German Gov To Ban Paintballing After Shooting

whoever57 writes "In response to the school shooting in March in which 16 people were killed, the German Government plans to ban all games in which players shoot at each other with pellets. The rationale for this is that 'paintball trivializes violence and risks lowering the threshold for committing violent acts.' Fines could be up to 5,000 euros."

Re:Germany is turning into a fucking preschool

[RsG]

True, but while I personally am not American, I can vouch that their system is better at avoiding censorship.

Look at all the idiot laws that Jack Thompson and his fellow crusading geriatrics tried to get passed. All of them, to the last, got struck down by the courts, or never made it out of the state legislature. That is an example of the system working as it should - the courts protect the rights that the lawmakers selectively ignore.

In Germany, those same sorts of restrictions have been, and continue to be, passed into law. There has been no restrictions upon the ability of the lawmakers to take away the freedoms enjoyed by the citizenry.

I'd say the German legal system is fucked. The American one is also fucked, but batting down censorship is perhaps one of the few things it gets right. Mind you, the moment the censors in the US try to ban sex instead of violence, the whole thing falls apart.

Re:Haven't these people learned?

[williamhb]

Haven't these people learned that they are just going to cause a much bigger problem then they are trying to solve? It saddens me to see how they are going after everything but the cause of it. Banning paintballing isn't going to solve a thing, stuff like this is still going to happen. Next thing you know they are going to try and ban all FPS games over there. Get to the root of the problem, not something they "think" is the cause.

Actually some aspects of the proposed laws do indeed get to the root of the problem. For instance tightening the restrictions on how registered guns are stored (the gun in this shooting was registered by the father but was not locked away -- had it been, this particular shooting certainly would have been much more difficult). As it is, there's talk of punishing the father through "involuntary manslaughter" under the existing laws (because the father knew his son was depressed and should have known this might happen) but that seems like vague retribution for the incident having occurred rather than unambiguous preventative legislation instructing gun owners that their guns must be securely locked away. Banning paintball is an odd reaction, but so far this is only a proposed bill -- AFAIK it's usual for proposed bills to be debated and to have things that turn out to be a bit silly taken out of them on the way through parliament (the Bundestag).

Re:Haven't these people learned?

[Anonymous Coward]

It wasn't a problem for Germans? You know, they also went after the disabled, mentally ill, homosexuals, communists, and anyone else they didn't like. The Nazis killed a lot of Germans.

Re:Haven't these people learned?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see how this is the government subjagating its population. More like being a stupid hysterical parent

"In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way."
-Franklin D. Roosevelt

Re:Really Germany?

[noundi]

I'll tell you what though. The level of excitement for me was only slightly higher when we had BT training in the army. That means all the real and standard gear but blank rounds with laser equipment to simulate battle. However what will improve when playing paintball is the way to think in extremely stressing situations. This was for me more or less the same using paintball or BT equipment. But then again extremely stressing situations doesn't necessarily mean battle. Either way, fucking retarded way to prevent crime. This won't have any effect at all. And if it does I pity the germans for being so simple minded, which I still doubt they are.

Re:Haven't these people learned?

[PietjeJantje]

You could find dirty hands in most countries, including the USA. I think he mixed up Austria and the neutral Switzerland. Italy or Japan with the Netherlands? The Dutch went along with the Nazis like Kuwait went along with the Iraq invasion, Rotterdam was bombed flat, and 5 years of deadly oppression followed until liberation.

This backfired big time allready

[Qbertino]

This is in the news here since two days ago and basically backfired big time allready, with even the police union turning to the CDU and saying 'totally hairbrained stupid idea'. Particularly hilarious is the reaction of one of those supporting the programm in an spiegel-online interview [spiegel.de] from yesterday (it's in the last fourth of the video - in German though - but you can catch the tone nonetheless). The guy loses his cool the instant he is asked about it, having been bugged the entire day about it. Very funny indeed and the comentary of the video doesn't stint on snide and whitty remarks on this political botch either.

Re:Ah, yes.

[tenco]

As others already pointed out, this is very nationalistic. And it puts the "benefit of all" ("the need of the many") above the individual, whereas the communist principle states "From each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs". It's also not classless as can be deduced from the term "middle-class". You also forgot the racist and eugenics part: that these points only apply to healthy people (what's healthy is defined by the party line) with a perceived "arian ancestry" and only as long as you don't oppose the party. All others are reduced to subhumans which can be robbed for the benefit of the arian welfare state at will (and that's what happened).

Re:Really Germany?

[Terminal Saint]

There are plenty of examples of people having been shot(even with assault and battle rifles) and failing to notice until later. Adrenaline is a powerful thing and it's better to teach a soldier to fight through having been shot. A paintball at close range hurts a lot more than a MILES laser, and is still a useful tool toward that objective.

An FBI wounding study found that even with their heart destroyed, a suitably determined individual can preform voluntary actions for 10-15 seconds. Furthermore, it reached the conclusion that often a combatant drops out of the fight not because they'd been physiologically rendered unable to fight, but because they saw how bad a gunshot wound looked and psychologically gave up.

Re:Reminds me of something Herman Goering said onc

[Anonymous Coward]

Herman Goering said this in his interviews for the Nuremberg trials.