Countless children worldwide have taken their first shots not with a .22LR rifle or a .410 shotgun, but an airgun, particularly a BB gun. But if state senators of New York have their way, they’re going to make BB guns (and other air rifles) sold in their jurisdiction lame and non-functioning through Senate Bill S9215.
Air rifles @ TFB:
You *won’t* shoot your eye out, kid
Most North Americans have watched the classic holiday movie A Christmas Story, where the young protagonist Ralphie longs for a new Daisy BB gun, only to be thwarted at every turn by adults, who warn him: “You’ll shoot your eye out!” But if Ralphie lived under the proposed laws in the state of New York, he wouldn’t shoot his eye with a BB gun, because that BB gun wouldn’t shoot at all.
That’s because Senate Bill S9215 places BB guns and other air rifles in the “imitation weapons” category, which means they must come with a barrel plug. Good luck plinking at targets in the backyard, dreaming of frontier shootouts with Black Bart, with a gun that doesn’t even shoot. And to add insult to injury, New York’s update on imitation weapons in 2022 says “they cannot be black, blue, silver or aluminum, and must be colored white, bright red, bright orange, bright yellow, bright green, bright blue, bright pink, bright purple, or be made entirely of transparent or translucent materials.”
So much for looking like Red Ryder as you’re shooting with your air rifle! Speaking of Red Ryder, the company that made the BB gun that bore his name for generations, Daisy has been pushing back hard against the new NY law proposal, including posting the following photo with the words “This is what the New York State legislators are trying to ban. Can you imagine not growing up with Daisy?”
And they have a point. While this law won’t end Daisy’s business in other states, it shows how the anti-firearms lobby is willing to chip away at shooters’ rights at even the grade school level.
