Drizzt
May 12, 2003, 05:04 PM
Playboy
June 1, 2003
SECTION: No. 6, Vol. 50; Pg. 49 ; ISSN: 0032-1478
IAC-ACC-NO: 101367346
LENGTH: 779 words
HEADLINE: Goodnight gun: children's book authors tackle firearms; The Playboy Forum.
BYLINE: Radosh, Daniel
BODY:
Goodnight kittens and goodnight mittens. Goodnight room and goodnight moon. Goodnight Beretta 92 FS double-action semiautomatic with 15-round capacity and delayed-blowback recoil.
Everyone knows children and guns don't mix. Bolstered by the modern parent's certainty that there's nothing children can learn from real life that can't be taught better by a didactic storybook, there's a new genre of kid lit to drive the message home.
While most of the books are by gun control advocates, the National Rifle Association gets into the act with the Second Amendment antics of its mascot, Eddie Eagle. In The Attic Secret, Eddie peeks into windows to see if anybody has left guns lying about. (Imagine how Charlton Heston would feel if the government tried a stunt like that.) Sure enough, a group of children are poking around Granny's attic when they find an old rifle. Before they can touch the improperly stored firearm, Eddie bursts in--and is promptly blown away by a responsible citizen protecting his home. Well, not really, but if that did happen, you can bet the NRA would defend the shooter.
Instead, Eddie delivers a stern lecture: "Don't touch it. Then don't stay around. Leave the area. Tell an adult what you've found." Party pooper. Granny returns the rifle to its proper place--alongside two gleaming guns in a living-room display cabinet. There's a padlock on the case; still, this is not the happy ending you'll find in any of the children's books not published by the NRA.
One of those books, Dana Doesn't Like Guns Anymore, tells the story of a boy and his bird friend Meadowlark. Dana loves his feathered companion but wishes he could sometimes play cops-and-robbers with his human friends. "Dana could not have a toy gun because his mom and dad said that guns only hurt people and animals." Eventually Dana rebels against his crypto-fascist parents by squeezing off a few rounds with his friend's BB gun, accidentally nailing Meadow-lark. This is a tale with two unintentional morals: (1) Parents should let kids play with toy guns or they'll end up using real ones; and (2) a boy will play with guns even if you give him a girl's name.
The Berenstain Bears and No Guns Allowed is part of a series of social-issues books that includes The Berenstain Bears and the Drug Free Zone. Written in the aftermath of the Columbine shootings, No Guns Allowed addresses not just guns but also "the culture of violence," because kids clearly need to learn about safety--and sociological jargon. Still, the book is astute enough to give fair hearings to differing views and to challenge simplistic solutions. When one teacher suggests removing "all violent literature from the library," another replies, "That would mean getting rid of such great authors as William Shakesbear and Robert Grizzly Stevenson." Of course, the most disturbing premise of this book--bears with guns--is never explored. Would it be all right if guns were available only to hunter bears for shooting humans?
Other kids' gun books have special moments, too. Guns: What You Should Know includes illustrations of the innards of a handgun and gleeful children racing a bullet. Guns Are Not for Fun offers a lesson in the danger of mixing firearms with bad poetry. "A bullet would burn a hurting hole right through your flesh/And turn your muscles and organs into a big mess!" Later: "Never ever again a soft puppy to feel/Just because you played with a gun that was real."
The strangest book of all is The Stray Bullet. While other authors have been informed by the latest pedagogical research--rendering their work tedious and predictable--the creator of The Stray Bullet claims she was inspired by her fright upon seeing two boys aiming what turned out to be water pistols at each other. The author's insight from this scene: Teach kids not about how they can get hurt by a bullet but about how sad the bullet feels when a pull of the trigger forces her to leave her home inside the gun. In this watercolor book, the bullet let loose into the air decides to save her own life, and that of whoever she is destined to hit, by simply refusing to land. Joyful again, she flies through a planet populated by hippies in T-shirts with slogans such as "The smart in you is the art in you." After a while these people seem so smug in their feel-good spirituality that you begin to wish the stray bullet would change her mind.
But no, she flies on, even fantasizing about the life she could have had (bullet wedding, baby bullets) had the gun not been fired. The Stray Bullet ends with empty pages where children can add their own illustrations. Inspired, I drew a Glock.
IAC-CREATE-DATE: May 9, 2003
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
See, I DO just read it for the articles...... ;)
June 1, 2003
SECTION: No. 6, Vol. 50; Pg. 49 ; ISSN: 0032-1478
IAC-ACC-NO: 101367346
LENGTH: 779 words
HEADLINE: Goodnight gun: children's book authors tackle firearms; The Playboy Forum.
BYLINE: Radosh, Daniel
BODY:
Goodnight kittens and goodnight mittens. Goodnight room and goodnight moon. Goodnight Beretta 92 FS double-action semiautomatic with 15-round capacity and delayed-blowback recoil.
Everyone knows children and guns don't mix. Bolstered by the modern parent's certainty that there's nothing children can learn from real life that can't be taught better by a didactic storybook, there's a new genre of kid lit to drive the message home.
While most of the books are by gun control advocates, the National Rifle Association gets into the act with the Second Amendment antics of its mascot, Eddie Eagle. In The Attic Secret, Eddie peeks into windows to see if anybody has left guns lying about. (Imagine how Charlton Heston would feel if the government tried a stunt like that.) Sure enough, a group of children are poking around Granny's attic when they find an old rifle. Before they can touch the improperly stored firearm, Eddie bursts in--and is promptly blown away by a responsible citizen protecting his home. Well, not really, but if that did happen, you can bet the NRA would defend the shooter.
Instead, Eddie delivers a stern lecture: "Don't touch it. Then don't stay around. Leave the area. Tell an adult what you've found." Party pooper. Granny returns the rifle to its proper place--alongside two gleaming guns in a living-room display cabinet. There's a padlock on the case; still, this is not the happy ending you'll find in any of the children's books not published by the NRA.
One of those books, Dana Doesn't Like Guns Anymore, tells the story of a boy and his bird friend Meadowlark. Dana loves his feathered companion but wishes he could sometimes play cops-and-robbers with his human friends. "Dana could not have a toy gun because his mom and dad said that guns only hurt people and animals." Eventually Dana rebels against his crypto-fascist parents by squeezing off a few rounds with his friend's BB gun, accidentally nailing Meadow-lark. This is a tale with two unintentional morals: (1) Parents should let kids play with toy guns or they'll end up using real ones; and (2) a boy will play with guns even if you give him a girl's name.
The Berenstain Bears and No Guns Allowed is part of a series of social-issues books that includes The Berenstain Bears and the Drug Free Zone. Written in the aftermath of the Columbine shootings, No Guns Allowed addresses not just guns but also "the culture of violence," because kids clearly need to learn about safety--and sociological jargon. Still, the book is astute enough to give fair hearings to differing views and to challenge simplistic solutions. When one teacher suggests removing "all violent literature from the library," another replies, "That would mean getting rid of such great authors as William Shakesbear and Robert Grizzly Stevenson." Of course, the most disturbing premise of this book--bears with guns--is never explored. Would it be all right if guns were available only to hunter bears for shooting humans?
Other kids' gun books have special moments, too. Guns: What You Should Know includes illustrations of the innards of a handgun and gleeful children racing a bullet. Guns Are Not for Fun offers a lesson in the danger of mixing firearms with bad poetry. "A bullet would burn a hurting hole right through your flesh/And turn your muscles and organs into a big mess!" Later: "Never ever again a soft puppy to feel/Just because you played with a gun that was real."
The strangest book of all is The Stray Bullet. While other authors have been informed by the latest pedagogical research--rendering their work tedious and predictable--the creator of The Stray Bullet claims she was inspired by her fright upon seeing two boys aiming what turned out to be water pistols at each other. The author's insight from this scene: Teach kids not about how they can get hurt by a bullet but about how sad the bullet feels when a pull of the trigger forces her to leave her home inside the gun. In this watercolor book, the bullet let loose into the air decides to save her own life, and that of whoever she is destined to hit, by simply refusing to land. Joyful again, she flies through a planet populated by hippies in T-shirts with slogans such as "The smart in you is the art in you." After a while these people seem so smug in their feel-good spirituality that you begin to wish the stray bullet would change her mind.
But no, she flies on, even fantasizing about the life she could have had (bullet wedding, baby bullets) had the gun not been fired. The Stray Bullet ends with empty pages where children can add their own illustrations. Inspired, I drew a Glock.
IAC-CREATE-DATE: May 9, 2003
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
See, I DO just read it for the articles...... ;)
