Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Sun Editorial:

Time to put an end to making guns that kids can easily mistake for toys

Toy guns

Shutterstock image

Utah gun-maker was recently pressured into discontinuing sales of its Block 19 kit, which made handguns look like they were built from Lego blocks.

A Utah gun-maker was recently pressured into discontinuing sales of its Block 19 kit, which made handguns look like they were built from Lego blocks. Credit viral news coverage and a cease-and-desist letter from Lego for that.

But products that make guns look toylike can still be purchased legally, as can guns that could easily be mistaken for toys. Several companies make vinyl wraps for firearms with a range of colors and graphics, and gun manufacturers offer a range of weapons with brightly colored grips and other components. These weapons are typically marketed for use by women or children.

A country with an out-of-control gun glut and far too many elected leaders who reject any reasonable gun safety legislation has given way to companies that operate with the mindset of the Block 19-maker. As the company put it in a statement, gun owners should “have the right to customize their property to make it look like whatever they want.”

Not so fast. To protect public safety, we as a society place reasonable limits and regulations on how individuals can customize their belongings and their property. It’s partly why we have building codes, for instance — to prevent property owners from customizing their properties in ways that make them dangerous to the occupants or surrounding properties.

For the same reason, we should bar companies from selling weapons or products that smudge the line between deadly weapon and harmless toy. Doing so only escalates a public health risk in a country where far too many children are killed or injured in unintentional shootings by themselves or other kids.

This is a growing problem, according to a recent study by the advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety. The organization reported that 314 unintentional shootings by children occurred between March and December of 2020, leading to 128 deaths and 199 nonfatal injuries. Those shootings were up 31% over the same period a year earlier. The likely cause for the increase: Pandemic-related school closures left children at home with more time on their hands and, in turn, more chance of getting bored, poking around for something to do and coming across an unsecured firearm.

Of course, not all of the guns involved in accidental shootings by children had toylike design elements.

But even if very few of them were, a responsible nation would do something about it. A logical starting place is to stop the sale of weapons with designer colors and graphics.

We’ve taken similar steps with other products. Cigarette companies and liquor manufacturers can’t market their products using cartoon characters, for example, and cigarettes can’t be sold in flavors that appeal to children, like strawberry or chocolate. Why? Because we’ve decided as a society that it’s important to shield kids from the health risks of smoking and drinking.

So why on Earth would we allow the sale of a gun that literally looks like a kid could have put it together out of a pile of blocks? Why allow the sale of a gun that has any toylike look about it?

There’s a danger on the flipside of this matter as well — nonlethal guns that are styled to look like firearms. Shootings have occurred when toy guns, or guns that fire BBs or soft pellets, are mistaken for firearms.

Gun-rights zealots will undoubtedly say that unintentional shootings by children aren’t a matter of the gun, but rather a failure of parents to keep firearms securely stored and educate kids about the dangers of weapons.

In an ideal world, that might work. And speaking of which, here’s a thumbs-up to the Clark County School District for its plan to send gun-safety information home with children this year, including a plea to parents to lock up any weapons in their homes. That’s a responsible action by CCSD.

But the sad reality is that not all gun owners are diligent about securing weapons, and even gun owners with good intentions make mistakes and leave guns where kids can find them.

Allowing the sale of products like the Block 19 only makes it more likely that children will pick up and use a real weapon thinking it’s a plaything.