Bang Bang

Children like weapons.

I certainly did. Even though my parents weren't too keen on buying me any violent toys.

I can totally understand that impulse. Any good, liberal, humanist parent would like their children to grow up without knowing the feel of cold steel, or cold plastic steel-equivalent.

It's much better for children to grow up being interested in cars (environmental damage and crash-risk), stuffed animals (enslavement of living things) and sports (steroids and homophobia).

I probably wouldn't want my children playing with toy guns either. Violence begets violence. Guns beget guns. Knifes beget stylish ankle-holsters.

But they're just so cool.

A swashbuckling sword-fight is always going to be more fun than a teddy bears' picnic - unless the bears are mutants with Uzis (which will damage the fine china).

The trouble is that violence is a part of so much of our cultural history. Not just actual history, but myths and fairy tales and films and television. It would almost be impossible to keep children protected from violence.

But do I like that kind of reasoning? The idea that violence is 'natural'? Most people who appeal to nature do so to justify terrible atrocities. "Of course I kicked the dog into a load of stinging-nettles: it's human nature."

The pro-gun lobby use that kind of argument all the time.  And they're idiots. It's funny how people only use the "it's only natural" defence for things they like. So bible belt puritans can proclaim the inevitability and righteousness of gun ownership, but condemn masturbation as an 'unnatural' evil.

I suppose violence at a young age can be damaging, or could be a natural expression of fundamental human needs. The way children grow up is complicated.

I'm sure there are children that play violent video games and watch horrific films, but grow up to be real sweetie pies. And children who are forbidden television and end up shooting a policeman out of boredom.

Sweeping statements are almost always statements that should be swept into the bin and set fire to.

I remember going to Toys R Us with my mum, wanting to get a Marvel action figure. (This was my favourite thing - and my mum's least favourite thing - which shows how much she loved me).

There were two that I needed: The Punisher and Dr Doom.

But my mum thought they both sounded too horrible. So I didn't get either.

I'm sure she didn't refuse to buy them - but I could probably sense that she was suffering in the Cathedral of Plastic Capitalist Terror and didn't want to make things worse.

To be fair, she had a point about The Punisher

He 's a Vietnam veteran whose family was gunned down by mobsters, and started a one-man war on crime. I don't know if that's a suitable toy for a child.

I suppose heroes teach us important moral lessons. The Punisher might have taught the eight-year-old me that street punks deserve lethal justice. That's an important thing to learn as a child.

The moral of the Spider-Man stories is 'with great power comes great responsibility'.

The Punisher story teaches us 'with loads of guns comes a large amount of smoking, bloody justice - also: WEAR A SKULL'.

But still: 'CAP FIRING WEAPONS'? That sounds pretty fun.

Dr Doom, on the other hand, seems fine. I mean, he does have an ominous name. But that's not his fault. It's his name. He's called Victor Von Doom. If he was called Victor Von Smith, he'd be called Dr Smith.

But he wasn't. You can't ask a man to give up his heritage.

And look how jolly he looks! He's like a special gnome. With a steering wheel for some reason.

POWER DRIVEN WEAPONS too.

I don't know what that means, exactly. All weapons are driven by some sort of power. Except for the Spontaneous Knuckleduster, which works through magic.

Look at his little tunic! If I had a tunic as a child, I would probably have done better at school.

Also, Doom is the ruler of Latveria. He has his own country.



Children need to learn about diplomacy and handling responsibility and creating robot replicas of yourself and battling that accursed Reed Richards!

Even without these horrible toys, I found ways to be morally dubious. You can make a sword out of a big stick. You can make a Howitzer out of a complicated configuration of sticks.

But I think I have a rational and correct attitude to violence.

I don't slaughter criminal scum, I'm opposed to gun ownership, I admire swords on a purely aesthetic basis, and I have not yet killed a policeman.

You can't hide the ugly facts of life from children. But you can condition them to understand what ugliness is, and why compassion is preferable.

And if they don't understand?

Give 'em the belt.