NRA rewrites classic fairytales to feature guns

NEW YORK, March 25 (UPI) -- The National Rifle Association has rewritten a pair of classic children's stories for its NRA Family website to include guns.

The stories, which include "Little Red Riding Hood (Has a Gun)" and the more recent "Hansel and Gretel (Have Guns)", were written by blogger and children's author Amelia Hamilton.

An editor's note on the first installment in the series explains the premise, pointing out the grim and potentially unsettling nature of children's stories and questioning how the situations would be altered by a knowledge of firearms.

"Have you ever wondered what those same fairy tales might sound like if the hapless Red Riding Hoods, Hansels and Gretels had been taught about gun safety and how to use firearms?" the note asks.

Both alternate tellings of the well-known stories feature their young protagonists being taught about gun safety and entrusted with their own firearms at a young age. Little Red Riding Hood sets off to her grandmother's house with a rifle over her shoulder, and Gretel skillfully takes down a 10-point buck with a single shot.

The presence of firearms allows Hamilton's protagonists to avoid some of the troubles faced by their traditional counterparts, but outside of Hansel and Gretel's hunting trip they never actually fire their weapons.

One passage sees Little Red Riding Hood's grandmother avoid the jaws of the Big Bad Wolf by simply aiming her shotgun at him.

"Those big eyes looked down and saw that grandma had a scattergun aimed right at him," Hamilton wrote. "He realized that Grandmother hadn't been backing away from him; she had been moving towards her shotgun to protect herself and her home."

Both stories conclude with some kind of authority figure removing the antagonist as the protagonists use their guns to subdue the threat.