Justin Bieber Comes Under Fire For Unsafe Fake Gun Twitter Pics

Justin Bieber is apparently having some fun on the set of Selena Gomez's latest movie, "Feed the Dog." The pop star appeared there Thursday night and took several photogragphs of himself brandishing a prop gun in wildly unsafe manners. The photos showed up on Twitter soon afterward.

While Bieber is met with praise in certain corners of the media for almost everything he does, these pictures have earned him some strikingly negative press.

Bieber's gun-wielding pictures come in the middle of a summer marred by gun violence, with horrific shootings occurring at a movie theater in Colorado, a Sikh temple in Wisconsin, and outside the Empire State Building in New York. And, on Friday, three people were killed at a New Jersey supermarket.

Obviously, many people are criticizing Bieber for possibly making light of firearms in the wake of these tragic shootings, especially by casually posting the photos on a site such as Twitter

Of course, it is worth noting that Bieber is posing with a prop gun, not a live firearm. It certainly makes his lack of trigger discipline more understandable. But many feel that Bieber's fans will have a hard time making that distinction, especially as the teen pop sensation targets a mainly younger audience.

At the very least, it could be seen as insensitive and teach a lot of kids that it's OK to casually walk around with your finger on the trigger of a firearm. It is considered very dangerous to hold the trigger of a gun without expressly intending to fire it. And it looks like other reporters agree.

Lauren Yapalater, a BuzzFeed staffer, had a small post displaying the pictures, with its only body text reading, "Not cool JB, even if it is a prop."

Hollywood Life posted a scathing article criticizing Bieber's recent photos, with writer Christopher Rogers claiming Bieber is "acting as if [the gun] is a toy." Rogers added: "Justin, whether you like it or not, you're a role model. And millions of fans, 27 million on Twitter, are following your every move. You have power in this industry, and holding a gun in jest is just plain foolish. I hope that Justin reconsiders the message he's sending with this recent photo and feels ashamed for making light of guns. Guns are not cool, Justin."