By Nick Leghorn via The Truth About Guns
There’s a reason that we have museums. At least for me, history is much easier to understand and much more interesting if I can see (and even better, touch) some of the objects of the time period. That’s what got me into historical reenacting — that and the freely-flowing vodka. Hey, it was college.
Anyway, one school in Atlanta decided to take some of their kids on a field trip (with full parental approval and supervision) to see some historical artifacts, and now gun control activists are in full freak-out mode.
From WSB-TV:
Images of a first-grader and a second-grader handling firearms showed up on Facebook after the trip, which involved student from Holdheide Academy in Woodstock.
Willis contacted the school’s owner, Tammy Dorsten, who on Friday night defended the trip.
“This was a wonderful learning experience with a safety class before and after the guns were handled,” Dorsten said.
Dorsten told Willis the children have been learning about sharpshooter Annie Oakley and folk hero Davy Crockett.
That seems like a perfectly reasonable concept for a field trip. Kids are learning about Annie Oakley. What better way to foster an appreciation for how truly talented that woman was than to show them some of the firearms she used and guide them through what it takes to make those same shots?
Apparently that was more than some pearl-clutching anti-gunners could handle. WSB-TV was more than happy to oblige, calling the children “preschool” students when the article body clearly states that they were first and second grade students. A small distinction possibly, but it does show that the media was more than happy to bend the truth to make the story seem even more shocking.
To the school’s credit they later issued a statement on Facebook defending the field trip as the valuable education experience for their students that it is.
The problem is gun control activists see guns and kids and immediately assume and interaction between the two is dangerous and irresponsible. They take an “abstinence only” approach with guns. That doesn’t appear to be working very well, though. Teaching kids about guns — demystifying them as the tools they are and how to handle them responsibly — will mean more kids will be safe if and when they encounter them outside of a classroom setting.
The horror.
