Rag Tag Community Prompt: Target

by rugby843, posted in Uncategorized

Kids with guns

Yes, they’re plastic

Filled with sponge balls, darts, plastic pellets

Supposed to be harmless

To me these are not “toys”

Targeting other children’s faces

Forget the softness of the bullets

Think of the implications

A child of twelve running around a playground with a gun

Shaped and clicking and simulated to use and sound like an AK-47

I watch as he shakes it with his right arm to reload

I see him mimicking all the moves of a soldier in combat

Sneaking around, lying down to get a steady-armed shot

His target in the sites

Is this what we want our children practicing?

I wrote this knowing I will get flak, and I welcome all of your opinions and ideas on it. I’m not asking you to agree with me, I would just like your opinion.

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/06/16/rdp-16-target/

9 thoughts on “Rag Tag Community Prompt: Target”

  3. We played war as kids – sticks becoming guns – it all seemed like such fun. Now kids play video games where the shooting is realistic and they are desensitized to the images of blood and gore, and television doesn’t help. It is worrisome. We can only hope that education (home and school) balance these practices with morals and ethics – an empathetic understanding of the dangers of guns.

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  4. We played cowboys and Indian with our cap guns, and we played WWII, as well. We were the children of those veterans. It all seemed pretty harmless back then. I think there’s more going on now, with our kids, than just gun play. Their problems seem to run very deep.

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