I want to start a poll about kids and guns.
Now I'm not talking Trench Coat Mafia stuff, just children playing cops and robbers with squirt guns, or shooting each other with cap guns...

what brings this up is my cousin wont allow her kid to play with guns, like most parents today, but I was raised around guns, real guns, SHOTGUNS, I think I was 10 before I ever shot one at the range, but even that was old for the people around me.

I worry that the kids who mistakenly shoot thier friends with their fathers gun do so because they have no respect for the power of the weapon. I can play with a shotgun all day long, but out of instict I will check it for ammo, then play then check again, and check again, knowing full well that there is now ammo in it but its better safe then sorry...

Im not trying to start a debate about the 2nd Ammendment or anything, Im just wondering...

Will You (or do you) Allow Your Kids to Play with Toy Guns.

 

I voted "Yes". I understood the difference between play and reality when I was growing up, and I hope my children will as well.

 

Option 1


Option 2


Option 3


Option 4

 

I don't see anything wrong with allowing it if your kids have a good sense of right and wrong. I think parents who shield their kids from these so called violent things are doing more harm than good. I don't have any kids yet but I will allow it when I do. I played with toy guns when I was young and started hunting when I was 12.

 

I think shielding a child from guns just builds curiosity. If they want to learn about it and they know you aren't going to help, they'll do it without your knowledge. Now, if there was no way whatsoever for my child to never hear of or see a gun, then yes, I wouldn't ever bring it up. But lets not be naive... a child only needs to watch tv for five minutes before seeing one of his tv stars brandishing a firearm.

 

My two sons help me clean my arsenal. They are curious about them , and I will share and teach them all I can. My five year old already owns a Daisy Red Rider BB gun as does his 3 year old brother ( the 3 yr old gun is still in the box locked in one of my safes). The 5 year old also owns a 17 cal. rifle. He has fired it at the range many times .

Screw the pansies who try and outlaw firearms. Be better parents instead of raising trash then blaming guns when your nutball goes off. Right now my sons are more interested in Martial Arts so I am teaching them to stand up for themselves and take not one bit of crap from anybody. I will buy through legal channels and when here in the Republik of Kalifornia bans everything I will purchase them through the black market. No worries here.

 

Well, this is an interesting topic to me. I have been shooting since I was 5, and I have been hunting since I was 12 (I am now 23). I used to compulsively play with toy guns as a child, and to date have managed to contain my sense of society-fueled angst to be later resolved through needless gun violence. If and when I decide to have children, they will be taught how to respectfully and safely handle all types of firearms. I used to watch "The A-Team" all the time as a kid, and actually owned some of the cool, and very real looking, toy guns sold in the stores. Teaching children how to behave responsibly is a part of parenthood. I see no difference between teaching kids how to respect firearms or teaching them proper table manners. The problem here is the consistent media attitude that guns are bad (or exceedingly cool to play with). If you teach children the line between where TV ends and reality begins, you should have very little in the way of problems with firearm abuse. Once children have deciphered that line, they will begin to understand that things they see on TV or on the internet (bite the hand that feeds me...) are not necessarily the same as in real life. My parents instilled this wisdom on me when I was young, and it needs to be dispersed over the whole of America. The reason this debate rages largely stems from the cliche people fear what they do not fully understand. The bottom line, if your kids want to play with toy guns a la "Cops and Robbers," by all means teach them first, then let them do it. Don't "shelter" your kids just because you care not to apprise yourself of all the facts of a particular issue. Better they learn the actual truth from you than from a Rambo movie on cable TV.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by WFO Racer
My two sons help me clean my arsenal.

 

But, suvh8r, you didn't reveal your answer to the topic of this thread. Would you/do you let your kids play with toy guns in the situations described above? A description of your thinking would also be helpful, so we can all be on the same page. Please, we're all dying to know...

 

I've had guns all my life. The first rule someone should give a kid is to never point any gun at anyone unless you plan to kill them, real or not. This could lead to bad habits that might shoot someone unintentionally. Look at that fool Jayson Williams. I remember seeing him on Cribs and how he carelessly handled his shotgun. It seems like he learned his gunmanship from the movies...truly sad.

Sam