Teaching Kids That Guns Aren’t Toys

Farideh Kioumehr didn’t intend to devote her life to child safety, it just seemed to fall into her lap. And like an adult being cradled on the tiny legs of a child, her passion to end gun violence has become a weighty proposition that consumes her waking hours. It’s a burden she’s happy to carry.

“Try to imagine a world where there is no violence whatsoever,� the energetic mother of two said. “I know it’s very idealistic, but if parents and grandparents and teachers and politicians could come together and teach their children a peaceful message, the world would be a different place.�

Kioumehr says she won’t rest until her message that “guns are for killing and toys are for playing� has reached a culture saturated with violence. She believes the place to begin is with kids.

To that end, the Sherman Oaks epidemiologist, who heads the International Health and Epidemiology Research Center, founded the Anti-Violence Day Project two years ago, in which she visits schools and invites the children to turn in their toy guns.

In return for surrendering play guns and participating in the day’s events, the kids receive T-shirts and certificates acknowledging their help in the campaign to “help save lives.�

“The program is such a success,� said Robert Barner, head of the Los Angeles Unified School District’s Jordan/Locke Cluster, which lent financial support to a recent Anti-Violence Day event at the Watts Tower Art Center. “Dr. Kioumehr is a real visionary. We all benefit from her work.�

According to research by Kioumehr and studies conducted by organizations nationwide, the leading cause of injury and death for those younger than 18 is handgun violence.

The use of toy guns in the commission of crimes has also risen sharply, often with tragic results. A youth was shot twice by a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy in 1995, when he mistook the child’s $2 toy gun for a .22-caliber pistol.

“I want to teach kids, the younger the better, that toy guns are dangerous,� Kioumehr said. “Older kids need to hear that guns are used for one reason only: killing. Unfortunately, gun-related violence is increasing and getting younger all the time.�

Kioumehr’s upbringing was anything but violent. Born and educated in Iran, she received a degree in veterinary medicine before heading to the United States to earn a doctorate in public health, with a specialty in epidemiology.

She and her husband, physician Reza Dadsetan, returned to Iran in the late ‘70s to teach at a Tehran medical school, but fled the country a month after the revolution began.

The couple settled in Sherman Oaks with their two children in 1990. Five years later, after her 10-year-old son came home from a birthday party wielding a toy gun, she began her anti-violence campaign. She knew then she had found her cause.

Although Kioumehr’s civic contributions have been recognized with a number of accolades, including 1996 and 1997 Fernando Award nominations, funding for her nonprofit organization comes in fits and starts, mostly out of her own pocketbook. She vows to bring her message to the city’s children no matter what it takes.

“What I get out of this is the joy of helping people,� Kioumehr said. “If I can save just one life, that is my reward.�

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