Some habits we can't decide if we should break

Twelve year old Tamir Rice was shot and killed by a white police officer while he was carrying a replica toy gun in the park. The officer shot him literally seconds after arriving on the scene.

17 year old Trayvon Martin was killed by an armed man who was convinced that this child was suspicious simply for walking down the street with his hoodie on.

Our family plan has always been to limit the amount of hoodies my boys own and after they get to a certain age, to stop buying them for them altogether. If you don't know of the historic and repeated negative association between hoodie sweaters and Black boys and men in the United States then you are welcomed to apprise yourself.

Our family policy has also always been to not allow the use of toy guns, or any toy behaving like a gun. Once our children are adults, if they choose to become gun owners, they were welcomed to do so after proper training and licensing, but they were never going to associate guns with play , which is also why we have certain gaming policies.

Our children also knew that they were not to play with other friends' toy guns either in public or indoors. It is too easy for Black children to be denied their appearance of innocence in the US (I am sure the same can be said for other parts of the world).

This past weekend, Kai had a wonderful

birthday party. Most of the children in his class attended as well as some children of friends of ours who weren't in his class but whom he'd played with multiple times before. Kai was so happy opening up all of his presents and he did a good job of thanking each child. When he opened a gift bag and pulled out what was pictured above, him and his siblings looked at us and I could see the knowing look on their faces like "well we won't be playing with that". He thanked the child and put it off to the side. I signaled that we would talk about it later.

After the party, Randy and I stood in the kitchen with the kids, ready to repeat our usual plans to simply gift the toy gun to someone else but as we opened our mouths, we both shut them again.

We had gun and clothing policies designed to keep our multiracial children somewhat safer in a country where gun violence is rampant and Black children are being terrorized by those who are supposed to protect them.

While there is crime here in New Zealand, the issues are very different, and while we know that racism exists everywhere, we haven't had to worry about armed police coming with guns loaded (they are usually unarmed) to a park shooting at children, or being surrounded by large numbers of people causally walking around armed with the dangerous combination of guns and hate.

Randy and I had to really think about whether or not we were ready to let go of certain practices and habits.

Can our children play with a toy gun and be safe?

Can our children play with a toy just for fun without having to keep the gravity of mass shootings and their school shooting drills foremost in their minds?

Can our children play with a toy gun and not be desensitized to the danger of real guns? Can our children walk around, post puberty, in hoodies and not be seen as a menace or a threat?

The toy gun is sitting unopened in a corner. We haven't told Kai if he could play with it and he has not tried to. I still want there to be a healthy respect for anything that can be shot at another living thing. I still like my policy of no toy guns, but it was the deeper reasons behind our pause that intrigues me. Our environment has changed. We are still learning exactly how. It only makes sense that some of our habits will be able to change as well.