Rebecca Thoman presents Ollie the Ostrich!

Ask Doug Grow what 2+2 equals.

If he answers "Orange", you'll have solved the mystery behind today's column.

A local gun shop is planning a kids gun safety class.

You just know that's going to drive some paternalistic liberal over the edge.

Grow starts:

Before the gun safety training class that a Minneapolis gun shop owner is planning for Minneapolis kids, all ammunition will be "secured."

Everyone agrees that's a good idea.

After that, though, questions arise about a plan by Mark Koscielski and his friend Joel Rosenberg to offer a free gun-safety program Friday evening at Koscielski's Guns and Ammo, 2926 Chicago Av. S.

The program is for children, 6 years old and up. Pizza and cookies will be served at the class, which is to "take the mystery -- and mystique -- out of guns."

Which would seem a good idea. Liberal-dominated media culture is profoundly hypcritical about firearms; solemnly intoning via public policy that guns are baaaaad, but glorifying them in movies, on TV, and in hip-hop songs and videos.

Beyond that? Guns have always had a mystique for kids, especially boys; they're the fictionalized token in infinite varieties of boys' horseplay. There was a time when that mystique was remedied by fathers who took their boys out and showed them what a 30-06 round would do to a 2x4 - sobering indeed. But those days are past, and urban layout and law make backyard demonstrations of firepower difficult, to say nothing of so many parents' puritan angst over guns.

More on that in a bit. Doug's got some self-righteous sniffing to do:

Koscielski, who seems to thrive on agitating city officials and those who support gun control [Grow states this without context; Koscielski agitates because Minneapolis treats gun owners like incipient criminals, gun stores like porn theatres - Ed.], says that he and Rosenberg are motivated by good intentions. Koscielski says he's weary of reading stories about shootings based on accidents or foolish behavior.

"We had a boy killed because he pointed a pellet gun at a police officer," Koscielski said. "We've had cases where somebody gets drunk, points a gun at somebody and kills them. When I was a boy [in Minneapolis public schools] we had gun-safety training and it didn't seem like these sorts of things were happening."

Koscielski said he and Rosenberg, who are certified firearms instructors, won't be teaching children how to shoot. Rather, they'll be teaching kids what to do if they find a gun.

"We'll be telling them, 'If you find a gun, don't touch! Somebody call 911.' "

But the two men also will teach kids how to handle a gun.

"Take the mystery away," Koscielski said.

I have a stepson. He's 23 now. When he was probably 10, his mother and I taught him the usual response if one of his friends brought out a gun; don't touch, call 911, yadda yadda.

But we also taught him a couple of the key rules - always point them in a safe direction. Always open the action (and how to do it) when picking it up and before handing the gun to anyone, to check if they're loaded. they're always loaded.

One day, at a friend's house, the friend's son brought out one of his dad's hunting rifles. My stepson, properly taught, did exactly the right thing - not only running to an adult, but also telling the other boy (as I recall) how to safely handle the gun until an adult arrived.

Good outcome, right?

Oh, the self-righteous sniffing has only begun:

Margorie Hardy, a psychology professor at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Fla., has a brief response to the Koscielski-Rosenberg plan.

"You're kidding," she said.

Teaching children how they should react around guns will have no impact on how they will react, said Hardy, who has done studies on children's play and guns.

"I'm sure those children will leave the store telling you it's not safe to handle a gun, but that doesn't mean they won't handle a gun," she said. "It doesn't work to tell a child not to touch medications; that's why we have child-proof caps. It doesn't work to tell a child about the dangers of drowning; that's why we have fences around swimming pools. The only thing that's effective is to keep the environment safe."

Um.

Right.

We teach kids not to steal, yet they steal. We teach kids to respect each other, yet they hit and bully and sometimes rape and rob each other. We teach our kids about self-reliance and free enterprise and responsibility, yet they grow up to vote Democrat.

Ms. Hardy's response - uncritically accepted by grow - is an absurd one; no education prevents all problems. But it increases the odds that any given child will react correctly, rather than incorrectly, in a given situation.

By the way - never forget that "keep the environment safe" is a euphemism for "remove guns from the environement"; naturally, that only applies to the law-abiding parts of the environment.

Beyond that, Hardy's answer reeks of "all children will screw up, which is why we have to restrict everything". Look at the message behind her statement; "teaching kids doesn't do any good". Only action above and beyond that of the parents can keep kids safe.

Now, childproof caps, fences around pools, and keeping ammunition away from kids all make sense - but teaching them proper, safe, responsible behavior helps, too, especially as they get older; I had the fear of G-d put in me about medicine and drowning (mom and dad had no guns); I don't recall ever even trying to open a pill bottle or sneak into a pool.

Gun safety is an adult issue, Hardy said.

Ah. It's that simple.

Ms. Hardy, you should spend a little time observing parents in the real world. They're not all responsible; some of them leave guns out where the kids can get at them. How will the kids respond? If they're not taught - how indeed?

Grow slips from the academically myopic to the absurd:

Her point of view is shared by Citizens for a Safer Minnesota, which has called for tighter control of guns. Rebecca Thoman, executive director of that organization, sounded a little startled by the Koscielski plan. She is concerned that such programs lead to bad public policy.

"We end up with policy in which we believe we just need to train children rather than have tighter restrictions," Thoman said.

Grow barely hints at the context; Rebecca Thoman - who is not only the "executive director" of Citizens for a Supine "Safer" Minnesota but practically the only member - Joel Rosenberg refers to CS"S"M as a "checkbook advocacy" group - wants a gun ban, pure and simple. Training - and a decline in accidental deaths that inevitably spring from it - are the last thing she wants. Avoidable tragedy plays into her hands. Rebecca Thoman is a coward, incapable of debating the gun control issue (I have challenged her to public debates, challenges that have gone unanswered), preferring to issue evidence-challenged declarations through her cronies in the press, of whom Doug Grow is a reliable mouthpiece.

She said she fears a resurrection of "Eddie Eagle" legislation, a National Rifle Association-backed scheme that actually had some political support a few years ago. Under this legislation, gun-safety training would have been a part of education for kindergarten through third-grade children in the state.

It gained support, Grow probably doesn't know to mention, because of a highly publicized rash of accidental shootings among children. Less publicized - many of the children lived in the homes of drug dealing parents who left handguns lying around all over the place.

Could the NRA's "Eddie Eagle" program have saved some of those lives? If Rebecca Thoman has her way, we'll never know.

Kudos to Grow, though; he imparts some balance to the story:

But Mike Hammer, the education coordinator for the state's Department of Natural Resources, said he has empathy for Koscielski and Rosenberg. Once upon a time, Hammer pointed out, the DNR had gun-safety training programs in many of the state's school districts, including Minneapolis. But after a number of awful school shootings, anything having to do with guns -- including safety training -- fell out of favor in most school districts.

The DNR still trains about 22,000 Minnesota kids, 11 years old and up, every year. It also has training information on its website for parents and kids.

But much as he believes in safety-training programs, Hammer also appreciates the positions of such people as Hardy. Giving a kid a safety course isn't enough; adult supervision after training also is vital, Hammer said.

The temptation to say "Er, Duh" is nearly overwhelming.

While talking guns, pizza and cookies, Koscielski started recalling the good old days.

"In fifth grade at Bancroft school [in the mid 1960s], we had a Halloween parade through the hallways," he said. "I was GI Joe and I was carrying my .22 rifle. A teacher came up to me and said, 'You don't have ammunition do you?' I said, 'Nope.' She said, 'OK.' "

It's always been a good idea to keep the ammo out of the hands of kids.

That temptation is getting stronger.

Posted by Mitch at February 24, 2005 07:20 AM | TrackBack