Police seize klingon weaponry in raid

[Darth Wong]

So they're going to arrest every non-cripple out on the streets? The human body itself is quite a lethal weapon when you get down to it.

A knife is a tool. Not a weapon. A tool. It can be used for violent purposes, but so can hammers (as I well know), screwdrivers, bats, sticks, and paint cans. It is quite easy to kill someone with your bare hands in the right situation. This ban serves no purpose at all.

Oh, and why hand in the bat'leth? I assume the guy wasn't planning on carrying it around, so what's the point?

Tell me, how much of this thread did you read before posting that knee-jerk knock-off?

[Coyote]

What is the cause and effect being advocated here?

The cause and effect seems to be "Plekhanov says that weapons tend to result in escalation of violence, Coyote interprets that as weapons making people turn to crime." Those are two different concepts, moron.

Is not an escalation of violence an escalation of crime? At least the type of violence being discussed here?

You do not need violent intent at the beginning of the evening in order for an altercation later in that evening to escalate much more severely due to the presence of a weapon, fool. I've made this point very clearly, and you are obviously ignoring it.

No, I am saying that it is also possible that violence could escalate even if there were no weapons within a hundred miles of the altercation. Now it really does seem to me that you're advocating the point of view that the prescence of a weapon will increase the level of violence beyond what might have occurred were the weapon not there. Am I misinterpreting your statement?

Nor do you need violent intent in order to panic and shoot somebody in some misguided attempt at self-defense or vigilante justice. Glocksman once admitted that he actually started pulling his gun out of his holster and was about to shoot a couple of punks playing paintball with each other on the street once because he thought they were packing authentic heat, remember?

This is true, and I don't believe that I tried to argue the contrary.

What's this "hair-trigger" horseshit? You made a strawman distortion (and don't give me that "sarcastic" bullshit; you're defending it when challenged so it's obviously not sarcastic and you're a fucking liar).

What I "defended" my intent when I wrote it, which to be a sarcastic asshole; due to the subject later in my post where it appeared that someone might be advocating "weapon owner = criminal" the comment was relevent even though it was not supposed to be taken as seriously as you have. I'll admit it was asinine flamebait; I went too far. So, was I being a dick? Yes. Am I lying about what I was trying to do? No. DW, I am truly sorry if you though that was the case, but it was not. You'll just have to take my word for it that my intent was to be an asshole, not lie to you about it. Making a poor presentation does not automatically make me Darkstar, so hyper down. Please.

It also has to do with the role of weapons in society; as I mentioned in my post and as others have also picked up, this is more than just some mugger in an alley. Some feel that weapons have a place in civilian hands as a means to deter government tyranny and they feel that it is a valid and realistic point of view; other think that is farcical thinking at best.

Well, we all know how private Iraqi gun ownership kept Iraq a safe and secure society during Saddam's reign and continued to do so now

Now who's fucking strawmanning? I said "some believe that weapons will deter tyranny, some believe it will not." Your comment about Iraq (and earlier, Somalia) goes to show that weapons in private hands are also not the sole answer to deter crime... But, again-- I never said that was the case. The problem is the level of violence in those societies, and if that violence is accepted as a legimiate means of dealing with problems. I ask you-- do you think if the guns in Iraq or Somalia, or the machetes used in Rwanda or Western Africa were magically confiscated overnight, that the violence would stop? Of course not; this was addressed earlier.

You obviously can't eradicate violent crime by taking away the weapons. Care to explain why this means that the idea of gun control must be wrong?

Because of two reasons: It wastes law enforcement resources criminalizing an entire portion oif the population that has done nothing wrong. The amount of money, time, and bureacracy tied up in weapons control diverts police power from actual criminal occurances. It also puts the onus of responsibility for the violent acts in the weapon; rather than the the wielder.

Tell me, do harsh prison sentences for murderers make murder go away? No? Well, I guess that means that by your logic, we should eliminate them, since you seem to think the only conceivable justification for a law pertaining to violent crime is that it successfully eliminate violent crime.

Again, a distortion. Murder is clearly a crime; whereas simply owning or carrying a weapon is not. The two are not comperable. My whole point to this is that there are some people out there that believe that the simple prescence of weapons should be criminalized. And I believe that we see how fallacious this is in the UK. When knives are outlawed, and crime continues, what will be banned next? They are blaming the thing and hoping that by removing these "evil talismans" they will remove the rot.

The problem being violence in society, what does any "weapon control" do to address the problems that fester crimes? It does not address lack of education, opportunity, jobs, or more esoteric things like confidence in laws or a sense of worth in the social order. It is a wasteful, feel-good measure that does nothing to deter the real problems. There are cities, states, and countries where weapons ownership of all types is quite high, yet they do not suffer the same crime problems.

Weapon ownership or weapon control is not the situation, but how the society in question deals with all sorts of underlying situations. By the time the argument gets to weapon control or ownership, the problem has already been allowed to get out of control-- it should have been handled long before.

Now, this is a repeating pattern that has demonstratedly failed to address the underlying problem of social violence.

The same could be said of prison sentences. So what?

If nothing else, a prison sentence does take a proven dangerous person and keep them out of circulation for awhile. The fact they spend their incarceration in a violent breeding pen for further criminal knowledge is the subject of another thread entirely.

[Darth Wong]

Is not an escalation of violence an escalation of crime? At least the type of violence being discussed here?

It doesn't mean you're turning into a criminal. It could mean that you think you're defending yourself, as Glocksman almost did to those teen punk idiots.

No, I am saying that it is also possible that violence could escalate even if there were no weapons within a hundred miles of the altercation. Now it really does seem to me that you're advocating the point of view that the prescence of a weapon will increase the level of violence beyond what might have occurred were the weapon not there. Am I misinterpreting your statement?

Not now. You were before, when you claimed that I was saying weapons turned people into criminals. That's not what I'm saying; I'm saying weapons tend to escalate the level of violence. You can't seriously believe that two guys who look like they want to brawl and two guys pointing guns at each other strike you as situations of equal danger.

It is quite possible to kill someone in a completely legal fashion with a weapon because you panicked, he was on your property, etc. even though he was no threat to you. In this case, a human life has been lost that didn't need to be, but you're not a criminal, nor are you a murderer. But if you weren't toting the gun around, and didn't panic and shoot some kid jumping your fence, there would be one less death, wouldn't there?

Nor do you need violent intent in order to panic and shoot somebody in some misguided attempt at self-defense or vigilante justice. Glocksman once admitted that he actually started pulling his gun out of his holster and was about to shoot a couple of punks playing paintball with each other on the street once because he thought they were packing authentic heat, remember?

This is true, and I don't believe that I tried to argue the contrary.

What's this "hair-trigger" horseshit? You made a strawman distortion (and don't give me that "sarcastic" bullshit; you're defending it when challenged so it's obviously not sarcastic and you're a fucking liar).

What I "defended" my intent when I wrote it, which to be a sarcastic asshole; due to the subject later in my post where it appeared that someone might be advocating "weapon owner = criminal" the comment was relevent even though it was not supposed to be taken as seriously as you have. I'll admit it was asinine flamebait; I went too far. So, was I being a dick? Yes. Am I lying about what I was trying to do? No. DW, I am truly sorry if you though that was the case, but it was not. You'll just have to take my word for it that my intent was to be an asshole, not lie to you about it. Making a poor presentation does not automatically make me Darkstar, so hyper down. Please.

Is there some reason you couldn't have said this in the first place instead of ranting that I'm such a terrible person for going off at you for posting strawman flamebait?

It also has to do with the role of weapons in society; as I mentioned in my post and as others have also picked up, this is more than just some mugger in an alley. Some feel that weapons have a place in civilian hands as a means to deter government tyranny and they feel that it is a valid and realistic point of view; other think that is farcical thinking at best.

Well, we all know how private Iraqi gun ownership kept Iraq a safe and secure society during Saddam's reign and continued to do so now

Now who's fucking strawmanning?

I'm attacking the people who advocate that argument; I understand that you are not one of them, but you are talking about them.

You obviously can't eradicate violent crime by taking away the weapons. Care to explain why this means that the idea of gun control must be wrong?

Because of two reasons: It wastes law enforcement resources criminalizing an entire portion oif the population that has done nothing wrong.

Not according to an exclusively rights-based ethics system. From a utilitarian system however, if it could be shown that social harm is mitigated in some way by this policy, then the policy would be a good idea and resistance to the policy would be harmful.

The amount of money, time, and bureacracy tied up in weapons control diverts police power from actual criminal occurances.

And how much time, money, and bureaucracy is that?

It also puts the onus of responsibility for the violent acts in the weapon; rather than the the wielder.

That's like saying that criminalizing the act of driving a car without a license "puts the onus of responsibility in the car, rather than the driver".

Again, a distortion. Murder is clearly a crime; whereas simply owning or carrying a weapon is not. The two are not comperable.

Thoroughly irrelevant to the argument, where you were saying that the failure of gun control to eradicate murder means that it was a waste of time and I was showing how that same logic could be applied to prison sentences for murder. If you want to create a new argument, feel free but don't try to weasel out of taking responsibility for a bad one by changing the subject.

They are blaming the thing and hoping that by removing these "evil talismans" they will remove the rot.

What a load of bullshit; it's not about putting moral blame on an inanimate object; it's about recognizing that humans are stupid, irrational creatures and should not be trusted with weapons by default, at least not without some kind of licensing scheme.

The problem being violence in society, what does any "weapon control" do to address the problems that fester crimes?

You honestly don't realize that this is a red-herring, do you?

[General Brock]

... This just means that the biker gangs didn't have access to them before the restrictions. If they did, do you think they'd have honestly given them up? And even besides that, there's still the proof in your post itself of that if their access to one sort of weapon is restricted, they'll just use another.

Actually bikers have been busted with heavy machine guns and the Oka Mohawks who ran a blockade by their reserve in Quebec allegedly had some heavy weapons. Criminals might use them amongst themselves, a discrete distance from witnesses. Or, they are just there for bragging rights. They aren't seen on the street where they can harm innocent bystanders. Canada only bans switchblades and gravity knives. If they are used, its not advertised any more than the machine guns.

Oh, I'll readily concede people do stupid things when not thinking clearly, but that doesn't mean that a privilege or right should be taken away from everyone else just because it gets abused by a few.

Hell, look at cars. They're arguably worse to society than knives. Accidents claim thousands of lives every year, they produce pollution, funnel money into the hands of corrupt corporations, and are often used in crimes themselves (ramming or getaway vehicles). But yet you don't see people advocating for their banning do you? (at least, not any sane people)

Of course, one might argue that cars are a large part of society while weapons are not, but people could get along just fine without them. Expanded and free public transport for example.

Or what about fast food? It cuts the lifespans of a lot of people due to health risks, raises insurance costs because of the problems associated with it, and other assorted problems.

Don't even get me started on alchohol.

But yet knives (I'll ignore guns for the purpose of this argument, last thing we need is to open another debate front) should be restricted, because people might get mad and stab someone else. Nevermind that in a bar for example, a person looking to do serious injurty to another has a choice of things to use. A pool stick as a blunt spear (using the pointy end) or club (using the thick end), a pool ball (bash their face in ala Boondock Saints), or a beer bottle used as a club or broken and used to stab them in the face or gut.

Hell, looking around the room I'm in right now, I can bring up an entire list of things I could use in a fight.

I could attempt to strangle someone with some headphone cords, hit them with a webcam, break a glass and stab them, toss a laptop at them, stab them with a pen or pencil, stab them with a letter opener, beat them with either of two lamps, or any of three seperate speakers, or even a folding table that weighs about 15 lbs.

The point is, anyone intent to harm another will find a way to do it if they put their mind to it, and the problem itself is them not whatever they use to inflict that harm.

The fact that you have to think about it is probably part of the law's intent. Yes, you could stab someone with a pencil or bash him with a laptop and carry on like Jackie Chan... but is it worth it? I mean, in half your examples, you're wrecking your stuff. A car, like a pencil or laptop, is not designed or intended as a weapon, but some knives and certainly firearms need little creativity to be effective.

That said, it is a little strange that there is knife hysteria just when Blair's popularity rating is in the dumpster and there are other policies of his that need debating.

As long as its not too hard to get one by citizens who prove themselves responsible and mature, it's not a bad idea, but actually restricting the ownership of something just because its abused by a number of people is just ridiculous.

Well, in Canada, therefore I would guess Britian, weapons ownership, or at least gun ownership, is a privilege. The governments can withdraw it or regulate it as they please as it is not a constitutional right or seen as a private property right.

Since there have been amnestys before, and there is still a problem now, obviously they need a better thought out program than media hype and hysteria to justify arbitrary government measures. If anything, it will become a mark of status for criminals and wannabes to carry and use knives, exacerbating the problem, while being a law abiding citizen becomes something second-class. Anyone with access to metal and simple machining equipment can make a cheap knife, and a criminal can easily ditch a weapon. A permit system would sort out law-abiding people who can be legally trusted with a knife more effectively than sweeping bans, and it would remind permit holders of the privilege and responsibility they have. The criminals would continue doing what they have been doing.

As for responsible and mature... this thread led off with a sharpened bat'leth... capable of removing the head of the weilder more so than anyone else.

[General Brock]

Interesting; this debate has been going on for a while in the UK:

16 December 2004

Knife culture? Cut the crap
There is little evidence for a 'rising tide of knife crime' in Britain.
by Brendan O'Neill

Is Britain in the grip of a 'knife culture'? According to the Home Office, the Department for Education and Skills, the Association of Chief Police Officers and just about every front page of every newspaper, it is.

The police speak of a rising tide of knife crime, where everyone from misguided schoolkids to inner-city hoods are apparently arming themselves with flick knives, pen knives, machetes and swords. The last thing David Blunkett did before stepping down as home secretary was to propose new measures to 'tackle knife crime', including banning under-18s from buying them and allowing headteachers to frisk pupils for anything with a sharp edge (in the event, however, Blunkett failed to turn up to yesterday's launch of the 'fight against knives', instead leaving it to his junior Home Office minister Caroline Flint). In effect, as one report put it, the government has decided to 'wage war on knives' (1).

It started with dire warnings from the cops. In November, London's Metropolitan Police expressed 'fears' about a worsening knife problem in the capital (2). The Met had already unveiled Operation Blunt, a campaign against the menace of knives, which included trialling a metal detector at Hammersmith bus station in west London in an attempt to catch out knife-carriers. Also in November, following claims that more children are bringing knives into school, then education secretary (now new home secretary) Charles Clarke said airport-style X-ray machines might be introduced in schools too, if he thought it was 'the only way to tackle knife-carrying' (3).

In December, the relatives of stabbing victims - including the parents of 14-year-old schoolboy Luke Walmsley, who was murdered in a school corridor in January 2003 - launched a campaign called 'Knives Destroy Lives'. They called on the government to introduce a five-year minimum jail term for carrying an object with a blade longer than three inches, and a six-month minimum jail term for carrying a blade shorter than three inches. They also warned, according to the Independent, that there could be 'civil unrest' if the government didn't do more to tackle the problem of knives (4).

It didn't take the government long to get involved. Blunkett announced a raft of proposals to tackle knife crime (even though he admits that 'the number of incidents involving knives remains low, [but] I share the concern of the public about this issue'). The Metropolitan Police and others are organising a conference to cast a 'Spotlight on Knife Culture in the UK', because 'the time has undoubtedly come for the government, law enforcement agencies, schools and social services throughout the UK to come together and formulate strategies to reduce knife violence and prevent further tragedies from occurring.' (5)

Eventually even prime minister Tony Blair expressed concern about Britain's 'knife problem', telling ITV1's This Morning that: 'You now get a mandatory five-year sentence if you carry a gun. And I think some of these people are switching to knives, which is why we are now looking at how do you make that tougher.' (6)

What's going on? How did knives become the biggest issue in British politics? There have been various knife panics over the past 10 years - but now, in the space of six weeks, knives seem to have been fully transformed from everyday objects that we use at home and work into evil things, leaving a trail of destruction in their wake and potentially threatening civil unrest. Yet the evidence for a 'rising tide' of knife crime is thin indeed. The anti-knife campaign, it seems, has little to do with fighting crime, and much more to do with launching a moral crusade against something, anything, that can make the authorities feel useful and perhaps even a little virtuous.

Apparently, a ‘knife offence’ doesn’t necessarily involve the actual use of a knife

When it comes to the facts and stats of knife crime, the authorities can't seem to keep their story straight. The furore over the so-called knife culture was triggered by London's Metropolitan Police at the end of November. The London Evening Standard reported the police's concerns about the knife culture 'spreading in London', claiming that '361 incidents involving knives' are recorded every week in the city, representing a rise of 13 per cent from last year (7).

Yet a Met spokesperson tells me that, 'There has been little fluctuation in the number of offences involving knives over the past three years'. In the year April 2001 to March 2002, there were 18,854 offences involving knives in London, accounting for 1.78 per cent of all reported crime. From April 2002 to March 2003, there were 19,107 offences involving knives, 1.77 per cent of all reported crime. The latest figures, covering the 10 months from April 2003 to January 2004, show that there were 17,362 offences involving knives, 1.96 per cent of reported crime.

So where did that claim in November come from, of 361 knife offences taking place every week in London representing a 13 per cent rise on last year? 'I don't know where it's from', says the spokesperson. If one does the sums, it seems that, if there are 361 offences involving a knife in London each week, that is actually little different from previous years. The 2001/2002 figure of 18,854 offences involving knives works out at 362 offences a week; the 2002/2003 figure of 19,107 translates into 367 a week. So 361 seems fairly ordinary, rather than evidence of a 'spreading knife culture', or even a 13 per cent rise.

What's more, the Met's category of knife offences apparently covers everything from cars being scratched with a knife to assault and murder with a knife. Even more strikingly, for all the headlines and handwringing about knife-assisted robberies and murders, it turns out that a 'knife offence' does not necessarily involve the use of a knife. According to the Met spokesperson, the Met's stats on knife crime include 'all offences where a knife has featured in some way'. 'Many of the offences…do not involve the actual use of a knife. [It] includes offences where a knife has been discovered by police during the investigation of another offence - for example, a knife discovered on a person arrested for shoplifting'. So stealing from a shop can become a 'knife crime' if the shoplifter had a knife somewhere on his person but didn't use it.

Is a breakdown of these 'knife' offences available, to show how many are minor, how many are major, and how many involved the 'actual use of a knife'? Apparently not. We do know, however, that of the 18,854 knife offences in London in 2001/2002, 70 were homicides, and of the 19,107 knife offences in 2002/2003, 67 were homicides. In both years, the other 18,000-odd offences cover everything from car-scratching to threatening behaviour to assault to offences not actually involving the use of a knife but where a knife was later discovered.

The Home Office, which compiles crime stats for all of Britain, not just London, likewise seems to make conflicting statements. In the year 2002/2003, a total of 1,007 homicides were recorded across all of the UK (this is higher than most years because the 172 victims of Dr Harold Shipman, Britain's first serial killer GP, were added, although they were murdered at various times over the past 20 years). In November 2004, according to one report, Home Office minister Hazel Blears claimed that of these 1,007 victims, 272 were killed in knife attacks. But a Home Office spokesman tells me it is misleading to refer to these as knife murders; they are categorised under 'homicide by a sharp instrument', which includes not just knives but 'broken bottles and glasses'. Perhaps the government should consider banning bottles as well as blades.

In a population of 60million, 272 killings with a sharp instrument a year seems a fairly low figure. Of course we'd all like it to be lower still, but will metal detectors in bus stations, more stop-and-search laws and the regular frisking of schoolkids do anything to tackle knife killings? Those suggesting such measures overlook one fact: at least as many murders, and usually more, take place in domestic settings as they do on dodgy street corners.

The logical conclusion is to ban knives from the home
Of the 1,007 murders by all methods in the UK in 2002/2003, 410 took place in a domestic setting, between family members, friends or acquaintances, compared with 414 listed as 'stranger' murders - and it should be remembered that in 2002/2003, the stranger category included, as usual, murders where the relationship between the perpetrator and victim was unknown and, unusually, Shipman's 172 victims, where the relationship was classified as a 'commercial, business or professional relationship, where the suspect killed a customer or client in the course of carrying out their occupation', which also falls under the 'stranger' heading. In most years, there are more family or acquaintance murders than stranger murders .

And according to one Home Office report, which analyses the Scottish experience, around 60 per cent of murders with a sharp instrument take place indoors, usually in a domestic setting. The logical conclusion, then, if restricting access to knives is seriously seen as a means of reducing the murder rate, is to make all of us empty out our kitchen draws and ban knives from the home.

In other parts of Britain, the apparent rise in knife crime is itself the result of the authorities' obsession with knives. At the end of November the Scotsman reported that 'Knife crime soars by 50 per cent in four years'. The paper said: 'The number of people caught carrying knives and other deadly weapons in Edinburgh has risen by 50 per cent, shocking new figures today revealed…. A total of 430 crimes involving possession of weapons were recorded last year, compared to 283 in 1999 - an increase of 51.9 per cent' (9).

But there seems a simple explanation for this: Scottish police have prioritised searching the general public for knives, above just about anything else. As a spokesman for Lothian and Borders Police said, the 50 per cent rise is the result of the police being more 'proactive'; for example, they have 'extensively used stop-and-search powers' on the streets of Edinburgh and elsewhere in their war on knives (10). They went looking for knives, and they found them. Surely, this is less evidence of 'soaring knife crime' than of a soaring obsession with knife crime. It also suggests that talk of a knife culture can become a self-fulfilling prophecy - the more knives are seen as a great evil, the more the police look for them, and the more the police find them, the more we are told we face a great evil. We will no doubt see a similar effect in London when the Met rolls out Operation Blunt to cover all boroughs.

What of the claims that more schoolchildren are carrying knives? Here, too, reports have been heavy on hysteria and light on evidence. Media reports have quoted from two surveys - last year's Youth Survey 2003, conducted by the polling company Mori for the Youth Justice Board, and this year's Youth Survey 2004, again conducted by Mori for the Youth Justice Board. Both surveys have been quoted out of context to paint an unrealistic picture of flick knife-wielding schoolkids.

The first thing to note is that the Youth Survey is just that - a survey of young people's experiences, where around 5,000 school pupils aged between 11 and 16 self-complete questionnaires on their experiences and perceptions of crime. So it needs to be read with the usual rider that young teenagers, for various reasons, don't always tell the whole truth and nothing but.

Despite the fact that the Youth Survey 2004 was published in July, some have chosen to quote from last year's survey - perhaps because its figures for the number of schoolchildren who claim to have carried a weapon appear that bit higher. The London Evening Standard reported that, 'A Mori survey last year found that 29 per cent of secondary schoolchildren admitted having carried a knife' (11). Guardian columnist David Aaronovitch repeated these claims on 13 December, writing that 'in a Mori survey for the Youth Justice Board, 29 per cent of 11- to 16-year-old school pupils admitted to having carried a knife - a figure that rose to 62 per cent of pupils excluded from school' (12).

A Mori pollster tells me their figures have been ‘dramatically taken out of context’
In fact, that part of the 2003 survey is not of secondary schoolchildren in general but of secondary schoolchildren who claim to have committed an offence. The survey interviewed a total of 5,549 school-attending and excluded pupils, 1,692 of whom claimed to have committed an offence. And of these 1,692, when asked 'What offences have you committed in the last year?', 29 per cent of school-attending pupils and 62 per cent of excluded pupils said 'carried a knife'. Yet this response of a sample of schoolkids who claim to have committed an offence has been transformed by some into a snapshot of the knife-carrying habits of all schoolkids everywhere.

The reporting of this year's Youth Survey has been equally dubious. The Daily Mirror claimed that 'a Mori poll has revealed that 28 per cent of 11- to 16-year-olds carry knives'; the paper claimed that some 'arm themselves with penknives' while others 'admitted they had flick knives' (13). Yet one of the Mori pollsters who was involved in checking and signing off this year's Youth Survey for the Youth Justice Board tells me that the press coverage has been 'massively misleading'.

In a section titled 'Possession of potential weapons' (note the use of the word 'potential'), it is true that 28 per cent of young people in schools said they had carried some kind of knife 'in the last year'. But 25 per cent of these young people said they had carried a penknife, a fairly harmless device which has been beloved of schoolboys in particular for generations. The Mori pollster tells me the figures have been 'dramatically taken out of context': 'It doesn't mean they are walking around with a knife everyday, it might only have been once. And the vast majority are penknives! They might be going whittling for all we know.' As the Youth Survey itself stated, in a passage that funnily enough was not quoted amidst all the claims of school pupils 'arming' themselves with penknives: 't should be noted that a large proportion of the knives being carried by young people…are penknives, which are, of course, used for a wide variety of innocent purposes.' (14)

Knife culture? What knife culture? The Met can't seem to make its mind up over whether there has been 'no fluctuation' in knife crime in the past three years, or a steep rise. Scottish and other police forces are finding more knives largely because they have made it their job to find more knives. And while there may be isolated incidents of violence, schoolchildren are not, whatever the headlines might say, turning up to class armed with machetes and bad intentions.

Today's anti-knife frenzy is bizarre. Ask yourself - why knives? Why not fists and feet, which have been known to cause serious injury and even murder if used inappropriately (in 2002/2003, 160 people were murdered through 'Hitting, kicking, etc')? Why not 'blunt objects', which were used in 47 murders in 2002/2003? Why not newspapers, which as every football hooligan knows can be folded up to form the 'Millwall brick', hard-edged enough to smash anybody's face in? Or ropes and scarves (there were 68 murders by strangulation in 2002/2003)?

There is little logic to the war on knives, because it has little to do with knives themselves. Rather, this looks like another attempt by the authorities to attach themselves to a cause in a desperate bid to appear caring and right-minded. In the absence of any political vision, or much of a political programme, the government is a sucker for moral crusades, where everything can be reduced to a simple clash between good (those who express concern about knives) and evil (knives). That's one reason why the campaign snowballed so quickly, from the Met's comments in November to the launch of the victims' families campaign in December to Blunkett, Blair and Clarke getting involved; government officials always on the lookout for seemingly simple moral issues were not about to let a campaign against evil knives pass them by.

And if it meant putting a dagger in the heart of rational debate about crime and society, so be it.

Spiked Liberties Link

[Broomstick]

Gee, Wong, think you could possibly find a more provacative image to throw into this thread?

It doesn't matter how "provocative" it is; it only matters that you presented an unverifiable personal anecdote as proof that knife-armed assailants aren't that dangerous, and I simply decided to post a rather well-known incident where they were.

The perpatrators of 9/11 were quite different than your average mugger/thug. They spent years training to pull off that crime, and if they had not had access to knives they are exactly the sort of people who would have utilized an alternative weapon. Banning knives would not have stopped 9/11. They would have used other means to obtain the real weapon of the day, a poor man's cruise missle.

Banning box-cutters because of 9/11 would be to punish the legtimate users of a tool for the crime someone else committed. By that argument we should also ban passenger jets.

Honestly, Mike, I sometimes think you post pictures like that for the sole purpose of pissing people off to the point of losing their logical cool, giving you an opening with which to attack them.

As I mentioned, I have been threatened by someone with a knife. Perhaps it is significant that I stopped carrying weaponry around some considerable time before that and disarmed my attacker in both cases without having or needing a weapon on me at the time.

Well goody for you. Would you like a medal? How does this change anything?

As a practical matter, it doesn't change anything.

No, I don't want a medal. I want a past where it was never necessary for me to learn how to fight. That is, however, a very unrealistic request.

The point is, I have twice overcome an attacker in a situation where he was armed and I was not. Knives are not some Ultimate Fighting Weapon that inevitably grants victory to the wielder. They are a very different sort of weapon than a gun. The purpose of a handgun is to be effective at shooting people and causing severe injury or death at a distance. The holder of a gun can kill you from beyond your arm's reach. A knife user, on the other hand, has to come much closer, putting him at risk. Unless it's a throwing knife, but you only get one shot with those, as opposed to multiple bullets from a gun.

Beyond that, most knives are not intended as weapons, they're tools. I can, perhaps, see justification for banning or restricting blades like swords, that are intended solely as weapons but a ban where a tradesman can't carry a carpet knife while going to a jobsite is just fucking stupid in my mind. What next - are you going to take meat cleavers away from butchers and ginsu knives away from sushi chefs? And before you cry "slippery slope" - last year a group of emergency room doctors in the UK seriously proposed removing what they called "long kitchen knives" from peoples' posession, essentially leaving households with nothing larger than a paring knife for all their cooking needs. Said something about simply buying your meat pre-cut. Cripes, that means no more carving your own home-cooked roast beef or turkey.

[His Divine Shadow]

I don't really see any point at all to the ban, won't accomplish anything of worth, anyone can get a knife and anyone can get a legal knife instead if they fear being searched by cops.

I believe crime rates will continue to rise and fall in their normal fashion, unperturbed by wheter the laws allow or forbid people to have knives/weapons on their persons. If the society is quite safe anyway and has low rates of crime (which is more related to sociological and economic factors from what I've seen) then people will likely not be carrying a weapon of some kind because they won't need it that much.

I agree with General Brock when he says that "it is a little strange that there is knife hysteria just when Blair's popularity rating is in the dumpster"...

[Mr Bean]

I find this thread very intresting. On the one hand I'm temped to jump in on the side of folks like Coyote and Broomstick. And yet I can see where the rest of you are attempting to try to go with your reasoning.


However...

In a population of 60million, 272 killings with a sharp instrument a year seems a fairly low figure.

Infact it seems that knife murders comprise less than 25% of all murders commited in the UK. I made an effor to find and compare murders by the guns and deaths to cars. However hard as I tried, Google, Yahoo and Jeeves failed me in trying to find and verify death statics.

Onto my own thoughts.

I carry a Leatherman, have carred one for years and will keep doing so, why? For the same reason I have emergancy flares in my car as well as a thermal blanket. Because should a situation arise, it would be useful.

Mine has a seven inch blade on it(Being one of the full Pillar/Screwdriver versions) which I keep sharpend. For self defense however I'd rather grab a handy brick or pull a gun. NOT whip out that blade and try and fight.

And going even further, of that 272 people killed each year, the majority of them seem to be people getting knifed in the home. Jilted lovers taking revenge or husbands or wives finding their other in bed with another and stabbing the both of them.

Infact from what I can tell, more people are stilling getting shot on Britain's streets than knifed...

So I ask, Why the hell do you even bother with it? Lets be generous and say that each year two hundred people are knifed on the street or out in public. For that your willing to spend millions of dollers, send dozens prehaps hundreds of people to jail for possesion of a knife, spend millions each year trying these people and jailing them.

In hopes of preventing prehaps two hundred deaths, except it never works that way, your not going to prevent all two hundred deaths, your going to prehaps prevent fifty deaths. Prehaps fifty people will not die next year.

So givin all that your willing to spend millions opon millions of dollers, incacerate dozens of people each year to prevent X amount of deaths to knifes. Nevermind the money cost, how about the civil liberty cost?

Will they ban glass bottles next? The hobo/broken man's weapon of choice is considered a "knife" under the statics they quoted, will they ban glass bottles as well since those can be used as weapons?

What's left after this? Guns, knives, prehaps glass bottles! Where the hell is the line of dimisning returns?

[His Divine Shadow]

What you say just makes me more convinced of what I said.

I agree with General Brock when he says that "it is a little strange that there is knife hysteria just when Blair's popularity rating is in the dumpster"...

[Keevan_Colton]

I find this thread very intresting. On the one hand I'm temped to jump in on the side of folks like Coyote and Broomstick. And yet I can see where the rest of you are attempting to try to go with your reasoning.


However...

In a population of 60million, 272 killings with a sharp instrument a year seems a fairly low figure.

Infact it seems that knife murders comprise less than 25% of all murders commited in the UK. I made an effor to find and compare murders by the guns and deaths to cars. However hard as I tried, Google, Yahoo and Jeeves failed me in trying to find and verify death statics.

Onto my own thoughts.

I carry a Leatherman, have carred one for years and will keep doing so, why? For the same reason I have emergancy flares in my car as well as a thermal blanket. Because should a situation arise, it would be useful.

Mine has a seven inch blade on it(Being one of the full Pillar/Screwdriver versions) which I keep sharpend. For self defense however I'd rather grab a handy brick or pull a gun. NOT whip out that blade and try and fight.

And going even further, of that 272 people killed each year, the majority of them seem to be people getting knifed in the home. Jilted lovers taking revenge or husbands or wives finding their other in bed with another and stabbing the both of them.

Infact from what I can tell, more people are stilling getting shot on Britain's streets than knifed...

So I ask, Why the hell do you even bother with it? Lets be generous and say that each year two hundred people are knifed on the street or out in public. For that your willing to spend millions of dollers, send dozens prehaps hundreds of people to jail for possesion of a knife, spend millions each year trying these people and jailing them.

In hopes of preventing prehaps two hundred deaths, except it never works that way, your not going to prevent all two hundred deaths, your going to prehaps prevent fifty deaths. Prehaps fifty people will not die next year.

So givin all that your willing to spend millions opon millions of dollers, incacerate dozens of people each year to prevent X amount of deaths to knifes. Nevermind the money cost, how about the civil liberty cost?

Will they ban glass bottles next? The hobo/broken man's weapon of choice is considered a "knife" under the statics they quoted, will they ban glass bottles as well since those can be used as weapons?

What's left after this? Guns, knives, prehaps glass bottles! Where the hell is the line of dimisning returns?

It isnt just murder though, a knife turns a drunken fight after a nightclub into a much messier affair. You need to add in the stats for folk seriously injured in an assault thanks to a knife to get a real idea of the scale of the issue...

After all, the difference between a murder and assault with a deadly weapon is just a) how well you know how to use it and b) how quickly you get good medical attention.

When I was working as a bouncer here the agency me required to be trained in emergency first aid with a particular emphasis on how to control bleeding and deal with knife related injuries.

[Mr Bean]

[
It isnt just murder though, a knife turns a drunken fight after a nightclub into a much messier affair. You need to add in the stats for folk seriously injured in an assault thanks to a knife to get a real idea of the scale of the issue...

Are you kidding me... your example is a nightclub?
Did you read my post when I mentioned another handy sharp weapon such as a BROKEN BEER BOTTLE! The kind you can make in most any night-club or bar and before you ask, yes people have been killed via martinee glasses steams to the eye. Infact I'm guessing a wound from a broken bottle would be even worse than from your avarage knife as every stab cuts deep into alot more area and leaves wonderful little broken glass bits in the wounds.

Agian your example is that "banning knives from a bar fight would make it a less messy affair"
Come on now.

[The Yosemite Bear]

*looks over collection* (remember I'm a professional, I just have this many because I can)

remind me to never move to the UK. BTW I'm thinking of getting a Kukri (hey it's a utility knife....)


remember the best reason to be a chef/cook. because it's an open excuse to indulge in pyro and sharp objects fetishes in a constructive manner.

[Keevan_Colton]

[
It isnt just murder though, a knife turns a drunken fight after a nightclub into a much messier affair. You need to add in the stats for folk seriously injured in an assault thanks to a knife to get a real idea of the scale of the issue...

Are you kidding me... your example is a nightclub?
Did you read my post when I mentioned another handy sharp weapon such as a BROKEN BEER BOTTLE! The kind you can make in most any night-club or bar and before you ask, yes people have been killed via martinee glasses steams to the eye. Infact I'm guessing a wound from a broken bottle would be even worse than from your avarage knife as every stab cuts deep into alot more area and leaves wonderful little broken glass bits in the wounds.

Agian your example is that "banning knives from a bar fight would make it a less messy affair"
Come on now.

I guess you didnt know that most clubs in scotland serve beer in plastic bottles and if they dont they generally decant glass bottles into plastic glasses.

Edit:
After all we'd have to be pretty dumb to tackle one problem to the exclusion of others.

[His Divine Shadow]

Holy fuck. Beer in plastic bottes/glasses? In Scottland? Ye gods the sacreliege. The only time we get plastic glasses in beer is when we're at one of those low budget american car meetings out in the open.

Christ is that because glasses and bottles can be used as weapons? Is that really so?

[Keevan_Colton]

Holy fuck. Beer in plastic bottes/glasses? In Scottland? Ye gods the sacreliege. The only time we get plastic glasses in beer is when we're at one of those low budget american car meetings out in the open.

Christ is that because glasses and bottles can be used as weapons? Is that really so?

In a word, yes.

I've worked at places where they wouldnt give customers that bought bottles of soft drinks the caps along with them becuase they'd been known to use them as a blunt instrument to beat folk over the head with or to throw at them (by filling them with water, hence the no caps).

Also, it generally isnt the crap plastic disposable glasses, it's specially treated stuff that some folk dont even realise is plastic until it's pointed out...heck, Ayr racecourse where I often work as a barman has special plastic champagne flutes.

[His Divine Shadow]

Jesus...say all you will for how it's not noticeable but now I know about it and I've also drunken out of those you-wouldn't-know-it's-plastic pints and bottles, they completely destroyed soda when they began with that and they aren't any better with beer. I think I'll be cancelling that idea for a trip to Scottland I've had mulling around. I ain't hopping on a plane to drink out of plastic pints.

[Old Peculier]

Jesus...say all you will for how it's not noticeable but now I know about it and I've also drunken out of those you-wouldn't-know-it's-plastic pints and bottles, they completely destroyed soda when they began with that and they aren't any better with beer. I think I'll be cancelling that idea for a trip to Scottland I've had mulling around. I ain't hopping on a plane to drink out of plastic pints.

Who the hell goes to Scotland thinking that a major part of their visit just has to involve drinking from a glass made out of glass anyway?
Not sure you're being 100% serious, but what's the big deal, it's just the container for a drink. Just as long as it isn't some flimsy shit why would you even care?

[Gandalf]

Who the hell goes to Scotland thinking that a major part of their visit just has to involve drinking from a glass made out of glass anyway?
Not sure you're being 100% serious, but what's the big deal, it's just the container for a drink. Just as long as it isn't some flimsy shit why would you even care?

The container can interfere with the taste of a drink.

For an example, drink some coke from a glass cup, and then a metal one. I did that once, and now I avoid the metal at all costs.

Glass is the ideal medium for many drinks.

[His Divine Shadow]

Who the hell goes to Scotland thinking that a major part of their visit just has to involve drinking from a glass made out of glass anyway?
Not sure you're being 100% serious, but what's the big deal, it's just the container for a drink. Just as long as it isn't some flimsy shit why would you even care?

Yes who indeed? A big part of Scottland are their pubs and the whole pub culture deal, lots of people go to Scottland to visit the places where they make their favorite brand of scotch whiskey, who the hell goes to Scottland to drink whisky out of a glass tumbler? If I go to Scottland to experience the pub culture I want the authentic thing, just like I would want a real tumbler and not a plastic imitation one.

Besides I also wouldn't dare go if the scots are so violent that measures like this are actually neccesary. Thats not even neccesary in the binge-drinking heaven known as Finland.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Jesus...say all you will for how it's not noticeable but now I know about it and I've also drunken out of those you-wouldn't-know-it's-plastic pints and bottles, they completely destroyed soda when they began with that and they aren't any better with beer. I think I'll be cancelling that idea for a trip to Scottland I've had mulling around. I ain't hopping on a plane to drink out of plastic pints.

It's all the UK, and it's not just for restricting damage at any bar room brawl, it's also to help litter and the environment issues. The city is a nice place to find a lot of broken glass on the street which is a bitch to clear up if every weekend you have morons smashing their pints on the pavement or throwing bottles. Last night, I noticed for the first time at a college nightclub with friends that my Smirnoff Ice was in a plastic bottle, they were all glass a few weeks ago.

Let's admit one thing here. The legislature on knives and other bladed weapons here right now is down to public assurance, more than anything. A mother, distraught from a high-profile knifing of her kid breaking up a fight outside school this month, makes the plea for a knife amnesty and harsher controls. Irregardless of the pain she must be feeling from that murder, there is little else you can conceivably do in the UK to address the issue of knives. I was in Manchester yesterday and noticed a gunsmith with some very nice firearms and a load of machetes, survival knives, bayonets and swords. You had to be 17 to enter the shop, but the law right now says you can be 16 and get a knife. They're changing it to 18 soon (which I think is now the age for air rifles, or it may be 16, up from 14).

You do need to have a good excuse for carrying anything like what we're discussing here. I have a Swiss Army Knife Card in my wallet. Blade is all of 3 cm, but it's handy for opening letters or cutting packaging and is perfectly legal. I usually have my keychain with me anyway. I have a habit of adding keyrings to this chain, not so much because they are pretty and shiny, but because in a pinch, I can twat someone over the head with it, possibly with my Maglite on the end too. May down someone, may not. But if I have the chance, I can and will do that should the attacker seem either psycho or unwilling to accept any cash offered. I have never been in a mugging, seen one or heard of one where I've lived in all my 22 years on Earth, though my home village is not crime central, Lancaster has a far greater chance for crime transpiring.

If anyone can really solve this issue, tell me how. In fact, scratch that. Write to your local MP or senator and get them to raise the thing in Parliament/Congress, because the black & white of either having no one carry weapons, or everyone carry weapons, simply doesn't do anything but act as a mediator for violence, with varying drawbacks. Attacking the cause, not the symptoms of crime, is something very few societies are able to do effectively, if at all.

On the subject, here's another knife incident just reported today. Skelmersdale, or Skem, is also where I collect my dole money. There's a reason it has such a big job centre support facility there too, and many, many chavs and nicotine addict mothers.

By the way, it's Scotland. One "t".

[Old Peculier]

The container can interfere with the taste of a drink.

For an example, drink some coke from a glass cup, and then a metal one. I did that once, and now I avoid the metal at all costs.

Glass is the ideal medium for many drinks.

Metal does indeed give a strange taste. In my experience decent plastic and glass are fairly similar.

Yes who indeed? A big part of Scottland are their pubs and the whole pub culture deal, lots of people go to Scottland to visit the places where they make their favorite brand of scotch whiskey, who the hell goes to Scottland to drink whisky out of a glass tumbler? Rolling Eyes If I go to Scottland to experience the pub culture I want the authentic thing, just like I would want a real tumbler and not a plastic imitation one.

Besides I also wouldn't dare go if the scots are so violent that measures like this are actually neccesary. Thats not even neccesary in the binge-drinking heaven known as Finland.

There's much more to pub culture thank the material of whatever you're drinking from, as I'm sure you know.
Has anyone actually shown that Scotland is actually more violent than other places in general. I'm from South-West England, and I wouldn't be surprised to see any of those things. Perhaps they just have stricter precautions, which you could argue is a good thing.

[His Divine Shadow]

It's all the UK, and it's not just for restricting damage at any bar room brawl, it's also to help litter and the environement issues. The city is a nice place to find a lot of broken glass on the street which is a bitch to clear up if every weekend you have morons smashing their pints on the pavement or throwing bottles. Last night, I noticed for the first time at a college nightclub with friends that my Smirnoff Ice was in a plastic bottle, they were all glass a few weeks ago.

After I read that I went and googled for it and I notice here a bunch of pub owners who has to campaign to be allowed to use glasses made of glass in their own pubs. Hell I'm just pissed now, enough to just refuse to visit on principle alone. Got a problem? Or heck, just imagine there is a problem? Make more laws. I really don't care about littering being used as an excuse for another ban on what we may and may not have in our hands, we're not children. This is just fucking absurd and I'm not responding rationally to this anymore either.

http://www.scottishpubs.co.uk/Aboutus/A ... paigns.htm

There's much more to pub culture thank the material of whatever you're drinking from, as I'm sure you know. Has anyone actually shown that Scotland is actually more violent than other places in general. I'm from South-West England, and I wouldn't be surprised to see any of those things. Perhaps they just have stricter precautions, which you could argue is a good thing.

I've already said there is a difference in taste as I know it from before, thats my experience and I said it from the start. And as you can see I am angry at the very principle. A ban on glass because people fight in bars and because it causes litter... Just another ban, probably just one of a thousand more coming, I just know that. The new bans and laws are not going to let up, stop, or even reverse, it's going to get alot worse and every new ban is going to be defended by someone.

[Rogue 9]

So they're going to arrest every non-cripple out on the streets? The human body itself is quite a lethal weapon when you get down to it.

A knife is a tool. Not a weapon. A tool. It can be used for violent purposes, but so can hammers (as I well know), screwdrivers, bats, sticks, and paint cans. It is quite easy to kill someone with your bare hands in the right situation. This ban serves no purpose at all.

Oh, and why hand in the bat'leth? I assume the guy wasn't planning on carrying it around, so what's the point?

Tell me, how much of this thread did you read before posting that knee-jerk knock-off?

At that time I'd read the first and last page. In retrospect, I should have waited until I had time to read the rest.

[Vendetta]

Banning knives would not have stopped 9/11. They would have used other means to obtain the real weapon of the day, a poor man's cruise missle.

He didn't claim it would have, merely that it shows that a knife can be a very effective weapon, which was a direct response to your claim (based purely on your own anectode) that they are not effective because, and I quote, "Most people don't know how to handle one as a weapon."

I know it can be hard to follow the thread of an argument for more than two posts in a row, but all you have to do is try.

[Vendetta]

I really don't care about littering being used as an excuse for another ban on what we may and may not have in our hands, we're not children. This is just fucking absurd and I'm not responding rationally to this anymore either.

Sadly, there are people in society who are only too happy to behave just like children, and they can cause enough damage and disruption to the rest of us that limiting their behaviour without significantly impacting on the rest of us is a net benefit to society.

The same applies to knife control. There are enough fuckwits that would cause trouble to impose controls on the carrying and sale of knives.