as divers and to have an industry tout them as such when they are actually just underwater tourists. I got on a horses back once and rode around for a while. I don't consider that I'm a horse rider or that I know anything about riding horses. In the dive world...I'm a diver!
I'm all for DM's and Instructors and charters being professional but the way the industry is put together it's just amazing that every other underwater tourist makes it out alive.
If anyone disagrees or has additional comments I guess this post will turn into a thread.