could hardly believe this sick 'gift' in M&S..

[hovely]

...a desk-top rocket launcher (with little foam missiles)

Fabulous. Why not package it up with a few photos of children's bodies being carried out of buildings in Lebanon? Or a couple of shots of tanks on fire with soldiers in them from Iraq?

Making toys of weapons is saying they are fun and games. Hovely is right to find this offensive. Toys have always represented mini versions of what we want our children to become or to value or to consider entertainment or to learn from. So, I'm not crazy about giving little girls toy irons and washing machines either but at least these aren't machines produced solely with the purpose of maiming and killing other human beings.

If you read a transcript of Bush and a lot of the 19 yr old boy soldiers sent off to bomb the hell out of Iraq talking about weapons you could be forgiven for thinking you were reading about 8 year old boys in a playground. Except their war 'games' kill real people. What matters is not the actual weapon made into a toy in M & S but the attitude which makes that acceptable i.e the attitude which says its ok to see weapons as toys and 'exploring violence' as a necessary part of growing up (something therefore which Bush has obviously not managed to do).

Finding these toys offensive does not mean you lack a sense of humour any more than not laughing at a toy rapist or a racist joke would make you lacking in a sense of humour (these things are just not funny). Neither does it mean that you are ignoring what really counts. Attitudes form Government policies and the public response to them. Attitudes count.

there is a big difference between a desk toy and weapons of war

buying a desk toy from M&S is not the smae as condoning a particular war

arguably it might provoke a discussion of the nature of conflict, history etc which would potentially be a good thing

blacknwhite - shouldn't her attitutude, if applying your argument, apply to toy guns as well?

And so the argument goes round and round. Let me kill the thread now please.

but I want to kill it....!! my turn!

But i'm usually so good at killing threads!

Thought this was going to be about their USB pole dancer.

It sounds cool to me. My action man used to have all that stuff, it was wicked.

I'd love to fire little missiles at my colleagues, it'd be a right laugh.

Some of the things that people get upset about really are getting a bit much now. Lucky that you don't have anything really worrying going on in your life if this bothers you that much.

Haven't read all the thread, but I'm with the "wha??" brigade. It depends on how much you really think about the associations of certain ojects.

'It sounds cool to me. My action man used to have all that stuff, it was wicked.

I'd love to fire little missiles at my colleagues, it'd be a right laugh.'

Perhaps you should get together with George Bush and go bowling.

'Some of the things that people get upset about really are getting a bit much now. Lucky that you don't have anything really worrying going on in your life if this bothers you that much.'

I'm dying to know what topics are more important to get upset about than weapons and some people finding the idea of them so funny that they sell miniature toy versions to small and big kids. Unfortunately many people are literally dying including kids because other human beings like to play games with the real thing.

Yes, I also object to guns or knives as toys. They are not funny and they are not games. A friend of mine lost his eye because of a toy bow and arrow as a child and I always wondered what adults said to both the victim and the perpetrator of this accident because this was after all small boys using 'toys' in exactly the way they were intended.

As I said before a society's toys and games reflect what that society values and wants our kids to find entertaining or educational. So you give little girls (and boys) dolls so they learn how to look after babies and we play monopoly because we live in a capitalist culture.

When we make toys and games of weapons (which let's remind ourselves our only created with the intention of killing and maiming other human beings) we are saying that violence is fun or it's important for our kids to learn how to do it. I want no part of it.

i think it is a bit insulting to say [paraphrase]'you are lucky not to have anything worse going on in your life if you object to this' HD. you have no idea what is going on in other people's lives.

I agree with you Ruty. The 'get a life' argument on this thread worries me more than the weapon toy itself because it's part of the same attitude that says violence doesn't really matter. Feel the same about the 'get a sense of humour' argument. I don't find violence and killing funny in the same way that I don't laugh at racist or sexist jokes or things like happy slapping for that matter. Thank God other people feel strongly about these issues too. I would never allow toy weapons into my house and when my dds v occasionally talk about killing other people or whatever as part of games they've seen others play I always challenge this. If more people had this attitude perhaps we wouldn't have so much violence from happy slapping to wars.

Haven't read all this thread, but tbh my initial reaction was more disgust at yet another piece of overpriced, overpackaged, useless plastic tat that will be bought for the office dickhead - surely no-one over the age of eight would find this amusing - or not for longer than half a minute or so.

A total waste of resources and money that in this unjust, unsafe world could be put to much better use.