Guns and prose(s)

By Christine

"I am going to be a nonspanking, loving, tolerant, patient, listening mother who will drop her knitting the moment her offspring calls her name..."

Um… did I say that?

Yes, I did. But that was before I had kids.

Moreover, I added: "My children will never watch TV, will listen to classical music only, and will become concert pianists by age nine."

Did I say that, too? Yes, except for the piano part.

The real clincher was this one: "If I have a son, he will never, I repeat NEVER, play with a toy gun. EVER."

I really meant that one, until one late summer day.

Our 5-year-old daughter had just learned to ride her bike. To celebrate we took our first family bike trip to a nearby beer festival, the Bavarian equivalent to a local fair where kids can ride overpriced carousels while the parents look on in a sleepy, beer-induced haze.

We took a break from the stomach-churning rides for a few refreshments. As the waiter cleared a neighboring table, he found a toy gun with colorful balls that a child had left there. Without asking, he plunked it in front of my son's nose. Thrilled at receiving this unexpected gift, my son tore open the wrapping before I could say "There go all my principles out the window!"

A few months passed. The toy balls rolled into dark corners of the house, never to be seen again. Not surprisingly, the gun sustained hours of play. My son simply loves it. But soon, Christmas came and the gun was forgotten.

For Christmas, my children got the animated Disney film, "Spirit," about a mustang in the Wild West. It is a well-crafted story accompanied by Bryan Adams' sandpaper voice and narrated by the rather nasal Matt Damon. What I didn't realize at the time was how violent some of the scenes are. That is, until they entered my home.

Jackson rediscovered his gun under the mounds of Christmas toys. Wielding it this way and that, he reenacted scenes from "Spirit," pretending to shoot his sister in the process.

A red flag went up in my motherly heart. I snatched the beloved toy from his chubby fingers and said "No more guns!" With great ceremony, I preceded to throw it in the trash. My son cried. I cried. My daughter cried. It was not a good scene.

The house settled as my children went to preschool. I put on my thinking cap. Is my son destined to become a troubled youth who might shoot his teacher on a whim, simply because he is processing something he saw on TV? What harm did I do in tossing his favorite toy before his very eyes? Why are practice and theory at such interminable odds?

The answer is: I don't know. But I do know this: I am marching down to the kitchen trash can right now and wiping off my son's favorite toy to give to him after school. It's the least I can do.

Comments

[Nick]

Not a Mom, or even a Dad (yet), but you may consider also using this as an opportunity to educate your son and daughter on what to do if they come across a real gun. Eddie the Eagle (an NRA program - http://www.nrahq.org/safety/eddie/) is a good place to start.

- Nick

[Joe Goldberg]

"Boys will be boys," and they'll let their violent side show through by playing out violent fantasies or role-plays. It's a healthy step in becoming a balanced adult, hardwired into our species. However, there's a difference between the imaginative use of fingers and sticks, and the use of toy guys. The former allows a boy to play within a fantasy world of his creation, the latter stifles creativity and thrusts him into the world created by the gun maker (probably a licensed tie-in with a cartoon or movie), where the gun is not only a gun, but a symbol of the values promoted by the cartoon (i.e. violence solves problems, use force to get your way, the biggest always win). Fingers and sticks don't contain that baggage.

This is one of the great points made in the book Consuming Kids, which I highly recommend:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1565847830

[MelissaS]

I've found that to be true to, that the no gun policy makes them even more likely to fantasize about EVERYTHING being a gun. What is the fascination? But I don't believe in toy guns creating violent sociopaths. If that were true, I myself would be a violent sociopath.

Oh, wait....

[Elizabeth]

Our rule is that you can't shoot people, only things.

[renee]

yes, i fought that battle too, and lost. even without a toy gun, every stick became a gun, and all his megablocks were fashioned in the shape of pistol. in fact, every long pointed object that remotely resembled a gun was used for a gun, much to my dismay. it's a boy thing:) no use fighting it. i figure as long as he's learning compassion and positive conflict resolution, there's no need to make an issue out of it. because if i were to enforce a no-gun policy, it would make guns all that much more appealing.