Ohio lawmaker seeks to ban fake guns

Hot Air – by Jazz Shaw

There really are no words.

Newly introduced legislation in the Ohio House would prohibit the manufacture, sale, or public display of toy guns designed to look like the real thing.

Under House Bill 119, authored by Democratic state Rep. Bill Patmon of Cleveland, the ban would apply to any BB gun or gun replica that a “reasonable person” would confuse with a real firearm.

Those who make, sell, or publicly brandish imitation guns could face up to 180 days in jail and a $1,000 fine…

“It’s either a gun or it’s not,” Patmon said in an interview. “This idea of imitations has gone a bit far, especially in this day and age. … This is a bill that if it saves one child or one adult, then I think it’s done its job.”

There you have it. There is no longer any need for parody or satire in the United States. We have a proposal on the table from a legislator to ban toy guns. This type of knee-jerk reaction isn’t totally unexpected, though. Patmon is pushing the bill in response to the case of Tamir Rice, a 12 year old who was shot after police were alerted to someone pointing a gun at passing cars. (It turned out to be a toy.) There have been a small number of other cases where people holding toy weapons were shot by police. Lawmakers always seem to find a way to use any tragedy as an excuse to regulate. A quick look at the raft of laws imposed across the nation after Sandy Hook will provide plenty of examples.

But in those cases, misguided as they were, the lawmakers were at least talking about restricting access to actual guns. Now we’re seriously going to have a discussion about banning toys? Paula Bolyard, writing at PJ Media, speaks up as a parent who finds the proposal misguided.

Our kids had air-soft guns when they were teenagers; they were allowed to have them only after being taught about their safe use. That included stern lectures about not waving them around in public and even sterner lectures about how to transport the guns in their cars — how to react safely if they were ever pulled over by police.

How about instead of banning the imitation guns for everyone, we just try some parenting?

Parenting? What a quaint notion. Sadly, it’s long since gone out of style, and we must entrust teachers unions and liberal lawmakers with the raising of children.

Just in case you were worried that this might impact the moves and television programs that the children in question view, fear not. Patmon’s legislation would provide exceptions for toy guns which are used for entertainment purposes, “including any motion picture, video, television, or stage production.”

Well, then… I guessed we’ve just about solved the problem.

http://hotair.com/archives/2015/03/21/ohio-lawmaker-seeks-to-ban-fake-guns/