TCC Maven

Playing with Toy Guns

Many people don't like guns. I don't see them as something to like or dislike particularly. They are tools, powerful tools, but tools none the less. There are appropriate ways to use them and inappropriate ways to use them, but I don't like or dislike them more than a screwdriver, for instance, which could easily be used in a an equally deadly fashion.

On the issue of our children engaging in violent play, I'd like to offer the words of one of my most admired TCC list members...Ingrid Bauer. I had the pleasure of meeting Ingrid at a book signing in a park. There were a number of families there. One child ran off with a stick to play swords and the mother said something about not understanding why her child wanted to engage in violent play when the child wasn't at all violent. Then Ingrid, wise woman that she is, said:

"I trust that my child is not violent, and therefore I have nothing to worry about when he plays with weapons."

Let us keep the continuum concept in mind when we are making decisions about the kind of toys our children play with. While it may be a personal discomfort with guns or with "violent toys" that leads to our decision, what will be communicated to our children is that we don't trust them...we don't trust them to remember that the things are just toys, that we don't trust them to use the toys in appropriate ways, that we don't trust their ability to discern between pretend and reality.

Let us think about what we are really saying to our children when we say, "Honey, I'm not comfortable with you playing with violent toys."

I think, as adults, we we be comfortably going along thinking that we've communicated our feelings about violence, but actually, we've managed to convey our mistrust of our children.

We've communicated a message that we believe our children can be easily warped and turned to violence by the presence of a piece of plastic.

I would prefer not to give this message to my son.

"Honey, I have so little faith in your character and innate sociality that I simply can not let you touch one of those toys because it might warp you forever."

I believe that message to be far more harmful than any issue encountered in gun play.

TCCMaven

Playing with Toy Guns