ORIGINAL: warhead13
Not everyone has the benefit of meeting someone like"Ol Doc" and they get really discouraged by the overwhelmingly negative attitude of (what has been in MY experience) the majority of AMA members.
I've just got to disagree with your closing statement. I've been around the AMA for a really long time. I don't think I would even use up the fingers on one hand counting the number of AMA members that I've encountered who have an "overwhelmingly negative attitude". Perhaps it's different in your part of the country, but I've met a huge number of really great people flying. Maybe I've encountered a bunch of negative people, but if I have, I just put them out of my mind.