I should imagine that the 3rd -grader gun incident in Bremerton will create a whole new surge of interest in banning guns. However, guns are innocent tools, no different than a hammer or knife. They have no feelings of malice or desire to be violent. I was raised around guns –- they were everywhere.

Both my dad and brother were hunters, so there were at least eight rifles and two handguns around the house. None of them were locked up and many were loaded. The guns were regularly brought up onto the kitchen table for disassembly, cleaning and oiling (to my mother’s chagrin).
However, I never once handled any of them, without permission. I was taught to respect property that was not mine and to ask, if I wanted to look at something.

Although this incident in Bellingham was an accident, why did this child take something that was not his and put it in his backpack?

When I was twelve or so, my dad taught me gun safety and how to shoot a rifle. I was a bit of an Annie Oakley, which gave him hopes that I’d join him and my brother on hunting trips –- not a chance, I love animals.

However, I do believe in the 2nd Amendment and our right to protect ourselves, our loved ones and our property. The police can’t be everywhere and not every intruder just wants to take a few of our possessions -– some want to take our lives. We need to be able to defend ourselves, and a bat or knife is no contender against an intruder’s gun.

The world is a different place, from when I was a kid. We not only respected authority, we obeyed. We also didn’t have these horrid video games that desensitize our kids, today. Shooting, knifing and bludgeoning an opponent and watching their blood squirt across the screen is a part of winning. Some of the movies are just as bad or worse, and there are parents that allow their children to watch these mind and emotion altering videos.

Combine that with the anger and hurt that children feel, due to divorce, being born out of wedlock and unwanted, parents being too busy and shuffling their kids off to daycare and you have the recipe for disaster. We’ve all seen the results.

I have volunteered in the local prisons and jails for 15 years. I hear the inmate’s stories of heartache, rejection, feelings of abandonment and the anger or frustration that caused them to go down the wrong path. I don’t speak from ignorance.

Guns are no different than they were when I was a kid. It’s our society that has changed.

Lee Ryan
Des Moines