In recent commentaries, Tribune columnists Stephen Chapman and Eric Zorn have criticized our new study, “Joe Camel with Feathers,” which details how the National Rifle Association is following a trail blazed by the tobacco industry with its Eddie Eagle “gun safety” program. So why is Eddie Eagle a Joe Camel with feathers?
Like Joe Camel, Eddie Eagle is designed to put a friendly, “cool” face on a dangerous consumer product, never warning of the risks that guns present. By leaving out the safety risks and portraying guns as an “adult custom,” Eddie Eagle actually strengthens the appeal of guns as a marker of maturity and adulthood.
Effective public-safety warnings must warn of the risks: cigarettes cause cancer, alcohol can harm pregnant women, small parts on toys can choke children. Eddie Eagle is Smokey the Bear without the forest fire; he never tells what can happen if you disobey his alleged safety chant. Why? Because such an approach would run the risk of harming the NRA and the gun industry’s future customer base.
Like Joe Camel, Eddie Eagle is industry-funded. The funding source for Eddie Eagle is The NRA Foundation, which in a two-year period received hundreds of thousands of dollars from the gun industry as well as tens of thousands of dollars from the tobacco industry. As an article handed out as a promotional flier by The NRA Foundation succinctly put it: “The (NRA) Foundation is a mechanism by which the firearms industry can promote shooting sports education, cultivating the next generation of shooters. Translate that to future customers.” And contrary to NRA assertions, Eddie Eagle does appear where guns are sold and displayed, whether it’s at a Wal-Mart sporting goods section or at the NRA annual meeting with “the largest firearms exhibit in NRA’s history!”
Eddie Eagle places the onus of responsibility not on parents, but children; essentially, guns don’t kill, kids do. The predictable result of this misguided and dangerous approach was recently illustrated in Ocala, Fla., when two children, ages 6 and 10, were killed by a single bullet unintentionally fired from a handgun by their 17-year-old babysitter. The 17-year-old had completed an NRA hunter safety course within the past year. The two children had been through the Eddie Eagle program in their schools. Eddie Eagle is not a gun-safety mascot but a gun-industry predator. And America’s children are his prey.
