Weapons and Shooting: Defensive shooting in national preview, an OPES

The limits of the commercial, the criticisms, the overview, the problems of the sector and the solutions.

What is a critique?

By criticism, we mean the activity that consists in the analysis and evaluation of any situation in any context. This activity is exercised by a professional category, has a public nature and is carried out so that it can be known by the mass or by the recipients of the message or information.

Professionals, evaluation, activity, knowable by the public.

Yet today, general criticism appears to be an insult, that is, a degrading expression for a particular person, or work, to which it is addressed.

Wanting to do things “properly”, in fact, today has its risks. Bringing back legality, true rule and discipline in a national sector such as that of firearms shooting appears almost like a kamikaze mission for those who have decided to live in quality and not in quantity.

“And yet it moves”, Galileo would have uttered, alluding to the Earth, after being forced to renounce his cosmographic doctrines.

Here, however, one does not abjure, on the contrary one perseveres, whatever the cost. And it seems that sometimes, consistency pays off handsomely. Today OPES is able to claim that it has produced, in uniqueness, a national sector of very high profile and sporting quality, the one concerning Firearms and Shooting. The writer asked for its creation in 2019, with the idea of ​​standardizing a sector of the highest profile and prestige within the institution. The presidency at the time was far-sighted and the new governance, enlightened and enlightening, led by the national president, Dr. Juri Morico, is a complex visionary architecture of inclusive and futuristic sport, aimed at social issues because sport, any discipline, is for everyone. However, there are rules, there are principles that cannot be abused or taken advantage of on equal footing to beat the competition or for competition. We want to remind everyone that the Sports Promotion Organizations were created to promote Sport and, with the “Reform of the Third Sector”, that is, the set of rules that re-disciplined the non-profit and the social enterprise, the Organizations are recipients of a heavy social task. At the beginning of the XVIII Legislature the schemes of the supplementary – and corrective – decrees of the Third Sector Code and of the Decree of revision of the social enterprise were examined and today, we are in full evolution, but the bowls are not yet stopped. This means that the norm is the General, the rule is the Colonel and the deontological code is the Captain and we are all the Sport Army, there is no other viable way. Respecting the rules is necessary for any civil society. It is in fact important to draw boundaries not to be crossed, which are the same for everyone. This ensures that each of us is free, without however ever harming the freedom of all the others.

Sport is freedom and the freedom of all of us, compressed in a society in full movement, is ordered by the rules. Imagine a sports competition without rules. Imagine a tournament without discipline. Imagine now, a training or a competition in a shooting range, with real weapons and real ammunition, without rules or discipline! It would be sheer madness, impracticable and very risky. Precisely for this reason the National Coordination of Firearms and Shooting exists which regulates all the national sectors relating to Shooting in all its forms, both in the competitive sporting expression and, above all, in the training field. An epochal work if you think that 16 autochthonous sports disciplines are promoted, over 20 methodologies and specialties are not counted.

It should be remembered that there is a “Regulation of Sports Promotion Entities” approved by the CONI National Council with resolution No. 1525 of 28 October 2014, in which, in Article 2 “Activities” we read:

1. The Sports Promotion Organizations promote and organize multidisciplinary activities for all age groups and social categories, according to the following classification:

a) Motor – Sports

1) of a promotional, amateur and amateur nature, albeit with competitive methods, with the aim of recreation, growth, health, personal and social maturation;

2) ludic-motor activities and introductory sports.

3) competitive performance activities, connected to their institutional purpose, in compliance with the provisions of the technical regulations of the National Sports Federations or Associated Sports Disciplines, to which they must refer exclusively, together with their affiliates, for the best achievement of the specific purposes subject to the signing of special Conventions compliant with the facsimile issued by CONI.

Which dispels the fog on any comment and/or free interpretation on the possibilities, or not, of the Institutions.

Well, then what are the limits of the commercial? Leveraging also on the Circular n. 18 of 1 August 2018 (Circular 18/E) of the Revenue Agency, then what “is not promotional sports” linked to the third sector, i.e., which does not benefit fiscally from law no. 398/1991? It is necessary to distinguish two fundamental concepts: the first is the commerciality of individual areas of activity (which can be verified by comparing with what is reported in article 79, paragraph 2 of the Code); the second is the general marketing of the Entity (cfr. art 79, c 5, Code of the Third Sector). It should also be considered that here we are talking about commercialization only with reference to IRES and not to VAT which follows completely different principles, not modified by the legislation of the Third Sector Code. We would also like to remind you that the 118,812 national sports clubs (ASD and SSD) benefit from law no. 398/1991.

What are non-commercial activities?

The Third Sector Code considers the following activities non-commercial (ref. art. 79 of the CTS – only the first 3 fundamental points):

• activities of general interest (Article 5), even if affiliated, accredited, contracted, with national or supranational public administrations, provided that they are carried out free of charge,
• scientific research activities of particular social interest if carried out directly by the bodies or entrusted by them to universities and other research bodies provided that the profits are reinvested in the activity itself or in the dissemination of results,
• public collections carried out occasionally also through offers of low-value goods or services to sponsors.

Below is a list exclusively for Social Promotion Associations.

What is commercial?

I am:

1a) the transfers of goods and the provision of services carried out towards members and family members and cohabitants of the same against payment of specific fees,

2a) activities of general interest (art. 5) if carried out in a different way from the provisions of art. 79 paragraph 2;

3a) the various activities referred to in art. 6.

Very clear, it is very clear, we are interested in point 2 and point 3 with particular attention, namely: “Activities of general interest (art. 5) if carried out in a different way from the provisions of art. 79 paragraph 2” and the “… various activities referred to in art. 6”. Many associations, voluntarily or involuntarily, in contravention of the rule that regulates the sector, promote and practice: “… different activities carried out in different ways …” and in this sense, it is good to remember the phrase “Ignorantia legis non excusat” (ignorance of the law does not excuse) is the classic principle according to which no one can invoke total or partial ignorance of the law in order to evade the application of the law.

We therefore arrive at the new expression of the OPES Arms and Shooting Coordination Sport, in an experimental phase, or the sporting “Defensive Shooting”, in the study phase applied since 2020, even earlier in the application phase by some members of the aforementioned Coordination National OPES.

What is OPES Armi e Tiro Defensive Shooting?

What rules does it adopt?

How do you practice?

How do we form?

In short, what sports methodology is it?

Who can practice?

Who can teach?

In reality, the questions that come to this Coordination are many more, some targeted, others aimed at discovering the secrets of experimentation. In fact, I can only anticipate that in mid-January 2023 the OPES National President will give life to a targeted press conference, on the occasion of the first national meeting of the OPES Armi and Shooting National Coordination of 2023. We discovered, at our expense, that doing things “done right” maybe makes it unpopular, but then it pays off and pays off several times. Furthermore, we have (for some time now) re-evaluated the principle according to which, doing something well done “before”, avoids continuous and repeated costly interventions necessary “after”, to repair the damage of something done wrong and quickly. Done. In my opinion, the “everything and now” is not functional to social inclusion. We all live, perhaps we survive in the age of time acceleration, of “everything and now” and of the “here and now”, without thinking that many are unable to accelerate. Speed ​​is beautiful, it’s fascinating, our standard day, uninterruptedly punctuated by a timer regulated with looming deadlines, as well as by appointments, commitments and rendezvous marked by an uphill time schedule, commitments that will have to be respected and defined with positive results urgently, as a source of failure, of feeling inadequate and here it is, a dangerous form of bullying which, in this particular context, can cause the very dangerous “Burn Out”! Against the incoherent fashion of the moment, I believe that, indeed I am resolutely sure that to educate, to teach takes a lot of time, a lot of calm and a lot, a lot of patience, these phases which, in any school or academy you have to find, in OPES we adopt this “Mentis Habitum”.

We promote Sport, we support the Social and, last but not least, We train, at various levels and titles, anyone who wants to experience Sport. We transmit knowledge and do not animate any form of arrogance, least of all bureaucratic or educational, instead we encourage collaborative attitudes by supporting inclusion, that is, that relationship between two sets that works when each single element is part of the other.

Massimiliano De Cristofaro

OPES Armi e Tiro National Coordinator