"Go outside and play!" - Ranging Shots

Guns Magazine, Nov, 2003 by Clint Smith

Have you driven through any neighborhoods lately? It seems to me there is a shortage of kids playing outside. Remembering back to being a kid I recall one of Mom's standard responses, "Go outside and play." Fortunately, my mom was different than a lot of others as she actually got in the tree house with us and shrieked like a banshee in a Tarzan movie.

Playing, outdoors was fun as I recall, we played cowboys and Indians (can't do that anymore). Cops and robbers (can't do that anymore). And general horseplay in the big fields around the place we lived, to include climbing on railroad tracks and dropping bombs (rocks) from the elevated railroad trestles above the river crossings.

In general many of the kids of today seem to play "safely" indoors with the Playstation[R] black boxes doing Vice City[TM] level six, machine-gunning the police, stealing cars and otherwise hosing down of two or three city blocks with bullets.

Okay, no harm no foul, or is it?

Maybe if we keep our kids (in many cases medically documented to be overweight) indoors and allow the television and the video game console to be the resident "babysitter" we should not be surprised by their lack of interest in the outdoors, sports and firearms.

For most of you reading this, these observations would fall into the category of preaching to the choir. You already do something with your kids, but you also know a lot of people who don't. There will come a day when these non-participating video kids can vote, unfortunately without having had to take physical education classes in school. Because (of course), it might make them feel bad to be involved in sporting activities where they may "lose" a game which would crush their ego.

And all of these video demons that killed three million people in their "games" can't possibly serve in the armed forces or in any capacity that would make them understand and appreciate the freedoms we enjoy--which by the way we know were not free.

So, issue number one: What about the kids? Send them outside to play. Teach them how to read a compass and map, build a fire, run a fire extinguisher, change a tire, load a magazine and maybe shoot a firearm under parental supervision. Now there's a concept--parental supervision.

Issue number two: Mothers and Morns. In all candor I believe that women (who outnumber the men by the way), will decide the issue of civilian ownership of firearms in this country. The anti-gun million moms (who aren't a million) appeal to the emotional side of women with their argument of "guns kill our kids."

And my response is yes, of course they do. Many guns killed American kids in Iraq, Somalia, Vietnam and Tarawa. But at the same time, let's not forget kids killed by their patents, in bathtubs, by drunk drivers, choking ... hell, your kids were even killed while diplomats argued over the shape and seating arrangements of a peace talks table! Really want to get Mothers angry? Find out how many kids were killed playing high-school football over the last 10 years.

Mothers, you understand the language of emotion. Let's try this one on for size: Your kids and grandkids will grow up to be slaves in this country without the ability to use guns to defend themselves in their homes or in their own country.

I am told that things change. I recently found paperwork to show I successfully participated in the high school rifle team for my four-year tenure there. The high school had a range in the basement, where we shot and stored the real rifles and ammunition used in the school-sponsored rifle team program.

We never had any school shootings.

I guess things do change.

Take your family, your wife, husband, kids and grandkids to a National cemetery on Veterans Day. Point out to them that the people buried under these flags are why they can pretty much live where they want, travel freely, go to church, and even own a gun if they choose to.

Then take your stone group to the range and teach them to have guns in their homes safely and explain to them that it's okay for them to defend themselves.

Here's one thing that never changes. On each Memorial Day there are always more flags flying in the cemetery than there were the year before. I guess some of us are paying more interest on the loan of a "free country" than others.

So send your kids outside to play in our free country. And as a matter of fact, why don't you go outside play with them.