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My family doesn’t own any firearms, but I live in Arizona, where I witnessed someone bring a gun into a children’s fun center just because they could. And considering my state’s laws regarding open and concealed carry, as well as its fascination with firing ranges at strip malls, the chances one of my children will play in a home with a weapon inside seems high, if not inevitable.
I know I need to introduce the concept and hazards of firearms to my children, but I’m unsure how to start the conversation. So I spoke to several experts about how to raise awareness about the dangers of guns and what to do if they ever encounter one.
Set boundaries
From James Bond’s Walther PPK, the video game Doom and the curving bullets in the film Wanted, popular media does romanticize guns and how they’re used. Because children are unaware of the hurt these weapons can actually cause, you might want to set boundaries around what your children watch and the toys they play with.
“We have to have age-appropriate, open conversations with our children about the difference between what happens in a movie, video games, or television versus what happens in real life,” says Dr. Alison Tothy, a pediatric emergency medicine physician at the University of Chicago. “As they get older, you’ll have to frame the conversation differently.”
You have to talk to your kids about guns, even if you don’t have one
You may not have a pool, but you still teach your kids how to swim because there will be a time when they’ll need to know how. According to a 2020 Gallup report, 32% of U.S. adults stated they own a gun, and 42% reported living in a gun household. That is one in three American homes with a gun, so even though you don’t own one, the chance of your child being somewhere with one is high.
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Illustration: Alisa Stern
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