From Capital Journal Online

Published Sunday, August 05, 2007

A teenage boy was shot in the leg Saturday night after he and friends found a gun in the 1600 block of S.W. Clay, Topeka police said.

The children told police they were playing with the gun when it discharged, hitting a 14-year-old or 15-year-old boy.

You know the best way to stop this kind of thing from happening? It's not by restricting guns to law abiding citizens or making guns illegal (something that would do nothing to limit the number of guns just like the War on Drugs has done nothing to limit the amount of drugs on the street).

It's by teaching your children what to do when they find a gun.

You can be as anti-gun as you want, but it's up to you to teach your children what to do if they find a gun somewhere. Hell, my five year old can tell you exactly what to do

• Do not touch it
• Leave the room / area
• Go tell an adult

It's real simple. I mean, we teach our kids what to do when a stranger approaches with candy. We teach them to look both ways before crossing the street. We teach them to call 911 in case of an emergency. We admonish them if they play with sharp knives or tools. We tell them to stay away from drugs.

Teaching your children to avoid firearms is just as important, even if you don't like guns.

This is why it pisses me off to no end that GFW have a fit over the Eddie Eagle program. Just like telling your kids one time doesn't do the trick, you need to repeatedly hammer the point home.  When I get home from the range and start to clean my firearms, I have my daughter help - but only after she tells me the rules above correctly.

Help protect your children today. Let them know that guns aren't toys and that if they ever find one to leave it alone and go tell an adult. Keep repeating this to them until they know it by heart. Being aware of what to do when finding a gun is not the same as glorifying them and no matter how much you may hate them, your kids may run into one some day.

Wouldn't you prefer they know what to do?