Events threatening paintball industry in Quebec, Canada.

[Taillo]

Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Recently, news networks in the Quebec province highlighted an article about a 11 years old kid who had a paintball injury. At the end of the last game of the day, the kid took off his mask, because he was unable to see a thing due to the amount of paint he had on his lense. He got shot right in the eye, by a player who did not heard the referee's signal and who did not know the game was over. It was a really close call, but after all he will not loose his eye. Who is to blame? The shooter, or the irresponsible? Not matter who is to blame, its paintball that is gonna pay...

This event has come to the attention of the news network, the kind of attention that makes people act... And now we have doctors, parents, lawyers that want to impose a 16 years old restriction to play paintball, and im afraid wath else will they come up with.

If you ask me who is to blame, i say the irresponsible one. There is already people careless enough to try out a paintball game out in the streets, causing damage to cars, windows, and getting the press attention against paintball. There is even guys who like to make some gangster drive-by paintball shooting against poor old women. She by the way, lost her eye...

Those examples looks like isolated feats of stupidity but they really happened. They did not help the paintball industry. Nor this kid, who simply took off his mask. I find it a little bit annoying to see the medias giving more attention to the kid who's too young to play paintball, than the other kids who shoots innocent bystanders.

Gun laws in Canada already forbids the sale of any gun that can be considered a replica, thus, airsoft gun sale or importation is forbidden, paintball guns that are close replicas are hard to get into the country. Most paintball fields dont accept the .43 caliber and sometimes a player is denied to go in the field with his too realistic gun... Milsim looks really cool in the united state compared to canada....

What more laws can do to paintball?

I dont know what will happens with this little mediatic urge, but if laws emerge from it, i hope it will not only be restrictions... Maybe the possibility of the creation of a provincial paintball association that will regulate paintball in the good way. So that lawyers wont have to hurt the sport when they solve issues.

Large paintball fields owners told the press that kid below 16 years old represent 10% of their customers. The paintball industry in Quebec has just began to grow up, most of the large fields are recording customer increase of 60% from 2006 to 2007. There is, according to the press, about only 10 professional and well organized large terrains in the province.

This regulation will not kill paintball in Quebec, but will still contribute into slowing its evolution.

[spyderpilotacs05]

I am a strong believer that accidents happen. If when the kid who shot the other kid without his mask on says it was an accident, it was an accident. If it wasnt than that kid gets to live with himself. I am afraid of shooting someone in the face even with a mask. When i accidently hit someone in the mask, neak , or balls i cant sleep for a week untill i know that there is no hard feelings and it was not on purpose.

Every weekend i play paintball of course there are regulars. But i allways see someone new and under 16 at the many fields i go to in upstate New York. I find it hard to belive that "Large paintball fields owners told the press that kid below 16 years old represent 10% of their customers"

If the restriction laws are passed i hope its only in Canada

Just Kidding!!!

[pb34]

How many times do you have to tell people; KEEP YOUR MASK ON! Classic example.

[applesauce]

thats what wavier forms are for.....

[durrell]

Not really NPT, moved this to News and Updates.

[vikingshadow]

Hahaha, there was a group of guys playing at our field a couple weeks ago and they split up into the standard 5 v 5 groups (after about 30 minutes discussion on who would play whom.) They were noobs, but had played maybe 5-6 times before so we weren't too concerned with them. THey all had condoms on, masks down, etc...

We counted them down, got the game started and saw the prerequisite player starting BEHIND the dead box (we always seem to have a couple of idiots who think the dead box is a bunker...) Then we noticed that one of those guys had actually lifted his mask and had it on top of his head like a hat! All of us started yelling, and the ref noticed at the same time and nearly tackled the guy but he started running away saying "What the ****?" He ran clear off the field thinking the ref was picking on him - idiot.

I'm telling you, well, I'm actually making a prediction. In the next 5-10 years, there will be major changes coming to this sport - and I blame the players for it all. Their attitudes, their idiocy, the gangsta/entitlment/elitist mentality that's so prevalent on fields anymore - all of it will lead to something that will hurt all of us. You can say all you want about other sports, but no other sport fosters the crappiness of the American youth and actually encourages it as this sport...well, other than skateboarding, but that doesn't involve pointing a marker at anyone, so they're pretty safe for now.

Sure, this stuff I'm saying is noticeable and we know it's just idiot trash talk, but think about all the people who aren't into paintball and what they are seeing as representatives of the sport. Yup, that's my prediction - there are alread cities banning the sport, I wouldn't doubt it if it becomes states before long.

[clickclicksplat]

Originally Posted by vikingshadow

LOT of cities have banned it - look into most city codes and I'll bet you'll see several that say you can't fire a paintball gun within city limits. They may not necessarily enforce it yet, but it's on the books. Shoot, my own town has that law so we have our field just outside of the city limits.

I know Baltimore has a law like that, but I'm fairly sure there's some kind of "except within approved paintball facilities"-type provision in there...

[Taillo]

Man you are scarry.

By the way, there is no minimum age to skateboard, but the amount of injury is far greater than in paintball...

[Elfmaze]

All they need to do is redefine the deffinition of "Gun" to include projectiles of non explosive nature and paintball will take a massive hit. Who will want to get a gun permit to play?

[vikingshadow]

Originally Posted by spyderpilotacs05

what cities have banned the sport? o, please do tell

A LOT of cities have banned it - look into most city codes and I'll bet you'll see several that say you can't fire a paintball gun within city limits. They may not necessarily enforce it yet, but it's on the books. Shoot, my own town has that law so we have our field just outside of the city limits.

Originally Posted by Taillo

Man you are scarry.

By the way, there is no minimum age to skateboard, but the amount of injury is far greater than in paintball...

I didn't think I was so scary??? More realistic than anything. And I know the actual statistics - Hell, been checking them for many years now. So you're just preaching to the choir. The problem is, paintballers tend to only focus on other paintballers. We aren't going to tell them anything they don't already know, for the most part.

BUT, you have to stop looking at it from your own point of view and start looking at it from the lay person's point of view. These are the people that are going to make it rough on us. Skateboarders don't run around "playing army and pointing guns and trying to 'kill' each other" which is exactly what people who don't know about paintball think about us. It's going to be up to us to portray the sport in the best light possible to keep it from being banned on a wide-scale basis. Hopefully it won't happen. I'd love to have my wife and kids, and then grandkids, out playing every weekend!