Does anyone know anything about this local group?

[snafu]

They are morons for playing airsoft in public parks. That my opinion atleast.

[Kjones]

No one said you had to choose, we as MIA ( the majority at least) do not have respect for dangerous behavior like that. You are putting Innocent people at risk and for no reason, there are plenty of other fields around that you boys can play at, you said it your self that a bunch of them showed up to the last no limits game and no one gave them any shit. All I really care about is the publics safety. You should also be careful because what I said about a lawsuit is a VERY real possibility, this is America, the American dream is to get a huge lawsuit and never work a day again, weather it is a justified lawsuit or not. People LOVE suing.

[T6e9a]

Just letting each group do its own thing, doesn't cut it. There is a great risk of ruining Airsoft for our local community at stake. Unless there was a way to legally separate the two groups, so that they were completely unafiliated with each other, it can't just be set aside and ignored. Legal matters are at hand, and even with whatever confidence they have in their permission, there will always be that ever-present risk.

But on a slightly more positive note, what sort of steps could they take? The obvious answer would be to get private land and do it on that, but like, could they have large signs at trail heads that would clearly portray how said designated areas were going to be used for how long and other nessacary info?

With public land, the steps and precautions you would have to take to make it completely (or even close to) safe and 'legal' would probably be extremely hard to achieve, and most likely not worth the effort.

[Squirrel]

@t6e9a Legal matters may be at hand, but there is next to nothing we as a community can really do about it.

1. They are clear they do not want to play by our rules on their forum. They are clear they think they are right.

-What can you really do to get through to somebody who thinks they are right? Ever get into a political argument before?

2. You are dealing with a group of minors for the most part.

-Remember when you were invisible? I do. I was part of an airsoft game at an elementary school that got busted by the police when I was 15 or so. We thought we weren't doing anything wrong. I had the opportunity to learn from my mistakes.

3. We as a community come off as pretty hard sometimes.

- I deal with youth on a daily basis for my job. The way that we come off with our rules can be very off putting to a 13-16 year old. It should be our responsibility as responsible players to teach others why our rules are the way they are. The logic behind them is very sound, but when it is shoved down somebody's throat who doesn't know any better the person will shut down and not listen. Not everybody has witnessed an injury to justify our rules.



There are plenty of opportunities for us to be ambassadors to the community at large. We can do it, but it has to be through proper education and logic, not through bullheadedness and name calling.

[Kochrane]

It just doesn't make any sense holding a game in a public park with all of the problems that could happen. Why take the chance? Holding it in an established place such as Action Paintball/No Limits or HITW that has enforced rules for everyone's safety is a hell of better idea than having it in public where something tragic could happen. If they want to suffer the consequences of holding such a game in a public area and something tragic does happen...I just hope it doesn't lead to something happening statewide. This is a sport that I have made damn good friends over the past few months and hate to have something happen that leads to this sports' ban or something else, if it comes to it.

[Lone Wolf]

About a year or so ago when I first joined airsoft we went to play alittle skirmish in a public park. (Note: this was back before I knew the rules) We jumped out of a vehicle and entered the woods. needless to say someone looking out their window alledgedly called the police. we found out later this was false but still the fact stands. If you play on public property there are a ton of bad things that can happen. Wether law enforment has given premission or not, if a cop sees someone with a gun they won't be thinking about airsoft. Its really not safe and so many things can go wrong. I learned from that incedent and no longer play on public property. Even if there isnt legeal issues the airsoft community can get a bad rap from someone just being stupid.

[Greekas (TehG3A3)]

I was a part of this group when it first started, but left shortly after I tried encouraging rules closer to MiA's. They've said they don't want to be like MiA and don't like how uptight MiA is. Fine by me, they can go dick around in a park (not that I really want them to) if it means I won't be seeing them at a safe, sanctioned game. I'd rather not be associated with people who could potentially have a hand in ruining the sport for everyone.

Edit: One member's excuse for having higher FPS rules was so he could "actually" have some range. Really? I honestly have a feeling that most of these guys don't go to MiA games because they're too cheap and lazy to downgrade the springs in their ECHO 1s and CYMAs and treat CO2 pistols like they're the best thing since sliced bread because of how hot they shoot.

[Allenator]

Hey guys..
I started the SEMAP group in late 2010 as a way to keep in touch with my airsoft playing friends. As time went on more and more people joined and it grew pretty quickly, faster than any of us thought it would anyways. You guys seem to be under the impression that not a lot of us are here on MiA, but we are. Although not all of us agree with MiA rules 100%, we still respect them when attending games and using the forum.

The group today is more than just some kids playing on public land. There are multiple other groups within our group who have their own private fields. People use our group for a variety of reasons. It is a good way to get a fast response to an airsoft related question, or to get some extra eyes on an item that you are trying to sell.

MiA is a very intimidating group for younger players to deal with. There needs to some sort of stepping stone between the elite that is MiA, and the younger crowd of players. You guys are cool in person, but on the internet you can be real dicks.

[Husky]

Aug 25, 2013 16:23:10 GMT -5 Allenator said:

MiA is a very intimidating group for younger players to deal with. There needs to some sort of stepping stone between the elite that is MiA, and the younger crowd of players. You guys are cool in person, but on the internet you can be real dicks.

Although not how I feel now this was very similar to my impression when I was 12 and first starting off. However, looking at my old topics, I would have been annoyed and a dick to myself haha

[Zorak]

Aug 25, 2013 16:23:10 GMT -5 Allenator said:

MiA is a very intimidating group for younger players to deal with. There needs to some sort of stepping stone between the elite that is MiA, and the younger crowd of players. You guys are cool in person, but on the internet you can be real dicks.

I think we've done a pretty good job of posting rules that will keep people out of trouble. Anyone who makes an effort to read the rules, or just lurks on the forum to pick up on how we do things, will do just fine. Kids who won't make that effort have no business complaining about people being dicks.

[Soulcatcherteej]

Aug 24, 2013 23:28:16 GMT -5 Bishop (Task-Force Nightmare) said:

A friend of mine keeps inviting me to play in their events. But I've watched some of their gameplay of their fields and it's like, they are playing in local public parks with little kids play scapes. Also I have been assured by them that the local authorities have given the okay for them to do it. But it's still iffy and I won't be attending their games at all. However I have come in contact with some of the members there and the few I talked to were incredibly rude to me because I was asking questions about how they go about safety.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using proboards

Okay, I'm an admin over at SE-MAP, and I'm respectful of what MiA does. I was an active member of MiA before we even started SE-MAP. Yes, our park is public land. The park is over 100 acres of pure woods. There are two or three baseball diamonds and one football field right at the beginning of the park. Past that, it's pure woods. We do have the occasional civilian wander in, but there's something nobody here has mentioned yet:

Attitude.

Most official fields are located in some city/moderately populated area, so they need their own private space cause a lot of people won't be okay with airsoft. Here in Commerce, virtually every store has a sign out front that says "Open carry permitted"; here, if the police know you or you look respectable, you can smoke weed on the front porch and they don't care; all the regular park-goers know us by name, because we're all stand up members of the community who do our best to help who ever when ever we can. Out here, airsoft is an accepted and common thing to see.

For example, we had a trio of young boys, maybe 10-12 years old, who were riding ATV's through our field once. They asked if they could stay and watch, and we told them to come back with eye protection and a parent saying it was okay. Not five minute later, they did. They all came back with full seal eye pro, and a Dad who was perfectly happy to let them stay and watch from the sidelines.

it's also a regular occurrence to have civies wander through, and tell one team where the enemy is because they enjoy it, and they don't mind us playing.


Basically, it's all about perception. Some places, airsoft is frowned upon. Some places, like here, it's accepted and enjoyed. And, as Phantom Reaper has been saying, we don't slam you, please don't slam us. We'll do our thing, and you do yours. If things ever go seriously bad for us, I invite you all to yell "I told you so".

[Simon]

A respectful, informative reply such as yours is appreciated, thank you. However, the repeated references to the Third Reich and Nazis in regards to MiA members frequently found in your forum and Facebook posts are extremely offensive. Hell, it's stickied in the "community stuff" part of your forum. This is the kind of stuff I'm talking about. I appreciate your post but because of the image portrayed by the rest of your players forgive me for not caring about the circumstances.

[Coletrain]

Aug 25, 2013 16:23:10 GMT -5 Allenator said:

MiA is a very intimidating group for younger players to deal with. There needs to some sort of stepping stone between the elite that is MiA, and the younger crowd of players. You guys are cool in person, but on the internet you can be real dicks.

Thats exactly how I felt when I first joined MIA.

Because of that, I just lurked, read the rules, and didn't post anything other than a commerce thread and the occasional "I'll be there" in the events section for a few months. After I felt I could post without doing something stupid, I started making other threads and contributing to other peoples threads.

You won't get yelled at if you follow the rules and don't do anything stupid on here.

[Lone Wolf]

He dose have a point about the attitude of the community. And Im sure they do play with saftey standards. theyr not as strict as ours, but thats on them. The people here at MiA dont want these guys on our fields and they obviously dont want to be on MiA fields so leave them alone. If we play on there fields then we adhear to their rules, if they come to our fields they adhear to our rules. The sport is about having fun. Thats the way they have theirs, this is the way we have ours. shit like this is how wars start guys. Really it is. let them have their fun and we'll have ours.

[Soulcatcherteej]

Aug 25, 2013 18:58:00 GMT -5 Simon said:

A respectful, informative reply such as yours is appreciated, thank you. However, the repeated references to the Third Reich and Nazis in regards to MiA members frequently found in your forum and Facebook posts are extremely offensive. Hell, it's stickied in the "community stuff" part of your forum. This is the kind of stuff I'm talking about. I appreciate your post but because of the image portrayed by the rest of your players forgive me for not caring about the circumstances.

I understand your not liking that, and I agree that is offensive. However, calling us a bunch of immature kids is also offnsive. Personally, I can't gaurantee what all of our members say, or that it refelects how our group thinks/acts over all. One of the above posts in this thread said they met some SE-MAP players, and that they were rude. I've met some MiA players that were rude, too. But I didn't write the whole group off because I met SOME out of MANY that were rude, and I'm glad I didn't because this is a very useful site.

Basically, please don't judge us before you know us. I invite any MiA player to come meet myself and the other admins, and some of our prominent members, and come take a non-game/event tour of the field with me/us. After you know us, our field, and those that use it, feel free to judge. Maybe you can come in civi clothes with eye pro just to watch a game sometime.