they were the militant anti-violence crowd, obviously. don't know you guns kill people?

These were people from this community who did not like my efforts to bring a more public face to this activity.

I sincerely hope these people have never shown their face at an event since.

Seriously, what the fuck.

well lets not wander too far off topic,

it happened a few years ago now.. and a lot has changed.

Fair enough, I wasn't aware of your efforts, and you can probably agree that it's very easy to see your posts on a regular basis and get the impression I got. I'm sure there are others that have the same impression. Not saying it's fair, but it's what I got. No offense or upsetting intended, so my sincere apologies for that.

For what it's worth, I think you make a good and reasoned argument. I'll try to explain how/why I think the UK system might still be a better idea than where we are headed, though.

I think you over-estimate the efficacy of strategies in the vein of "personal freedom". I believe that the rights that would be awarded to an officially-recognized sports and/or enthusiast community or even to a business community would be far more powerful than ones that have been granted to a loosely knit group of individuals, largely through a loop hole. It's no accident that in the United Kingdom the primary mindshare footprint of the airsoft regulations is UKARA -- a business consortium. This is a growing and substantial business that employs more and more people in the UK. In the United States, anti-airsoft laws have successfully been defeated by the airsoft business "lobby". What I'm suggesting here is that UKARA in the UK and similarly-knit groups of businesses in the USA have established an industrial foothold. Big footholds are harder to disrupt.

In Canada, we have a very loosely-knit group of businesses and people, but nothing like what we see down south or over the ocean.

In addition, I think too many people here are trying to avoid a VCR/UKARA type route because they're conflating the freedom to play airsoft and own airsoft guns with themes of firearms ownership rights, with a touch of libertarian ethics. That's a perfectly fine personal stance to have, but I think it's massive overkill for the issue at hand and terrible for effective community outreach. In the UK this vein of discussion probably never even got visited because they have very few gun rights to begin with, and it was much easier to get the public to buy in on the sport being an extension of legitimate -- and from the public's view totally benign -- hobbyist and re-enactment activities. From the perspective of evaluating effective marketing strategies for the airsoft lobby, I believe that "cold dead hands" flag waving type branding is always going to lose. In the public eye, that just reenforces the "bunch of gun-toting crazies" view, which is bad. Airsoft is not junior firearms, and I would argue it doesn't factor into the same set of logic with respect to how we interact with the governments and out rights, and so I think our interests can and must be marketed differently.

We just need to consider better strategies of social engineering than we have already.

The issue is.. that airsoft guns are regulated under the firearms act, and the criminal code provisions governing firearms.. these issues are linked.

you can't say something is different.. if the government has already set in law that they are not.

Lots of people talk about "legitimizing" the sport..

This activity is already legitimate it is 100% legal to participate in airsoft games, in fact the police often go out of their way to state they have no issues with legal and legitimate recognized uses for airsoft guns.. the bylaw posted above does as well.

Shooting each other with airsoft guns is already 100% legal and a recognized legitimate use for airsoft guns.

why would we want to add more regulation to an already recognized legal and legitimate pastime?

Our right to posses airsoft guns is already confirmed in the Criminal code, our ability to import , purchase and transfer most airsoft guns is 100% legal and permitted.

so if every aspect of this activity is already 100% legal and legitimate.. what exactly is more regulation for?

In the UK it is a serious criminal offense to posses a replica firearm.. in Canada it is 100% legal

City Bylaws are designed to provide an enforcement tool in the case of unfettered proliferation of an undesired event or type of behavior.

The federal government has stepped out of the way or retailers and importers.. the provinces have no jurisdiction to control airsoft guns.. because they are proscribed under the Criminal code.

Any and all control then has to fall to cities, We can't both call for age verification and control of the sale to minors and Criminals for ourselves and then raise a cry when cities also try to do the same thing.

Why would you get a fine at a local game. The bylaw is restricting the manufacture, sale and marketing of replicas in retail situation.... Not the use or ownership. This seems to be a kinda pointless approch by the police as most airsoft stuff they are complaining about is probably purchased online. The bylaws we deal with around where I live hamper us a bit more as they prohibit discharge of any projectile, but I dont believe that bylaws can make it prohibited to own a legal firearm (ie airsoft that falls withing RCMP fps limits).

Back to the bylaw issue at hand go fight it. Sitting at home, complaining on this board will fix nothing, write letters show up to public hearings. Fight or be silent.

You might want to make the point that this bylaw does nothing to stop those who wish to break the law and only effects those who obey it. And perhaps making an effort to educate potential users and existing users rather than ban everything would be a more useful approach.

Oh and on the UK example no no no ask the real steel owners how well that sort of thing worked out for us.

I doubt it would change much, most of the sales is in Pacific Mall and you know how many businesses there follow the law? Let's be honest, do you really think this bylaw would stop sales in PMall? At least there's Splendid China Tower across the street from PMall on the Toronto side.

Wait. What?

its 100% legal to own a replica firearm, just what he said...

[QUOTE=shaharov;1720511]Why would you get a fine at a local game.[QUOTE]

Exactly where I'm going with this...

We have a saying in Québec :

''This is a storm in a glass of water''

AFAIC, replica firearms are illegal. At least, that's what I've always thought. Guns that shoot past 366FPS (or whatever it is) are uncontrolled firearms and thus, are legal.

We've used the "obtained before 1998" loophole towards sub-366FPS guns, but technically guns released after 1998 and shoot below that threshold are in fact, illegal to own, acquire, and to transfer.

Source: http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/cfp-pcaf/f...plique-eng.htm

TRANSFER of replica firearms is illegal, ownership is 100% legal

After reading that page, my understanding is the same as ken's: