Giving toy guns as gifts

[juneau]

I'm not sure whether I'm being unreasonable or whether others feel like this.

DS was 7 earlier this month and he had a party which his school friends came to and he was given three toy guns as gifts. Now I know it's up to people what they give and that as the recipient's parent I don't get a say, and I should be grateful that these DC came to his party and brought him a gift (and I am), but I would never give a gun as a gift. I think it's really inappropriate and I'm very uncomfortable with having even toy guns in my house. Seeing my 7-year-old running around with a gun (albeit a plastic one), and shooting at us and laughing is horrible. And of course he loves them and he was given them and if I took them away then I'd be the bad guy

No I would never encourage it, and don't feel completely comfortable with it myself but I do kind of get why kids do this stuff, it's like playing around with ideas of ghosts/monsters/robbers etc, imo. Running around with a nerf gun or water pistol is just cartoonish, what about when kids rough & tumble and play fight? Me and my sisters used to have a great time pretending to punch eachother and doing exaggerated falls etc

He may never be interested in that kind of play of course, but your language of he doesn't "get" to do it, well I think that's unrealistic, if he wants to do it he'll do it!

He may never be interested in that kind of play of course, but your language of he doesn't "get" to do it, well I think that's unrealistic, if he wants to do it he'll do it!

Yes - my son specifically isn’t so bothered so it’s not a big deal, but of course I can’t watch him all the time. But that’s parenting, isn’t it? You try to do what you think is best and it sticks or it doesn’t! But I think not trying because ‘they’ll just do it anyway’ is pretty weak as arguments go.

But I think not trying because ‘they’ll just do it anyway’ is pretty weak as arguments go

Well that's not what I said

Oh sorry, I wasn’t having a go, poor word choice.I know that’s not what you said

(English is not my first language and sometimes the subtleties of it escape me)

I’ve given nerf guns as gifts. I asked my son what the child likes to play and he said shooting games if the parents didn’t like pretend guns then they clearly didn’t know what their precious little bundle plays at school tbh a lot of the ‘no guns/swords/rough and tumble’ gang of parents I know have some of the roughest kids in the playground because they’ve never learnt how to play like it properly.

a lot of the ‘no guns/swords/rough and tumble’ gang of parents I know have some of the roughest kids in the playground because they’ve never learnt how to play like it properly

Absolutely this!! Then the parents are shocked because they're "so quiet" at home

I can’t understand the glee of ‘haha they do it at school’, or the PP who talked about her anti-gun SIL whose son went off to fight in Afghanistan, like ‘well, that showed her, imagine trying to do what you think is right for your child LOL’ - there’s a similar sentiment on the thread with the parent who’s prefer her toddler didn’t eat biscuits at playgroup, a lot of glee that he’ll do it anyway when he’s older so why bother?

I am a parent who would be surprised if my son goes from never mentioning it ever to suddenly being a cage fighter with a stick gun the minute he crosses the school gates - but my son doesn’t go to a school where guns are included as play or encouraged, and I can’t think of a single friend of his whose parents feel differently to me. It doesn’t have to be a part of childhood, there’s not a whole host of little boys so filled with rage at not being able to play with guns that they snap the minute their parents aren’t looking.

My DS is not allowed to play with guns’s. if he gets given one, it’s returned sharpish, I hate them, my DB keep’s on buying him Nerf gun’s . even tho I said to him we don’t allow DS to have them. The mantra in my house is, gun’s are not toy’s and the only purpose of a gun is to kill.

No glee from me, and maybe your kid won't ever want to play guns, but the idea of trying to control their imaginative play seems very stifling to me. And I guess I just remember how much fun I had playing water pistol fights with my friends. The idea of my mum running out and banning the game because of her own moral ideas about play seems very controlling to me. She let us get on with it, no harm done.

I've seen plenty of children making guns out of the edges of toast sqaures!

If they want one they'll just improvise.

But poca what is my son missing from not being allowed to play with guns over any other kind of imaginary play? What does a gun, specifically a gun, bring to his play that he doesn’t get from say, an imaginary train?

And surely parents imposing their own moral ideas onto their children is fairly standard as parenting goes? For example, I I think you have a moral responsibility not to be racist, of course I’m going to pass that onto my children. That’s fairly typical, is it not?

• I should add, my son is allowed to play with water, we have a hose and a sprinkler and he loves them. He’s not missing out on playing with water either.

the only purpose of a gun is to kill

But that's completely wrong

**But that's completely wrong

Please enlighten me?

I have, twice on this one thread already.

A water gun isn't designed to kill. A water gun is designed to get someone wet. When we played with water pistols as kids we didn't think we were killing or even pretending to kill eachother, if my parents came out and stopped us from playing because "guns are designed to kill" it would've completely baffled and freaked us out.

Guns exist in many forms, not just those that kill humans that we think about as adults, think about the guns that suck ghosts up in ghostbusters, or buzz lightyear's blaster gun, or the splurge guns I mentioned in bugsy malone. I mean, you can ban your kids from watching any popular culture that contains any form of gun I suppose but as they get older that gets harder doesn't it? Basically I think you're narrowly projecting your own moral stance on guns (ones that kill) on something that is an apparatus that can be used to do other things too, boring stuff like gluing etc or more fantastical fictional stuff.

But poca what is my son missing from not being allowed to play with guns over any other kind of imaginary play?

I'm not saying he's missing out, but if you do go out of your way to halt this type of play you are controlling something that he will see no menace in, because he's a child and has not yet seen the damage that real guns do. He's just playing! As my dd often likes to tell me when she's being a monster and I pretend to be scared, "I'm just playing mummy!" .

At the Pre school my dc went to it was strictly ‘no guns’ ‘guns are bad’ etc etc
If a child improvised with Lego for example got a telling off o remember my ds being upset as would say ‘but they have guns for mummies there ‘???! I didn’t understand he kept saying it
Turns out they had a hairdresser set he thought the hairdryer was a gun 😂

Where I live, there is a huge farming community so guns are very prevalent. I’m from a military and farming background so guns are a part of life for me and the kids. The only parents against it here are the ones who moved here for the ‘country’ living

Turns out they had a hairdresser set he thought the hairdryer was a gun

Ha I suppose it is a kind of air gun?!

poca but I’ve already explained the moral stance thing. Unless you’re seriously telling me that you don’t pass any moral objections to anything onto your children?

He does know about the damage real guns do, because we’ve talked about it. I’m glad we agree he’s not missing out.

I have moral objections about stealing but I don't stop my kids pretending to be burglar bill. It's playing! It's just playing,

Ah ok, poca I think you and I just have different parenting styles then. I would stop my kids if they were pretending to steal too.