Once an icon of Rockwellian America, the lone boy toting a Daisy BB gun as he wanders the woods has a new reputation - that of an outlaw.

In the boldest of a growing ledger of laws across the country aimed at gradeschool "gunslingers," a new ordinance here makes it a crime to let children under 16 use a BB gun - or its modern cousin, the paintball gun - without parental supervision.

To many, it's common-sense legislation catering to suburbs under attack by roving gangs of "terrorist teens" who lob paintball grenades and frighten neighbors.

But here, in a state where rifles are as popular as bagels in New York, critics see a clash of a self-reliant gun culture with the more genteel behavior of wealthy modern suburbs. The issue is raising questions about how far a city can go in criminalizing what some consider a "rite of childhood." More broadly, it is spurring a debate over whether the town is acting too much as a "nanny," making decisions about a children's activity that should be left up to parents.

"This law puts everybody in an awkward position," says Rick Whalen Sr., a local parent who just bought his son a Daisy BB rifle. "In one sweep, the city council has deemed that my judgement as a parent is irrelevant, and that's distressing."

Alpharetta sits right on the faultline between the creep of gun-wary Atlantans and the kind of red-dirt hollows that Bo and Luke from "The Dukes of Hazard" could call home.

In just over a decade, this city has gone from a sleepy burg of cotton fields to a high-tech 'burb that's home to Nortel and E-Trade. Bond traders doing sushi lunches have largely replaced drawling farmers leaning on their John Deeres.

"You can't find a better example of a space station full of Northerners landing in the middle of the country and changing everything around them," says Walter Olson of the New York-based Manhattan Institute, who wrote about the issue on the website overlawyered.com.

"What you have, on one hand, are vegetarian parents who'd never let their child touch a BB gun. On the other hand are parents who say, 'One day, he'll have perfect aim,' " he says.

The law is part of a growing trend from New Jersey to California, where suburban "edge cities" seem ready to put certain controls on guns - even some that people consider to be toys rather than weapons - in the interest of safety. With 3.1 million BB guns in circulation, 14 states and scores of communities now have some type of restrictions on them, ranging from outright bans to mandatory gun-safety courses.

The BB guns can do serious damage. Alig Jahay's suburban cat is one victim of careless target practice. Last year, Mr. Jahay's pet came limping home with a BB gun wound that cost him $1,000 in vet's bills. Another suburban woman's cat was recently found shot dead by a BB, and a third person had $500 worth of damage done to her car.

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