Alan Kleymeyer

Are airsoft  guns safe? Part 2 (One mother’s experience)

I don’t think that’s really the right question.  Are knives safe?  I mean they just lay there. What’s dangerous about them?  My initial search on the airsoft question found an overwhelming response of Yes, they are safe, which was quickly followed by “If handled properly”.  Back to that knife analogy. Heck, rattlesnakes and guns are safe when handled properly but I’m not going to let my kids play with them. 

My search also found many parents that were ok with their kids playing with airsoft guns who also teach their kids to handle regular guns responsibly.  To them, that means the same rules for regular guns apply to the airsoft gun, not the least of which includes “Never point at or shoot another person”.  In other words buying airsoft guns for target practice is ok.  But is that what kids want to buy them for? No!  They have been made to believe that these guns are ok to shoot each other with, as long as they wear goggles.

Here is one reply:

Airsoft guns are perfectly safe if used properly. Safe use of airsoft guns requires using eye protection, and preferably ear protection. Eye protection should be in the form of goggles or masks that fit without leaving gaps. Paintball masks work well.

Shooting an airsoft gun at an unprotected person is not safe. An airsoft BB, even from a low-powered spring gun, can cause serious damage to an eye or an eardrum.

Shooting an airsoft gun at someone’s eye at point blank range is potentially lethal.

Here is another one:

Rule of thumb. If you are old enough to purchase it (legally), then it is safe.

From http://www.airsoftgi.com/conditions.php
LEGAL AGE CERTIFICATION:
By accessing the Site, you certify that you are older than 18 years of age or the age of majority where you live, whichever is older; that you are the owner of any credit card used to purchase on items on the Site; that you are familiar with all local laws in your area affecting your legal right to access airsoft products; that any products you buy are for your own private enjoyment and that you will NEVER share these products with a minor in ANY WAY.

Minor = 17 or younger.

For me, the question is Can airsoft guns be dangerous in the hands of a minor?  And the answer for me is yes.

Update Jan18, 2009:

This post has gotten several comments.  Many supporting the idea that airsoft guns are dangerous, several young posters continue to defend them as toys and perfectly safe.  Kids think they are invincible.  They never think they are going to get hurt.  I’ve been fighting David over wearing FULL equipment, not just a helmet, when rollar blading and skateboarding.  He says “I won’t get hurt”, “I haven’t gotten hurt yet”, which I reply “It is only a matter of time”. When you do take a hard fall do you want to do it with equipment or without?  He still fights me.  I finally said fine, just wear a helmet but if you fall and suffer a significant injury, then you will no longer be a proud owner that Waveboard (ripstick) we bought you. He finally took his first hard fall last week, ironically after he agreed to wear equipment.  He did not wear his hand protection, however, and suffered a very mild wrist sprain.  I think he may be more open to wearing full equipment now.

So for those that think airsoft guns are perfectly safe, I ask do you want to wait until you suffer an eye injury?  Is it really worth your sight to take the chance?

Here are two articles describing the injuries caused by airsoft guns:  1  2

Below is the contents of the second post:

I am an ophthalmologist at Piedmont Fayette Community hospital and
feel compelled to write in to discuss a serious topic: Eye safety.

I have just seen another patient with an injury from an AirSoft
pellet gun, making it four patients I have seen in the past two months
with similar injuries. I have seen two this week alone.

I am writing to plead with parents not to allow their children to play with these “toys” without considering the risks.

There are over 300,000 serious eye injuries in America each year,
with over 50,000 coming from projectiles of some sort (bullets, BBs,
pellets, paintball, fireworks, etc.) Most of these injuries are in
young people, primarily boys. The level of severity can range from mild
to severe, but any easily preventable injury is unacceptable in my mind.

For years, I have seen a rise in eye injuries due to paintball.
Paintball pellets are a potentially destructive force that seem to be
magically guided towards eyes. Paintball equipment clearly reads that
eye protection (helmets) should be worn at all times.

In every paintball injury I have ever seen, the victim briefly took
off the helmet (to clean the face-shield or reload the gun) and was hit
at that instant. As with most safety equipment, the availability of the
equipment is not the problem; the usage of the equipment is.

Now, I am seeing another troubling trend. AirSoft guns are becoming
very popular, promising “simulated warfare” with tiny plastic pellets
or BBs, and are marketed as being safe. There are warnings on the
equipment that eye protection should be worn, but the suggestion is
“they are just plastic, they don’t really hurt.” A review of a popular
AirSoft website found this quote:

“The combination of realism, safety, flexibility, and low cost makes
AirSoft more appealing to the average consumer who would like to
exercise his or her steady eye/hand coordination without the inherent
dangers.”

I suspect that there are many parents who are convinced that this
activity is safe and that no harm will ensue. Please believe me,
parents, this is NOT true.

All projectiles can and will injure the eyes, especially when they
are aimed at other people in simulated war games. Your children will
not wear eye protection as they are instructed 100 percent of the time.
At some point, an injury will occur. I would rather meet you somewhere
else than our newly remodeled ER.

I am not trying to put the paintball purveyors and AirSoft suppliers
out of business. Used completely as indicated, they may be perfectly
safe. I rarely see injuries from paintball game locations, because they
are very vigilant about eye protection.

Most of these injuries come from the backyard, and that is why it is
so disturbing. I want to make sure parents are aware of the inherent
dangers, so they can make their decisions accordingly. Loss of vision
in a child from this type of injury is a preventable catastrophe.

Brian D. Long, M.D.
Eye Consultants of Atlanta

Well, I won’t tell you whether I actually own the ABBA Gold CD or that I might have ripped an old Ed Bruce LP (I know, that’s a double-whammy I-just-aged-myself statement, I mean how many people would write Ed Bruce and LP in one sentence?).  My taste is actually pretty diverse and I like a LOT of what plays on the radio today.  Here is what’s on my “What I’m Listening To” playlist:

<<playlist removed>>

If you’ve never heard of IMEEM, it’s a social media service that let’s you create playlists of music, videos, and photos.  You can listen to and upload full-length tracks!  I actually use it to discover new music, they are always recommending songs and I get recommendations based on the songs on my playlists.

Update: January 8, 2009

Well, IMEEM is no more.  They were bought out by MySpace.  They are suppose to be migrating IMEEM accounts over but so far it’s not quite the same experience.  I’ll check back periodically to see if it’s worth using.  In the meantime, I’ve started using Last.fm.  They don’t let you upload your own music but you create your own radio stations by specifying songs or artists and the station plays songs similar to them.  They limit play on the computer but the experience is pretty nice on the XBOX 360 which has support for Last.FM.

I also have discovered Pandora.  Like Last.FM you create ratio stations.  They have pretty amazing technology that matches songs and artists similar to the ones you select.  What’s cool is they tell you exactly why a song matches your selected criteria.  You can also read a lot about the song, artist or other stuff.  Pandora has a terrific Flash interface.  Last.FM does not allow you to pause.  You can only stop.  Pandora allows you to pause.  Pandora limits you to skipping 6 songs per hour per station it also has a limit of 40 hours per month.   The free service is ad supported or you can pay 99 cents for the rest of the month once you’ve reached the 40 hr limit. You can pay $36 for unlimited play for a year without ads.  Pandora FAQs are here.

I use to think  I preferred having an exact playlist of my favorite songs but I also loved discovering or re-discovering songs.  With the ability to tell  Pandora which songs I like (and get more replay) and tell  Pandora which songs I DON”T like (and thus remove them from playing again in that radio station), Pandora may have the best of all worlds.  It’s my #1 place for listening to music on the Internet for now.

Sample  Radio Station created by Pandora:

I selected Hall &  Oates and the next six songs that played in the station:

Journey – Who’s Crying Now
The  Police – Every Breath You Take
Dan Hartman – I Can Dream About You
The Doobie Brothers – What A Fool Believes
Fleetwood Mac – Dreams
Spandau Ballet – True

Not bad huh?

There are really three reasons why I blog.

1. I like writing down various events or thoughts in my life.   I get a feeling of closure once I have documented something that I wish to remember, would like to refer back to, or be able to share with others and link to. Basically, I do the blog for myself.
2. I like to give back to the development community.  When I've researched extensively a  problem I'm having coding, and I find the solution,  I publish it here in hopes that I might save someone with a similar problem some time.  For example, THIS post is #1 today, in Google search for the phrase "xcode breakpoint" which probably means that Google has decided it is very relevant and people are benefiting from it.
3. I like to give back to others.  Same as #2 but more on a personal than a professional level. THIS post is #1 in google as well for the phrase "Why music is important in our culture".  It is the post with the most comments.  People don't generally leave me a comment unless they REALLY got something out of a post.

I spend a lot of time searching the net as I'm sure many of you do.  Most of the content I read are not news site or commercial sites, no, most of them are personal sites and blogs.   I try to give back to that community since I'm an avid consumer of it.

I came across this interesting post titled Netflix's DRM Turned Me Into a Pirate.

I have to admit, I have empathy for those that TRY to do the right thing but due to company policy or poor implementation, turn to "other" means to get what they want.

I've been there.   My latest example was losing Jane's Mac Mini hard drive.  All her iTunes library went with it.  I googled and found out that Apple WILL allow you to download your library as a one time exception.  Of course I didn't learn this from Apple, they wouldn't dare advertise this, but they will  honor it if you ask.  Thing is, we weren't able to get our entire 100+ song  collection.  Due to reorganization of their "database" or whatever, they were unable to provide about 10 songs.  Think I'm going to re-purchase those song?  Of course not. 

Ed emailed me a link to this article because he knew I had complained about the violence and language in games that I loved but wished I could turn off the mature content, at certain times. I don’t mind if David plays war or shooting games as long as the violence is not too graphic and the language not too harsh. Gears of War is still, today, my favorite co-op game and one of my favorite console games in general. I had the most fun playing coop with David. GOW had an option to turn down the violence. The chainsaw kills didn’t squirt all that blood, for example. Most other parents are not as liberal as I am in what they allow their kids to watch and play.

I am very pleased to hear that GOW 2 may offer parental controls to their M-rated game. First of all, it can’t be that hard to add this feature. Second, it doesn’t effect those that prefer the more mature content. I’m glad that Epic and Microsoft are not underestimating the number of potential customers that would give a gritty game like GOW a chance if it had a more family friendly rating, or the number of kids that play games that are targeted for older kids.