Pass a Law! The Evils of Toy Guns

www.CapitalismMagazine.com ^ | July 17, 2003 | Tom DeWeese

[Tailgunner Joe]

What would you do if a seven-year-old kid walked into a store where you were working or shopping and brandished a gun and said he was robbing the place? I'd slap his rear and take him home to his mother. Liberals shake in their shoes and misplace their backbones with legislation to ban toy guns.

In Annapolis, Maryland, a seven-year-old child walked into a video store holding a toy gun and announced he was holding up the place. Now, Alderman Cynthia Carter has introduced legislation in the Annapolis City Council to not only ban all toy guns, but also fine parents of any children caught playing with them even in their own yards. What a senseless abuse of government power!

When I was kid my heroes were Roy Rogers and Hopalong Cassidy. They carried guns and so did I. I had a large arsenal of pistols, shot guns, derringers and air rifles. All toys, of course. I spent many an evening after school with my friends playing cowboys and Indians or cops and robbers. We formed armies and built forts. We shouted, "bang, you're dead." Then, when our mothers called us, we went home and had supper.

Let me also explain that I didn't live a utopian "Leave it To Beaver" lifestyle. I was the original latchkey kid as both of my parents worked and no one was home when I got out of school. And my possession and use of toy guns didn't groom me to be a gun fanatic or violent predator. Though I am a member of the NRA and fully advocate gun ownership, as an adult I have never owned a real one.

My play was about good and evil. As my friends and I wore our gun belts we were after the bad guys; people who stole other people's property or threatened lives. Very few of us ever wanted to be the crooks. That's how we played it because that's how Roy and Hoppy played it. Guns were an extension of morality. They helped equalize the weaker over the bully. The cowboy shows of the day called guns "peace makers" because being able to defend yourself was almost a guarantee that nobody would mess with you.

Skip to today in a world where guns are always depicted as an evil, something to fear. A world where kids learn that guns are only for violence. Where "zero tolerance" laws make a school suspend children simply for pointing their fingers at someone and saying "bang." With such fear of guns drilled into our society is it a surprise that a store full of adults would simply freeze as a seven-year-old held up the place?

Nothing today is beyond the reach of those who would control all aspects of our society by banning anything with which they don't agree. No idea is too far-fetched or outrageous to be considered. No invasion of personal family choice is unreasonable.

There is no need to ban toy guns. There are already laws on the books making it illegal to rob stores, and if a gun is used, even a toy guns. It's still armed robbery and there are very severe penalties.

Of course, perhaps the bystanders in the store can't be faulted for taking no action against this brat. Had they taken my recommended course and spanked him they would have been arrested for child abuse. No wonder liberals want to ban guns. Their real fear is that the rest of us will gleefully shoot them.

[OldFriend]

Dems want laws making everything fun illegal.

[basil]

Great article, full of common sense. There seem to be a lack of that these days.

[Sacajaweau]

Toy guns don't kill and the whole thing is ridiculous. There was nothing more fun than to go through a roll of caps. I had a happy, safe, pistol-packin' childhood. We all carried a knife, too. It was for a game we played called "mumly peg". It was based on "strict attention and agility".

"No one" in our area was ever in trouble..but then, if you did the least "little" thing wrong, all hell (MOM) would break out and there would be "no baseball" for a week. Sitting on the front porch for a week "stunk".

[hattend]

Now, Alderman Cynthia Carter has introduced legislation in the Annapolis City Council to not only ban all toy guns, but also fine parents of any children caught playing with them even in their own yards. What a senseless abuse of government power!

If Alderman Cynthia Carter is still around after the next election is which she runs, the people of Annapolis are asking for this type of abuse.

[joesnuffy]

My favorite was my "Fanner Fifty" in my Maverick swivel holster
My spring loaded "Thompson M1A1"
My sawed off Winchester ala Wanted Dead or Alive - Josh Randall
And my extra large lever action Wichester ala "The Rifleman" Lucas McCain
Which of course eventually lead to a Red Ryder BB gun
A "Nylon 66" followed by
an M-14 an M-16 an old colt 1911 45ACP plus occassionally playing with an M-60 an M-79, TAC Air (Phantoms & Skyraiders), four-duece mortars, and of course 105mm, 155mm, 175mm ARTY, and the 'B' model gunships and Huey Cobras

Its obvious -one thing leads to another....

[FourPeas]

Hmmm. Of course this is ridiculous and Alderhuman Carter is an idiot. I wonder what the proposed punishment is for the parent of a child to makes a toy gun from their fingers, a stick, a puzzle piece of the state of Florida? What if, *gasp*, the child puts the toy gun in their coat pocket and someone really thinks that the seven year-old is actually armed?

This article and the writer's response to it reminds me of another article I read here on FreeRepublic: a shop keeper slapped a boy's rear end for teaching his bird to curse. The mother is now raising a stink because the man dared to be so bold.

I have no problem with the shop keepers action or with hitting a boy on the rear for pretending to rob a video store. However in the same society where a law to outlaw toy guns is actually contemplated is the same society where a parents will notify police if you swat their misbehaving youngins.

[Atlas Sneezed]

Bang

[The Duke]

I still love my old Remington Nylon 66.

[Fiddlstix]

The inmates are running the asylum

[Little Ray]

I had the most incredible Thompson SMG fully automatic capgun! You pulled the charging handle and it would feed a tape of caps through the hammer!

Darn it, I wish I could find one now. Those were the coolest things I ever played with, until I got an M203. Even automatic weapons are not as much fun as things that go boom. Biggest complaint is that Army didn't let me shoot it enough...

I have some nieces and a newphew who need these...

[The Brush]

I had a Dick Tracy snup nose 38 with a shoulder holster. This thing looked so real people were using it to rob places.
War toys were all the rage in my area and the Saturday morning cartoons were ripe with advertisements for them.
I had walkie talkies, gernade launchers, backpacks, hand gernades that worked with greenie stickum caps.
I don't have a gun anymore. I know better, I'd have used it on a lawyer of two by now.
Guns didn't make me violent, lawyers did.

[OldFriend]

Oh no, never outlaw bananas how will the left teach sex ed to our children.

[OldFriend]

Two little boys in our state were suspended from kindergarten for pretend shooting with their fingers while playing outside during recess.

Another little boy was actually arrested and brought to the police station for using a chicken finger as a gun and pointing it in the cafeteria.....he was six years old.

[Jay D. Dyson]

What would you do if a seven-year-old kid walked into a store where you were working or shopping and brandished a gun and said he was robbing the place? I'd slap his rear and take him home to his mother. Liberals shake in their shoes and misplace their backbones with legislation to ban toy guns.

Next thing you know, they'll ban dolls for little girls because the dolls "make" the little girls grow up to be unwed mothers...

-Jay

[StriperSniper]

We might have to outlaw bananas!!

Only on fishing boats. ;-)

[ExSoldier]

"I had the most incredible Thompson SMG fully automatic capgun! You pulled the charging handle and it would feed a tape of caps through the hammer!"

I had one of those, too!

"Those were the coolest things I ever played with, until I got an M203. Even automatic weapons are not as much fun as things that go boom."

You should have played with MY MK19 on my FAV (Fast Attack Vehicle) Its a full auto M203. I mean...why Waltz? When you can Rock-n-Roll!!

[whereasandsoforth]

This reminds me of a windy March day back in 1976. I had stopped for gas at a local station and asked for five dollars worth of regular. My five-year-old son was in the back seat. When the attendant came for the money, I rolled down my window about an inch to put the bill through. My son put his toy gun through at the same time. The attendants hand shook. I looked back and said, "Phil, stop that!" We had a good laugh.

Phil will be 32 this November and he has never held up another gas station (that I know of). He has a 10 year-old son. Pay back is fun-as-hell.

[ninenot]

Its obvious -one thing leads to another....

Sooooo...where do you store the 155?

My wife has a problem with a 3x6x5 gun cabinet.