The US gun laws are failing its children.
In 2013 in South Carolina three-year-old Tmorej Smith was playing with his seven-year-old sister.
They were in a bedroom of their Greenville unit when the siblings stumbled upon a pink handgun.
Thinking it was a toy the two began playing with the gun until BANG! It went off and Tmorej Smith suffered a fatal gunshot wound to the head.
Police labelled the incident an accident – the toddler had pulled the trigger himself and no charges were laid.
While this story is horrifying it’s far from unique.
In 2013 American pre-schoolers who found guns left out in their homes killed more people than terrorists – the Boston bombings killed four people but by June of that same year there were 11 deaths in the US where the shooter was three to six years old.
According to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, as of 2012 thirty-one per cent of US households had at least one child and one gun kept in the home.
Those staggering stats have prompted one gun safety group to urge parents engage in common sense gun safety.
On its Facebook page gun safety group Evolve lobbies for what it calls the “third voice in the gun debate”.
On its website the group maintains it is neither pro-gun nor anti-gun, it is not aligned with any political party or organisation because whether you own a gun or choose not to “safety and reduction in gun violence are of paramount importance to both.”
But it’s a cry that often falls on deaf ears so the group has come up with a humours yet unsettling ad campaign with the slogan: “If they find it they’ll play with it.”
The organisation’s ads use sex toys, condoms and sanitary pads to remind parents that “children think that everything is a toy” and if there are guns in the house they should be kept well out of reach.
So what’s better, to have you kids die of embarrassment with a maxi-pad or by their own hand with a pistol?
We know what we would rather.
Gun safety organisation Evolve has one clear message for parents: “If they find it, they’ll play with it.”
Wouldn’t you rather kids die of embarrassment? Luckily tampons aren’t lethal.
Kids think that everything is a toy, don’t they?
While the ads are funny the chilling underlying message is clear: If they find it, they’ll play with it.
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