"Guns down, paintballs up". A new movement to curb gun violence.

[Decoy of Fenris]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/05/savage-21-paintball-wars-trend-gun-violence

In videos pouring on to social media from cities across the US, young men are seen brandishing weapons, calling out rivals and firing as people scatter down blocks and around buildings. The point of it all? Gun violence prevention, according to the people involved.

The weapons fire paintballs and participants say it’s a way of settling feuds and disagreements that might otherwise have led to real gunfire.

“In this generation everybody’s fascinated with guns,” said Jarret McClain, a paintballer in Durham, North Carolina. “But if you got paintball guns and you know nobody can get hurt and it won’t cause nobody’s family to cry, at the end of the day it becomes fun shooting at people.”

McClain credits the Atlanta rapper 21 Savage with sparking the recent wave of interest in paintball after he posted a number of videos to social media in early April calling for “guns down, paintballs up” as an alternative to gun violence. McClain said it’s been effective too, and that his crew had already settled three separate vendettas with other groups through paintball.

While I know that this only tangentially touches on RKBA itself, I find it funny that one of the first responses about a new lifesaving trend to supplant gang violence is "paintball gun looks like semi-auto gun, ban them".

[kimbutgar]

1. I got hit by a paint ball once. Stings like hell

But if I had to chose over getting shot by one over a real gun. Paintball all the way.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

2. Some will overload the air pressure in the paint gun

Then the paintballs are real painballs, will leave a mark. Or dent a car.

But yes, generally not lethal.

[iscooterliberally]

3. I got hit in a drive by paintball shooting once.

I got a nice welt on my stomach. If they had got me in the eye or the throat it would have been much worse. I caught the little shits and called the cops on them. Sure I too would rather have that than be shot by a real gun, but paintball guns aren't really safe either. You have wear protective gear, and you should never shoot at someone with a paintball gun that isn't dressed out and ready to fire back at you.