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EXCELLENT insight, Heather! i was challenged to make an anti-wartoys poster recently, and one of my brainstorm ideas was that "today's warmongers were yesterdays kids with war toys". i'm saddened by this...

We attended a 2-year old birthday party today, and as usual we found something really fun for him at Serendipity Toys behind the arcade, where they don't sell any guns, war toys, etc.

My father bought me many toys when I was child, even a pistol when I was around 10 years old that shot real blanksi.e. they sounded like a reall.22 caliber but no bullet cam e out. He was a warrior, raised a warrior, had no choice but to defend himself from an early age. Yet my toys did not make me a warmonger, I learned the difference between healthy fierceness and acting out my insecurities onto others.

I agree that war toys are not my preference yet they themselves do not create warriors. Our environment, family, teachers, mentors have great influence on us. Through the music I listened to and the diversity of opinions I was exposed to in swchool I was able to form my own opinions. I trust children as they grow to learn discrimination. There has always been a warrior caste and priest(medicine person) caste. Human nature still is alert to the possibility of the sabre tooth cat stalking us. These feelings of eminent danger and the fear of seath run deep in our veins. The challenge is to help our children discern between real and imagined dangers.

great insights as well, Raymond...and it becomes more and more clear why this is not a cut-and-dry, black-and-white issue. i had war toys as a child as well, and now my Ninja Turtles dont even have the plastic swords they came with. WE turned out okay, so what's the problem?

still, i think that having had war toys increased our CHANCES of developing warrior mentalities. for those with other elements of the war movement strongly present in their lives (those other dangers you alluded to), the chance goes up. in my recent research into violent video games for a meeting of Citizens for Peaceful Resolutions which i hosted on that topic, i learned that the research is saying not that playing with violent toys or games will make you violent (although there is a brief increase in aggression and such WHILE you're so engaged), the real danger of these games lies in the ways their used. namely, that war play (as well as violent movies) encourage an oversimplified world view in which
a) the world is divided into "good guys" and "bad guys", and
b) the "bad guys" deserve to be destroyed

the folks who research this stuff are concerned that this will program young minds to approach life's problems in this way: that their perspective is the good one, that the other is bad, and that the bad must be destroyed (literally or figuratively) and moved beyond. i can resonate to the logic that's present in that concern...

I agree with you Evan. I would rather see less violence in play and in the media. To build relationships built on trust peaceful means of conflict resolution need to be present. There are so many technologies and models to choose from to share with the young.

It seems to me that little boys and the bigger boys that spring up from them will always need some outlet for this expression. I have seen so many parents confiscate toy guns and the kids pick up sticks for swords, bananas for pistols. That said, I'd rather see a World Cup than a World War. Sublimating and guiding these natural urges, learning the difference between make-believe and reality, fostering peaceful strength and a healthy relationship to feelings of aggression and the desire to compete seem like the most effective ways to usher boys into manhood without emasculating or stifling them.

That said, I find the recent glamorization of sadistic violence in film disturbing. The way I see it, violence is sometimes part of the natural order, and even has a place in human reality - from standing up to a schoolyard bully to preventing the spread of Nazism in Europe. But the increasingly graphic portrayal of torture on screen that seems to have only escalated since the heyday of Quentin Tarantino is really disturbing, even if the "bad guy" is doing it. Apparently even the new bond movie contains graphic sadistic violence despite it's PG-13 rating. This is a far cry from the stylish days of the Sean Connery Bond (still the best). Letting a kid play outside in summer with a water pistol is one thing, but making it hip among his peers to be desensitized to inhuman acts is very troubling.