Super Soaker Central

http://nuttynewswire.com/story/24854.shtml

Apparently, London police have banned a water gun fight scheduled to take place in a city park. That's bullshit. If any of our members in Britain were planning to attend this, can you give us all some info on who to complain to about this?

Let's all email London's authorities and point out that we'll be canceling our trips to the city to attend this water gun fight if we're risking arrest. Let them know they will lose money for this and they'll back off quick.

I'm not attending but that's bollocks! That'd be an epic city soakfest, and they're going to cancel it like whiny bitches?

RAAAAAGE

While I think it's canceling is overkill, I can understand the concerns over holding these sort of events. Simply put, key rules of water warfare get neglected when you get too many random people attending a soakfest: that is to respect non-participants and public property. When places get trashed since there's really no group accountable for the behavior of the attendees and clean up afterwards, all it takes are a few troublemakers to convert a fun-loving crowd into a much more damaging one.

In cases like these, it'd be best were a company be willing to sponsor/oversee such an event, promote products, and also help ensure that things don't get out of hand. I'm all for large-scale soakfests, but I don't like seeing public parks trashed by some people who just expect others to clean up after them.

Well, I see both sides of the story, and I think that Isoaker is right. If they had some kind of official presence, then it wouldn't be a problem.

The only justifications they have to cancel it is if it's taking place in too large of an area, has too many people, and if previous water warfare events have ended up with damage to personal property. Plumbing, gardens/vegetation, etc. have been heavily damaged before in large scale soakfests and I can say from experience that even with only 20 people, things can get out of control if even 3 of those people are just goofoffs regardless of whether you have soakfests with hoses or one hit kill elimination in the woods.

Now try coming to southeast Michigan. If you so much as have a relaxed water war with only 6 participants in a public park, chances are that the numbnuts will call the police on you, because you're supposedly scaring the kids off the playground. (i.e. the kids who see big CPS water guns and want to join the wars.) The police didn't bother my team but they did talk to some people on the other team. (They were generally polite to the best of my knowledge but I've seen other incidents in a fairground where one of my friends was getting harassed.) Try a large scale soakfest at the same park and I can't even imagine what would happen. There'd probably be police sirens.

Big soakfests between unrelated people are bound to result in trouble, and in all honesty are a bad idea. All it takes is someone to show up pissed, get annoyed at being soaked, and use their blaster - or worse - as a club.

It's in Britain? I'd totally show up to that with a CPS 2000 full of oil. I hope it doesn't leak...cause I have no plan for plugging it...

Because it's ALL of Britain's fault that one oil company makes a mistake, right? Because the entire population of Great Britain came together for the master plan of spilling oil in the Gulf of Mexico, and therefore the entire London population must be taught a lesson by having oil spilt everywhere.

And it's not like BP is 39% American owned, compared with 40% British owned, right?

Britain =/= BP.

Don't make accusations if you don't know what you're talking about.

Times Online wrote:BP had just six men on the Deepwater Horizon. The rest were employees and contractors of Transocean, the firm that owned the rig and was responsible for the drilling.

Directly quoted from Times Online.

But then IIRC those 6 BP men overruled Transocean on matters about the drilling. The decisions taken by BP against the views of its contractors may be what resulted in the failure in the first place.

Guys, lets get back on topic.

Even though the soaker battle is banned, I would still attend if possible, just to show that not all water warfare enthusiasts are going to cause trouble.

I would advise against showing up, unless you WANT to get harassed by the police and potentially have your blasters stolen by them.

@TheTyphoon: I feel that I should address this...the post was intended as a joke. Intent is often lost in translation on the internet, but there was no true anti-British message intended.

I read about 10-25 articles on the spill daily and am more well-informed than the average American on the subject. There is no anti-British sentiment among the ranks of the educated citizenry. This is not about Britain; it's about BP. Ask your tabloids where the British-bashing myth came from, because it certainly didn't originate on this side of the pond. Americans are angry at the company, not the country (the country has nothing to do with it). The whole myth about us ignoring the American companies involved in the disaster is also a myth. You really think that they're getting off the hook? They've kept a low profile because they don't have the deep pockets of BP. This spill would be the end of them if they claimed the same level of responsibility. But, they won't escape unscathed. BP is the main target for many reasons, the most significant being that they lied to our faces again and again and continue to do so. Obama is playing nice with BP as far as I see it - TR would be rolling in his grave at the lack of teeth in the current federal government. TR would have blown BP apart and spit on the ashes. BP has revealed itself to be a terrible and indefensible company.

Sorry DX, I was a bit douchey there...I feel stoooopid now.

It's just on other forums there has been occasional anti-British sentiment that's almost always un-necessary, and I kept having to refrain from arguing back due to forum mods....it's not the tabloids that have given me the impression that there's an anti-British sentiment, it's more because of what you'd call the "outstanding individuals", a.k.a individual users on the net who ruin it for the better ones.

Again, sorry. I've also been a bit RAGE-y because of exams, so yeah.

I feel that the spill is entirely the fault of BP, and have never even thought of blaming England for it. That is why most of the public here only wants to see justice, and good, regular inspections so that this can never happen again.