I'm going to answer this a little different (although AB is making essentially the same point).. It depends a lot on whether you are a shooter or not, and we need to face that reality that shooting generally does not sit well with the general public (yes, it may be a lack of education, but that's the reality - half the world problems are founded ina lack of education, so we aren't going to solve that !)
I'm shooting (safely, legally) in my backyard, and a neighbour observes me from their upstairs bedroom window.
In the three different scenarios I'm shooting:
a) Webley Service
b) AA S400
c) Hellboy M4 carbine AR style BB repeater
let's say the neighbour is a fellow shooter. In the three various scenarios they may be thinking:
a) ooh, a webley service.. I wonder if he has the interchangeable barrels ? With matching serials ?
b) nice gun, they really are timeless
c) "Walt" !
Now the more likely situation; the neighbour is a non shooter, with Joe Public's generally low opinion, and even lower understanding, of "guns":
a) Interesting, that looks like an antique
b) hmm, should he be doing that in the garden ? Is it legal ?
c) "RUN !!!" <dials 999>
So I guess us answering as shooters is almost missing the point... we may think the tacticool shooter is a walt, or there may be good reasons to have such a gun (e.g. NV use / compact, whatever). But it doesn't really matter what we think.
What Joe public thinks really does matter, for the reason AB stated.. they outnumber us 1000:1 and they have the same vote, for the politicials who govern our sport. They may be uneducated (yes, both the public and the politicians
), and we should always be looking for opportunities to pro-actively educate and challenge incorrect understanding, but from a PR perspective, tacticool and Joe Public are a very bad combination for the long term future of our sport.
All IMHO