Toy guns--actual toy guns--aren't something we should really have to worry about being regulated into obscurity. I'm not talking about super-realistic airsoft guns or non-firing replicas that are little more than props, but look realistic. Those might run afoul of some enterprising anti-gunner and, to some degree, already have.
But toys are toys. They're not even that realistic anymore, compared to back in my day. They should, in theory, be fine, but some people have long had a problem with them, trying to argue that playing with toy guns leads to violence later in life. I'm sure they could find a link where a high percentage of violent felons, particularly those who came up in my era, played with guns.
That would have been like trying to find a link between drinking water and violent crime, though.
Still, demand for toy guns seemed to drop for a while, and when my son was young, I had a hell of a time even finding one locally. Now, that seems to be changing, enough so that some in the media are talking about using the toys safely.
With summer in full swing, kids are out and about, but what are they playing with? A study conducted by Global Growth Insights reported nearly 56% of toy manufacturers have an increased demand for foam guns such as Nerf guns.
With an increased demand, it is vital for children to understand how to use them responsibly.
Quincy Pro-Act Officer Amber Haistings said using these toys without care can result in tragic situations.
“Don’t shoot at cars, don’t shoot at people, don’t be out in the street pointing it and running around with it, stay within your house and your backyard,” Haistings said.
For the most part, she has seen eye injuries from toy guns. The responsibility of handling these toys with care is not only on kids, but also parents.
“Like we said, we want kids to have fun, but you also need to know, and that’s where we hope that the parents educate their kids,” Haistings said. “If you know your child has one, talk to them about it.”
The other factor with toy guns is their appearance, as many of them can look realistic.
Realistic toys also require parents to lay down the law and make sure the kid doesn't do anything stupid with them, and "stupid" has a broader range than, say, a Nerf gun might.
But I said in the headline that this is good for the Second Amendment. Why is that?
Well, it's two-fold.
First, it means a lot of the hostility toward kids having toy guns has died down, which was driven by anti-gun hysteria. While the country isn't remotely as pro-Second Amendment as I'd like--I'd want it to get to the point that this guy gets an aneurysm--it's still a sign that things are moving in a better direction. Especially since many of those kids are going to grow up thinking guns are pretty cool and will want to become gun owners.
We all know that gun buyers are more likely to be gun advocates, after all.
Second, this is a fantastic way for parents to start teaching basic gun safety rules. The safety measures being presented in this piece are about toys and kids, but when I was young, my father used my toy guns to teach me the Four Rules. While it might have been one thing when we were playing war and I pointed a gun at an "enemy," it was quite another for me to wave it around the house. He enforced those rules on me so that they were automatic, and when I got old enough to own guns, I knew them backward and forward because I'd been hearing them and practicing them since before I was old enough to pick my own Saturday morning cartoons to watch.
If parents embrace this as part of the life lessons they instill in their kids, even if they're not gun owners themselves, then they'll be raising kids who are less likely to do something stupid if they find a gun, less likely to let a friend do something stupid with their parents' guns, and less likely to do something stupid as an adult.
All of that will filter into the statistics in due course, thus undermining the arguments for gun control to some extent or another.
The effects will be second- and third-order effects, but they'll be real.
Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
Help us continue to report on and expose the Democrats’ gun control policies and schemes. Join Bearing Arms VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member