[Mastador1]

Back in the day when boys were allowed to be boys and toys were something that got them to use their imaginations and were fun too! Now the want boys to be neutered drones that are glued to a computer screen.

[Moonman62]

These days boys can get automatic airsoft guns. There’s a couple of BB guns that can also shoot automatic. The difference is you won’t see them advertised on TV.

[T. Rustin Noone]

In 1960 I was about 9 years old and visiting my cousins in suburban Philadelphia for what was supposed to be a summer vacation. The cousin closest to me had a birthday shortly after I arrived so we went to the local toy store and picked out a couple of Tommy Burst machine guns - one for his birthday, one for me. We spent the next two days burning up rolls of caps and generally waging war against the neighborhood and each other. At the time I had no clue what “pacifist” or “liberal” meant so I was perplexed when I found myself on a bus three days later back to Cape Cod, my Tommy Burst tucked away in my suitcase.

Now I understand. It also explains why the Philadelphia clan sat in suspicious outrage listening to my deeply conservative father wax on about the ‘good old days’ tromping around Europe with George S. Patton and the 3rd Army.