Toy guns. Would you allow them in your house?

[spidermama]

My DH and his two brothers were not allowed guns in the house. So desperate were they to play gun games that they used to bite their toast into gun shapes and use them.

here is the site that tells you all about the weapons used

IMHO it is far worse to let your child witness violence of one parent onto another or to their siblings than what toys they play with

I remember doing that to the lolly sticks too.

just returning Awen's hijack, we have a springer spaniel whom we are thinking of training up, hence we are going to clay pigeon shooting.

He comes from a long line of working dogs although we have definetly got the soft one of the family as he can often be seen on the beach with a seagul on his back or hiding from the cat!

mamatoto, interesting that you say you would be 'HUGELY offended and upset if my little ones ended up playing with your son and his guns' AS an anti gun person, would you agree that reaction is at the at the extreme end? So, if we happened to be in the same park what would you do? Would you have approached me, told off my son or just simply ushered your children away?

You say that, 'I am sure that, unbeknown to you, some parents have been (offended)and whilst your nose was buried in a book - ushered their child away....'

You seem very certain that some parents would have been pretty livid. TBH, I did half expect pursed lips, critical looks and the odd polite but hostile approach from parents but so far, nothing has happened. Perhaps my bit of SE london is not typical....

My son begged me to let him take his guns out so children could join him. At first, I was reluctant as it seemed really non PC and I was worried about other parents' reactions. But I know he can play well with other children and knows the rules about guns and play, so in the end, I really couldn't see a logical reason to refuse his request.

I have been letting my son take a gun collection to the same park on average once a week since April. As a battle scarred mumnsetter, I have my critical parent antenna finely tuned. I make eye contact with the parents of any child ds ropes into his army games. So far, no parent has seemed particulary annoyed with our gun-toting presence. I have never seen any parent up and go or usher their children away becuese we were there. What happens is that some children my son approaches (about 50% I'd say) just do not want to play with the guns or join him in army games - they just say no. It does not rock their boat I guess.

I have mused on the possiblity that I am overstepping park etiquette by bringing toy guns to share out, but as there are no rules about this and no one has, to my knowledge, complained, it seems silly to ban my son's games.

Tigermoth, I would agree with mamatoto, but dh wouldn't be bothered. I would discourage my children from playing army games with toy guns, or with sticks (too big an eye poking risk) but I probably wouldn't be that bothered if they used their fingers. So yes, I would attempt to usher away (I'd probably fail because I could see such a game appealing to ds and probably dd too). This may seem daft, but there you go, different things cause different people issues.

I do not believe that if they play with guns they will grow up to be violent, I just don't like the combination of guns or modern military wear with children. My mother who's views are stronger doesn't like ds wearing camophlage trousers either. I think that there are many other games children can play without guns, and don't believe that saying "no" at the toyshop causes them any great problem.

Expatinscotland, I'm with you. Had enough of guns growing up in the States. I don't allow any weapon toys but DS (who is almost 3) has started making 'pow-pow things' with his legos. No idea where it came from.

As a child we were never given toy guns but could make them if we wanted to out of lego etc. My mums thinking that was if we wanted to play with guns one day fair enough but the next day it could be something else. Meaning that toy guns would never encourage us to play shooting only our imagination. I took the same line with our kids.

I sell toys and I would never sell guns, I find it strange that our local market the main toy stall sells lots of replica type guns also. I plan to have a stall there soon and give them a run for their money.

bloody hell this is still going!! Well adding another bit.. i am with you soup dragon and tigermoth.. It isnt plastic toys breeding violence but parenting and violence within the home. Also how many kids watch cartoons daily which nearly always contain some killing or maiming?? Or computer games with the sole purpose is to kill?

At the end of the day I make sure i give positive input and re-inforce that violence solves nothing. For risk of being flamed and not in anyway having a poke at anyone in particular, i think i send a clear message of no violence in terms of the fact that i do not use any form of corporal punishment with my ds. That howver is a whole other debate..

At a big family do lately I noticed, with horror, that ds2 (5) was having a plastic sword fight with a cousin. I pointed frantically so DH could stop them, but he said, 'Leave them. They're fine'. They were BRILLIANT. It was like watching sport. No-one was badly hurt, but if either of them hit each other slightly too hard they apologised and carried on. They loved it.

I read a study that said that games played with "pretend" guns eg lego, fingers, (toast!) were more imaginative and less violent than games children played with realistic replica type guns. Has anyone found this to be the case with their own children?

It hasn't been an issue yet in our house, but I will probably take the "don't buy them, don't allow them to be bought, but tolerate lego and toast guns" line. It does turn my stomach to see a child with a realistic looking toy gun and I have left parks and playgrounds because children there have been playing with them. To me it is not an appropriate toy to take to a public place - I agree that some people will feel offended by it and therefore they are best left at home.

At nursery, DS & friends used to go around shouting "BANG". When told off for playing guns they said "but we're being fireworks (shooting eachother)"

I don't ban guns any more than I ban the bloody Barbies that DD plays with, but I make sure that they know exactly what harm guns can do.
I'm a firm believer that if you ban anything, it becomes 150% more desireable, so I take a fairly laid back approach.

To reiterate what some have already said - when I was a child (a very long time ago in the olden days), we played "cowboys and indians" etc. and my brothers had toy guns. However, we were not exposed to the type of stuff that children see nowadays.

Children now have their own news programmes, are allowed to see inappropriate TV programmes, watch films with so-called "moderate" violence and kill things (including people) on game consoles. They see stuff in "real life" that I never did. When we "killed" each other, it really didn't mean anything - I see children now who "kill" in their games, and they are a lot more graphic. They make the sound effects, describe the gore, and it is very very "real life".

Oh no, I sound like my mother ... "when I was young" ...

Didn't you watch "JOHN CRAVEN'S NEWSROUND"?

DS watches newsround on BBC1

We do have newspapers in this house

Hardly ever watch the news anyway

But I think it can be totally blown out of context

Surely seeing violence in people is far worse

ie Dad thumping Mum or visa versa

I watched Tom and Jerry and so does DS

But he does not play with the CAP guns very often at all or his swords {apart from his fencing foil}

I really wish my son had a craze on dinosaurs instead of army stuff. Then I could feed his imagination to my heart's content without feeling he or I were causing offence to anyone. I could buy him model dinosaurs, dinosaur costumes, dinosaur books and videos - he could go out to the park dressed in a dinssaur mask, make dinosaur noises and gestures, play dinosaur fighting games with his friends and (as long as he was good) I suspect no one would bat and eyelid.

As it is, he likes army stuff - it fires his imagination at the moment. So I feed this (within reason and if he is good) just as I would feed any of his enthusiasms. He does all sorts of play - drawing and painting army scenes, constructing bunkers out of furniture, making model tanks (I took him to a green festival recently. We were at a stall were children could make models out of rubbish. With glee my son immediately made a tank - loudly describing to the adult helpers the functions of its many guns) he likes being read children's action books and watching historical war documentaries, if allowed. Should I shoo him away from all the stuff he likes? tell him he can't draw the pictures he wants, not let him chatter on to me about the army? I don't feel right about ignoring and denying what is important to him and a very big part of his playing for now. I would rather risk offending strangers tbh.

dh (who was in the forces) and I have talked to him about the how armies kill and destroy and people die - ds says he doesn't want to be a soldier, he doesn't want to kill people. I don't know where his enthusiasm comes from - my oldest son was never like this.

Some experts ar now saying that it is detrimental to boys imaginative play if you ban all 'violent' play. Even if my so plays at something else, there is always an eliment of violence in it, I hinestly think that it comes with the testosterone, and that by playing it out he is helping himself to deal with these emotions (much as being frightened in a safe environment helps them to deal with fear)

In my experience if you ban it, it just goes underground, and they learn to feel ashamed of their imaginative play.

My brother played with toy guns all the time, and even had an air rifle in the 'risky' 60s! As an adult his is quite normal and has no interests in guns at all. Children learn violence by seeinf real violence, not by pointing a stick and shouting 'bang'

Tigermoth, I can understand what you're saying and of course it's important that you support your son's interests. Telling him it's wrong to like those things could obviously damage his self-esteem and I am sure you are doing your best for him as a parent. I am wondering, though, if when it comes to taking them out of the house, you could explain that other children might be frightened by them. This did happen to my son in the park when an older boy pointed a toy rifle in his face. It sounds as if you are sorted with the situation though, this is just a suggestion in case you did want to keep it to your own house (and avoid uptight people like me flouncing off )

Tigermoth I must say I can see your point of view but will never agree.

Later on in life If A child did turn into a gun toter/ psychotic - it would be the one with the obsession when he/she was young, the one ' begging' his mum to take his 'gun collection' (nice!) to the park - who would make good TV

errrrmmm I dont think a gun toting murderer in any circumstances makes GOOD tele and surely this statement just shows how crass and limiting TV journalism is in its need to show the 'reason' for this kind of thing as if its as simple as that.

And if it is then think wed all better start being REALLY REALLY positive about the beginning of the working week hadnt we

I think the gun toting maniac is far more likely to be the one who was not allowed to work out his "obsession" before he was able to purchase a real gun. Get real.

Well with three lovely big popular non- aggressive boys and a two degresss in Psychology I think I am 'real'

Carry on raising your boys as you please but keep them away from my daughter

must get to work - but can I just say I respect the fact that frannyf and mamatoto can see my point of view, without agreeing with it.

When my non gun-liking son was 5, I had to watch his games quite closely as he was prone to hurt chkldren semi accidently when he got excited. When I took him to a park, he often bumped into other children, playfighhting got out of hand etc etc. I would never have read a book while looking after him. He did not adhere to behavior rules half as well as my youngest son + gun does.

oh, and my youngest son gets on very well with girls.... they often join his games...you don't live in SE london, do you Mamatoto?

I agree one of my three boys needed a calming influence as without it he was like a mini- bulldog in a china shop! Less so now though but still more energised than other two!