Two grieving fathers of Sandy Hook victims seek new federal policies in an attempt to decrease violence involving guns in a special to The Washington Post.

Mark Barden and David Wheeler, who lost their sons Daniel, 7, and Benjamin, 6, in the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School, are speaking out for the first time on Father's Day to ask for the gift of protecting children from gun violence. Both Barden and Wheeler are involved with the organization Sandy Hook Promise -- Barden is advocacy director and Wheeler a volunteer.

Sandy Hook Promise hopes new legislation would create "safer places to live" through new gun technologies including electronic firing pins, biometrics and enhanced software systems, as well as changes to school technologies including shot and gun detection systems. Mental health is also a focus. But their main goal is moving "the conversation from 'gun control vs freedom' to 'a parent's love for their child.'"

Unfortunately, they are using the misleading statistics recently provided by Everytown for Gun Safety to bolster support. This list has been good for nothing other than to stir emotion out of understandably distressed parents.

They ask:

How is it that after our beautiful sons were murdered, along with 18 of their classmates and six brave adults, we have seen no major federal policy passed to address this problem? Why is it that we now see summer not as a time of celebration and vacation but as a relief from having to read about new school shootings because kids are no longer at school or on campus?

The plea continues:

This Father’s Day, we ask you to do one thing differently. Look at your children, your beautiful, growing, pesky children who bring you so much joy and sometimes cause you so much heartache, and ask yourself — really ask yourself — this: Am I doing everything I can to keep them safe? Because the answer to that question, if we all answer honestly, clearly is no.