Lori: The following article appeared in the August issue of the NRA's 1st Freedom mag....
'Britons Rethink Toy Gun Ban'
A ban on toy guns in British nursery schools is being relaxed as new research suggests they reduce agression
Over the past two decades toy guns have been removed from schools, and British parents have been advised not to allow their children to play with them at home. Turns out that was bad advice.
Far from encouraging violence, toy guns lead to calmer and more imaginative play, says Penny Holland of the University of North London, a lecturer in childhood studies....
The article goes on to say that toy guns have been reintroduced at a number of nurseries.
Hmm... and this is in Britain, a longtime gun control paradise where even a BB gun requires a permit to own.
Lets get those toy guns back out!
Comments?
Rich
[This message has been edited by RACastanet (edited July 26, 2000).]
Gender Gap on Gun Control Issues (continued)
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RACastanet
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Gender Gap on Gun Control Issues (continued)
Sure, here's a comment: where did this appear except in that most unbiased NRA publication? What kind of study was it? What were the actual results? How was aggression measured? Not that I dream about this study being overturned, but right now there's nothing to overturn.
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RACastanet
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Gender Gap on Gun Control Issues (continued)
Hello Ian. Ever the skeptic.
Regards, Rich
[This message has been edited by RACastanet (edited July 31, 2000).]
Regards, Rich
[This message has been edited by RACastanet (edited July 31, 2000).]
Gender Gap on Gun Control Issues (continued)
Ok... here's my little comment (my opinion) on gun control in our wonderful country.
I think what this country needs is "Kid/Family Control", not gun control or prayer in school... where have our families gone? Mom is out in the work force and so is Dad and kiddo is left in daycare or wherever to learn from TV, teachers, etc. (can you tell I'm NOT a feminist? and yes, I'm a single working mother).
Take for a complex instance those kids in Colorado, their parents didn't even know what was going on in their own garage let alone with their own kids? What kind of family is that? I'm not blaming those parents, but man... GET INVOLVED with your kids and I'll just bet their aggression is against other things than other kids with a gun!
*whew* I could go on all day... but I wont.. just wanted to put in my $.25 *Wink*
*hugs*
Kimberly
I think what this country needs is "Kid/Family Control", not gun control or prayer in school... where have our families gone? Mom is out in the work force and so is Dad and kiddo is left in daycare or wherever to learn from TV, teachers, etc. (can you tell I'm NOT a feminist? and yes, I'm a single working mother).
Take for a complex instance those kids in Colorado, their parents didn't even know what was going on in their own garage let alone with their own kids? What kind of family is that? I'm not blaming those parents, but man... GET INVOLVED with your kids and I'll just bet their aggression is against other things than other kids with a gun!
*whew* I could go on all day... but I wont.. just wanted to put in my $.25 *Wink*
*hugs*
Kimberly
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RACastanet
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Gender Gap on Gun Control Issues (continued)
Kimberly: Please, go on all day. I'm with you 100% on this. Even at age 17 and 19, my kids still love to go out and play with mom and /or dad. We early on made family events a regular event and it continues.
I've got two great, well adjusted kids even though there have always been (GASP!) guns in the house.... imagine that. Sometimes the whole family even goes to the range as one of our outings.
On Tuesday I will post a thread on Bill Glasheen's forum to tell about the ultimate, unbelievable father/son event we will be embarking on soon. Watch for it.
Regards, Rich
I've got two great, well adjusted kids even though there have always been (GASP!) guns in the house.... imagine that. Sometimes the whole family even goes to the range as one of our outings.
On Tuesday I will post a thread on Bill Glasheen's forum to tell about the ultimate, unbelievable father/son event we will be embarking on soon. Watch for it.
Regards, Rich
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RACastanet
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- Joined: Thu Mar 11, 1999 6:01 am
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Gender Gap on Gun Control Issues (continued)
Kimberly: Visit Glasheen's forum and click on my 'wish' thread to check out my father/son event.
Rich
Rich
Gender Gap on Gun Control Issues (continued)
I'm glad this thread came back up to the top - being away I let it slip past and I wanted to respond.
I wrote in another thread my concerns about young children and toy guns... the only decision is an educated one. For myself, I still have a lot to learn, but with what I've learned so far from case histories, studies, literature and these forums - I've decided on the following course: (This is just my personal plan of action - I'm not saying it is perfect - just my current plan - to be revised at my discretion!) At age four gun safety education begins. No toy guns ever allowed. Water guns only after a discussion that they are never ever pointed at people. (I know - where's the fun - but they LOOK like guns and I feel the play "shooting" sets up dangerous habits and assumptions. Other "shooting toys" - like nerf projectiles etc. are okay - but again - NEVER to be shot at another person. Still as young as he is I supervise his play - and if ever one of these toys is aimed at a person, the toy will be lost for at least a week - hasn't happened yet. He's better at it than I am! Playing with a nerf thing (I don't know what the heck it's called) the other day he had to cross in front of me to retrieve the projectiles and HE insisted that I put the shooting thing down before he walked in front of me because "you can never point it at people!" So far so good. Eddie Eagle video and materials are next!
Kimberly - thanks for your input! I feel so sorry for parents of children involved in accidental shootings - knowing that if a child wants a gun it is a fairly easy task - even without parent's knowledge - but issues like the Columbine tragedy shake me up when we learn that the guns were in the house for some time - and the parents seemed pretty oblivious. From what I've seen (and how far can we trust the media anyway?) those kids seemed to be screaming for adult recognition and some kind of valuation from someone - positive OR negative. A very sad sign of our times.
I wrote in another thread my concerns about young children and toy guns... the only decision is an educated one. For myself, I still have a lot to learn, but with what I've learned so far from case histories, studies, literature and these forums - I've decided on the following course: (This is just my personal plan of action - I'm not saying it is perfect - just my current plan - to be revised at my discretion!) At age four gun safety education begins. No toy guns ever allowed. Water guns only after a discussion that they are never ever pointed at people. (I know - where's the fun - but they LOOK like guns and I feel the play "shooting" sets up dangerous habits and assumptions. Other "shooting toys" - like nerf projectiles etc. are okay - but again - NEVER to be shot at another person. Still as young as he is I supervise his play - and if ever one of these toys is aimed at a person, the toy will be lost for at least a week - hasn't happened yet. He's better at it than I am! Playing with a nerf thing (I don't know what the heck it's called) the other day he had to cross in front of me to retrieve the projectiles and HE insisted that I put the shooting thing down before he walked in front of me because "you can never point it at people!" So far so good. Eddie Eagle video and materials are next!
Kimberly - thanks for your input! I feel so sorry for parents of children involved in accidental shootings - knowing that if a child wants a gun it is a fairly easy task - even without parent's knowledge - but issues like the Columbine tragedy shake me up when we learn that the guns were in the house for some time - and the parents seemed pretty oblivious. From what I've seen (and how far can we trust the media anyway?) those kids seemed to be screaming for adult recognition and some kind of valuation from someone - positive OR negative. A very sad sign of our times.
Gender Gap on Gun Control Issues (continued)
Here is something interesting on the subject matter:
Sunday, August 6, 2000
Sculptor will 'disarm' one of her works
By Deborah Baker
ASSOCIATED PRESS
SANTA FE, N.M. -
The boy and girl, slightly crouched, take aim at one another. She has a hose; he, a water pistol.
For Linda Strong, it was an image that captured the joy of being young.
When the sculptor was asked to create a fountain for a city park, it was a natural: Using her children as models, she caught in bronze their many water fights.
That was 21 years ago. Today - to some observers who have watched gun violence escalate and seen children bleeding in schoolyards - the piece evokes something more sinister.
So Strong is about to alter her sculpture in this art-savvy city. She plans to chisel off the boy's hand Thursday and give him a new one, holding a garden hose rather than a gun.
"I think it's the right thing to do," she said.
Last year, following the deaths of 14 students and a teacher at Columbine High School in Colorado, there were letters to a local newspaper and calls to City Hall objecting to the fountain.
"At first I didn't consider doing anything about it," said Strong, sitting in her studio south of Santa Fe. "I just went, 'Oh, listen to these people.' "
But then her fountain was vandalized. The boy was smeared with green paint, and someone wrote "no gun" on his legs. The artist became intent on protecting her work.
"And so I capitulated. I thought, the times have changed," she said. "I am open-minded enough to change with the times."
Strong went to the city, and the Santa Fe Arts Commission recommended the change.
"I don't like revisionism in art, but I think art in public places has another responsibility," said Letitia Frank, the commission chairwoman.
Strong, 58, is the first to admit that when no water is running through the fountain - frequently, during this summer's Western drought - the boy's pistol doesn't look like a squirt gun.
"I want people to look at it and enjoy it. It's not being enjoyed," she said.
Not everyone agrees with the revision.
"I don't think there's anything wrong with it," said Diana Beilman, 15, glancing over at the sculpture from a nearby skateboard park. "Little boys hold guns all the time."
Jack Samson, who moved to Santa Fe in 1930, blames "self-appointed guardians of our morality" for the planned alteration. "It is an effort to be politically correct, and I think it goes over the bounds of common sense," he said.
The estimated cost of the alteration is $1,700.
"If you look at public sentiment now in terms of guns and youth, even though it's a squirt gun, most people in favor of [altering] it feel that . . . the message it's providing in its imagery is not appropriate in this day and age," said city spokesman Juan Rios.
Locals enjoying the park on a summer afternoon appeared to agree. "If the artist and her family are willing to change it, and it will calm people, why not? We need more calm," Kerry Featheringill said.
Sunday, August 6, 2000
Sculptor will 'disarm' one of her works
By Deborah Baker
ASSOCIATED PRESS
SANTA FE, N.M. -
The boy and girl, slightly crouched, take aim at one another. She has a hose; he, a water pistol.
For Linda Strong, it was an image that captured the joy of being young.
When the sculptor was asked to create a fountain for a city park, it was a natural: Using her children as models, she caught in bronze their many water fights.
That was 21 years ago. Today - to some observers who have watched gun violence escalate and seen children bleeding in schoolyards - the piece evokes something more sinister.
So Strong is about to alter her sculpture in this art-savvy city. She plans to chisel off the boy's hand Thursday and give him a new one, holding a garden hose rather than a gun.
"I think it's the right thing to do," she said.
Last year, following the deaths of 14 students and a teacher at Columbine High School in Colorado, there were letters to a local newspaper and calls to City Hall objecting to the fountain.
"At first I didn't consider doing anything about it," said Strong, sitting in her studio south of Santa Fe. "I just went, 'Oh, listen to these people.' "
But then her fountain was vandalized. The boy was smeared with green paint, and someone wrote "no gun" on his legs. The artist became intent on protecting her work.
"And so I capitulated. I thought, the times have changed," she said. "I am open-minded enough to change with the times."
Strong went to the city, and the Santa Fe Arts Commission recommended the change.
"I don't like revisionism in art, but I think art in public places has another responsibility," said Letitia Frank, the commission chairwoman.
Strong, 58, is the first to admit that when no water is running through the fountain - frequently, during this summer's Western drought - the boy's pistol doesn't look like a squirt gun.
"I want people to look at it and enjoy it. It's not being enjoyed," she said.
Not everyone agrees with the revision.
"I don't think there's anything wrong with it," said Diana Beilman, 15, glancing over at the sculpture from a nearby skateboard park. "Little boys hold guns all the time."
Jack Samson, who moved to Santa Fe in 1930, blames "self-appointed guardians of our morality" for the planned alteration. "It is an effort to be politically correct, and I think it goes over the bounds of common sense," he said.
The estimated cost of the alteration is $1,700.
"If you look at public sentiment now in terms of guns and youth, even though it's a squirt gun, most people in favor of [altering] it feel that . . . the message it's providing in its imagery is not appropriate in this day and age," said city spokesman Juan Rios.
Locals enjoying the park on a summer afternoon appeared to agree. "If the artist and her family are willing to change it, and it will calm people, why not? We need more calm," Kerry Featheringill said.
