To feel incredibly sad when i see little boys in the playground weidling plastic machine guns

[lucyellensmum]

This has always baffled me, even before i became a parent. What is it about human nature that has us wanting to play killing games at such a young age?? I mean, its not a new phenomenon is it - so now its gangsta and whatever it might be called, when i was young it was cowboys and indians. WTF?? Why do toy manufacturers still do this? There are CHILDREN being killed by guns in this country and it appears to be a major problem. I don't know if playing with guns naturally leads to this, i mean, im sure 99% of perfectly nice little boys play with guns and they don't grow up to be gangstas and murderers. But WHY do people think this is OK??

We constantly teach our children that it is NOT OK to hit and be spiteful. But then we say, ah, but its ok to pretend to kill each other?????

I don't have a boy, i have two girls so thankfully havent had to have grandparents etc buy them toy guns and army tanks, i would probably just give in and let them have them for an easy time, but it would make me uncomfortable. But am i being unreasonable, it is just human nature so natural play? ITs the same with play station, i do think that has a lot to answer for though.

I think the OP is being, if not unreasonable, then perhaps a little precious.

As many have said, little boys (and, to perhaps a lesser degree girls as well) playing gun games is as old as time itself. My ds is way too young for this yet but I wouldn't be freaked out by him playing gun games although I'd prefer that he didn't use plastic replicas to do it.

It is certainly true that years of PC intervention by schools has failed to reduce the inclination towards real life violence, sadly. I understand education guidelines have changed on this subject and that there is now an acceptance that "boys will be boys".

Sometimes I think that certain traits are just hard wired in to most boys and girls but the whole biological determinism argument is certainly unpopular with many MNers.

i dont think im being precious at all, im not making a judgement on the boys in particular, its just that i saw a group of boys playing with guns in the park and it made me feel sad. I do accept however that it is a natural part of developmental play and as someone has already posted, it would possibly be wrong to suppress this.

slightly off subject, why is it do you think that there is such a gun culture these days. Its clearly nothing to do with boys playing with guns and i wasnt suggesting that. But i honestly have no clue why this is going on.

I hate hate hate toy guns. I don't think I will ever buy any for my kids - although if they choose to buy some for themselves when they're older I won't complain... I think it's awful, all the violent toys and games and tv programmes... I know I can't keep ds away from it all for long though sigh

i dont like toy guns etc but as others have said they use what they can find-ds1 likes twigs!about a year ago he was given his first toy gun at a party.dh and i discussed what to do with it and decided to watch ds1 and how he played.he played with it for 2 weeks tops and pretended to shot pirates that were invading then lost interest and is probably at bottom of toy box.

My ds doesn't know what a gun is really he's 4

My sons are 2.5 and 4. They have not got any guns (although plenty of swords??) The only time they have ever seen a 'gun' that I can think of is in the start of the Ratatouille movie where the little old lady tries to shoot the rat.

We don't talk about guns. I don't know where they learn about guns, but their favourite game is: Power power. (I think they mean pow pow - making a gun noise).

They hold their fingers and thumbs up as though it's a gun pointing at each other and yell: power power. One falls over and dies. Then up they jump and they do it again. And again.

No idea where they get it from. I WILL NOT be buying them any toy guns and any that come into the house will be binned.

I wouldn't mind my ds playing with guns any more than I would mind my dd playing with a fairy wand (incidentally, ds prefers wand at moment). It is just playing. I don't know why boys play with them more than girls - I wouldn't care which of my children played with them as long as they were running around and interacting with the other children - might disturb me a bit if they just sat in a corner polishing weapon...

Gun culture is due to huge influx of guns into this country (mainly from Eastern Europe and ex-USSR as well as US and, someone told me, parts of Ireland now that sectarianism has died down a bit) and their availability making gun crime more common. Increased black market activity - drugs, prostitution, counterfeiting - means that there are bigger networks of people involved in these areas and so more turf wars/people killed in crossfire.

DS is 4.6 and really doesn't do anything with guns, real or imaginary.

I am very happy about it but do wonder why he has never been interested.

lucyellensmum, these threads are always started by mums of girls.
We Mums of boys are resigned to it and let them get on with it while we open the wine!

No guns at nursery but since ds moved up to the pre-school room 7 months ago he makes his hand into a gun shape and goes "kill kill kill". Can we play killers mummy can we? look mummy this is how you hold it. Dp can't wait to join in, afraid I'm a bit of a spoil sport.

Better than banning guns (or killers) is to get them to do other kinds of play. We do turning each other into frogs/statues/goonies. Same kind of thing running around and pointing things but less obviously violent and more obviously fantasy

Idris - he's possibly a bit young. DS2 has got very boyish over the last year (he's 6). At 4 his favourite colour was pink and he didn't like rough play, never played shooting type games- was all co-operative trains. He's changed. Exposure from school I guess, but nowhere else. DS3 is getting into it much younger - but he has ds2 to copy.

Ds1 7 has lots of guns and swords etc. If he doesn't have access to these he will make same out of stick or anything. I never 'pushed' the idea of guns - I didn't discourage it either. Ds2 5 has no interest whatsoever despite being surrounded by them. I didn't do anything different. On the whole, I think its a stage boys go through and I can't say I find it 'sad'. Different things in raising kids hit your buttons. Other things about parenting make me sad, or other things about other peoples parenting makes me sad.

im sorry if the OP seemed anti boys, it really wasn't meant to be. Boys do tend to prefer this sort of play though - i was too busy chopping all my dolls hair off and telling my mum they had the plague! My DD is only 2.9 so probably not into the gun toting stage yet anyway. I do find the difference between girls and boys fascinating though and often puzzle if it is nature v nurture, or visce verse

Well I certainly enjoyed playing with ds and his two new water pistols yesterday. We both got soaking wet and had a great time

These then got used as a 'bang bang you're dead' type toy. Can't say I'm too bothered tbh. I do the 'killing is not nice' thing.

It has actually lead to some very simple conversations about the nature of life and death actually

I love him too, Marina. I love the idea of playing with a John Stuart Mill action figure.

Isn't gun culture just big boys playing with guns? They create it

Hmm, wonder what a Mother Teresa action figure would sell...

.....and do you think that baby dolls and push chairs will induce our dd's to be pregnant at 12?

i used to push a dolls pram with my guinea pig in it, whilst wearing a holster for my cap gun. what does that mean?

That you are one dangerous mutha???

I have two boys. They have toy guns and swords which they use for play fighting games. it's perfectly natural behaviour for little boys. They're not violent in any other way so I'm not worried about them becoming gun-toting gang members when they grow up.
As everyone else has said, they will make guns out of sticks, Lego and even their fingers if they don't have the real thing. I really think there's no connection between toy guns and children shooting and knifing each other in the street.

my ds 3 has a water gun and loves it would these be frowned apon or are water guns classed as ok as they are fun and squirt water or would the fact that its a gun still be abd thing

im not against things like this as a child only has a childish mind i had guns that flew them things out with suckers on the end didnt make me want to turn into a gun weilding criminal

just wandered what the view of water guns were really aswe love them and they are so much fun

sorry if this has been discussed already im too tired to read through as ds not been well up all night

Another weird thing is that boys appear to be able to make a gun noise (a sort of back of the throat thing-I can't describe!).
I used to go out of the room when they wrestled because I can't stand it but they loved it.
We once went to Jersey Zoo and two bear cubs were wrestling, after watching them for a while they looked at each other and started themselves! It was really funny at the time (aged 6 and 4)-just animal like behaviour!

At church on Palm Sunday, the vicar was most taken aback when, to a boy, every single young chap who was given a palm cross turned it over to make a sword and started fighting with it.