And what, pray tell, is a 17-year-old doing with a toy gun?
Was there someone else he wanted to think he had a real weapon?
Methinks this kid was up to no good - not an innocent these people try to portray.
Someone needs to explain to them that they don't have the authority to do this.
Given that the police up there have shot people holding cell phones, thinking them guns, is a cell phone ban next? Heck, in the dark damn near anything could look like a gun.
(1) Yes, the law banning toy guns is ridiculously stupid and Stalinist.
(2) However, black parents have been told and convinced by all their usual "community leaders" that toy guns encourage violence in their neighborhoods and that having toy guns may cause their children to get shot by "racist" cops.
(3) In all this hysteria, a bunch of white guys from outside the neighborhood - who never do anything else in that neighborhood as a group - come in and start handing out toys that all the gullible neighborhood parents are told are dangerous and a menace.
(4) Result: stupid LPers are accused of participating in a racist conspiracy to get black kids killed, and support for the retarded new law is galvanized. Nice work guys. Next time why don't you buy up a few thousand vials of crack and offer free to the kids? That will do wonders to further your opposition to the WOD.
On the other hand, banning toy guns altogether is a bit much, and likely to be counterproductive.
I would dare to suggest that, among little boys, some sort of gaming involving guns (battle, cops, cowboys, etc.) is absolutely inevitable. Some kids might be satisfied with a "gun" cut from cardboard, but others will be indulged by parents or grandparents with either a realistic toy bought out of state, something carved by grandpa and painted to look real, or maybe an unloaded or defective real gun. It could happen, and the same mistake will recur.