Inappropriate play- 4 year old

[Elg90]

Hello,
I have an energetic 4 year old who is starting school in September.
He is into Spiderman amongst all marvel. My husband is lenient and did occasionally let him watch an older rating programme (maybe a 12) - now stopped.
I do not and am not happy with him watching anything older than he is.

My son occasionally says things like "shoot you" and mentions guns (which I despise), this has all come from marvel films and of course some play maybe at nursery. TV ban now on.

I have picked my son up from grandparents (in-laws) and he said he has been playing guns this afternoon, I'm shocked and upset that they would encourage that play.

Looking for advice/ experience on how to manage the above. Thank you

I'll probably be in the minority but I can't see an issue. As soon as they start school they'll be playing guns on the playground. We took ours to air soft at at that age - proper equipment, rules etc.

I hate the play with guns but it's very normal and IME little boys will make guns out of everything. If he wasn't doing it now, he certainly would be in September.

If he's into Spidey let him watch loads of the Spidey and Friends series, it's very innocent. If he shoots you just "web" him back.

The cats out the bag there I'm afraid. You certainly can't blame this on the grandparents. You'll just have to make sure he grows up with a knowledge of the devastating impact of gun crime.

I work with 2-4 year olds. Sounds 4 they start making guns out of stickle bricks, duplo, connecting pipes - whatever. Many of them have nerf guns at home, which is naively what they think a gun is. I think you just have to realise it's normal and they'll get over it. I usually say "Hmmmm... we're not allowed to make guns at preschool so I hope it's a water gun!". They nod and carry on shooting each other.

I’m with you OP, in that I really don’t agree with toy guns and violence for fun.

Despite not having a TV at home (we’ve never had one, even before children) my eldest (3.5) has become obsessed with Spider-Man and other Marvel characters in the past year! I think he heard about them from his nursery friends. So I guess it’s unavoidable once they start school?

I deal with it by saying that real guns hurt people and aren’t toys, though I try not to react too much as this will just encourage him! Any guns that he makes or pretends to have, I refer to as “water guns” and then feign being soaked and ask him to dry me. Usually this gives him the giggles and ends the fight.

I do think it’s reasonable to gently speak to grandparents and ask them not to encourage guns as toys. We have mentioned it to our parents, as I think it was pretty common when we were young and our generation of parents is more likely to have an issue with it.

You are on to a losing battle here. I absolutely despise guns and violence but every single little boy I've met has a nerf gun or similar. My children's dad has them at his house but I don't allow them here.

It's not inappropriate in terms of society unfortunately even though I think it's awful.

My DC have always been screen free, literally except an episode of the gruffalo or old bear tales when they are unwell. They still pick up sticks and pretend they are guns. We do have a few old fashioned picture books that involve a hunter with a gun, so I suppose it's come from that. It doesn't worry me at all.

I’ve managed to (mostly) redirect mine into casting spells. It seems to fulfil the desire to point something at another person and then something happens, so if they cast a spell at me I’ll jump, or drop down, or pretend to be a cat

I hate toy guns too and wouldn't have them at home, but you can't really police what they play at other people's houses, unless it's dangerous obvs.

Im pretty sure it's normal for that age.

At my DS's nursery they had a rigid policy of no toy guns. Unfortunately they didn't take into account that we were living near a big army base, where many of the kids had parents in the army and were very used to guns, so they'd use random items/sticks at nursery to make imaginary guns to play with instead 😁