Voluntarily handing in a large blade to the UK police

[sidpost]

A flick knife is a very useful tool for rope and twine work. Once a flick knife or a butterfly knife are open, they are no different from any other knife. I can’t imagine that anyone is prepared to suggest a repeal.

A major part of a (quasi?) democracy, based upon majority rule by popular vote, is image.
Unless you can think of a better system, then we are stuck with the politics of headline and the sound bite. It’s currently our only defence against the despot.
Calm rationality rarely wins votes. Knives are emotive. That’s good for votes.
Long term education, social development and poverty eradication are hard work and very boring.

Politics are mainly about emotion and rarely about facts. My perception of BREXIT from afar was that it was based on emotions and feelings with few tangible facts. The results don't seem to be what either side expected.

9/11 was initially about the facts but, ended up being about the emotions and can be argued made things much worse over time. Was 2 decades of war a reasonable response to a small dedicated group of terrorists?

Muslim hate was not nearly as significant before 9/11. After 9/11 Muslim hate is almost universal even though it was a small minority responsible.

In the end, the Taliban has returned and the Mideast is less stable today. Who really won and who really lost? Everything is mainly about emotions today and facts rarely get in the way of those emotions.

Just like the original post and the saga about emotions while ignoring facts along the way. The knife in question is perceived by the police apparently as legal but, they still treat it like it wasn't. Ultimately it is an inanimate object that can do nothing on its own. It takes the intent of an evil doer to actually use it in a criminal way to have a negative outcome and then, it is the user that did that, not the knife. The knife was just the tool at hand. A rock, brick, or bat, .... could also substitute for the knife in a scenario like this.

 

[sidpost]

No, UK knife crime is generally youth gang-related - you only get to see the sensational and relatively rare innocent stabbings.

I see random attacks by knife in places like the UK and New Zealand occasionally, though honestly a bit randomly. I have also seen a few reports of knife killings in a UK pub being appealed for leniency due to being crimes of "passion" and not premeditated attacks.

 

[Pattree]

Text on this one?
It’s news to me.

 

[sidpost]

Coming full circle, whether someone has a big knife or even a sword at home, what risk is there to other people? My firearm is not a risk to my neighbors either.

 

[sidpost]

Text on this one?
It’s news to me.

Typically BBC America news coverage on the local BBCA station newscasts. BBC.com has had a video or two I have seen on this topic as well.

 

[Chris]

Knives are used here because firearms are much harder to get hold of. We basically have the same sorts of crime, it's just ours is done with knives because they don't have guns. The difference really is the number of people it's easy to kill with a firearm than with a knife, due to the distances and physical challenges.

We also have slightly different social challenges and cultures so I'm not sure it's ideal to compare the two - safe to say that all countries have their own, often complex problems.

Either way, the answer isn't often just 'ban them all!', that's the easy option the governments go for because it is cheap and easy, whilst giving a headline they can point to. If they wanted to address gun or knife issues in either of our countries, they'd have to actually put some work and money into both addressing the root causes (poverty, underfunded social services and police services, inequal education and opportunity dependent on location and demographic) which costs a lot more money and takes a lot more effort. Heaven forbid they do what they're paid to do, instead they just interfere in the lives of the law abiding majority.

 

[matarius777]

Politics are mainly about emotion and rarely about facts. My perception of BREXIT from afar was that it was based on emotions and feelings with few tangible facts. The results don't seem to be what either side expected.

9/11 was initially about the facts but, ended up being about the emotions and can be argued made things much worse over time. Was 2 decades of war a reasonable response to a small dedicated group of terrorists?

Muslim hate was not nearly as significant before 9/11. After 9/11 Muslim hate is almost universal even though it was a small minority responsible.

In the end, the Taliban has returned and the Mideast is less stable today. Who really won and who really lost? Everything is mainly about emotions today and facts rarely get in the way of those emotions.

Just like the original post and the saga about emotions while ignoring facts along the way. The knife in question is perceived by the police apparently as legal but, they still treat it like it wasn't. Ultimately it is an inanimate object that can do nothing on its own. It takes the intent of an evil doer to actually use it in a criminal way to have a negative outcome and then, it is the user that did that, not the knife. The knife was just the tool at hand. A rock, brick, or bat, .... could also substitute for the knife in a scenario like this.

Once America starts interfering with a sovereign nation, it never ends well. Congo, S. America, Middle East etc.

 

[Goosegog]

My nephew was stabbed and killed with a kitchen knife purchased that day from B&M..
Today I was shopping in Lidl and in the reduced box, a nice set of kitchen knives, both blades over 8 inches.
dont think the zombies know about them

 

[Pattree]

Typically BBC America news coverage on the local BBCA station newscasts. BBC.com has had a video or two I have seen on this topic as well.

If an individual has carried a knife into a pub and deliberately pushed it into someone else there is no way the defence barrister would plead a crime passionnel. They’d be laughed (in a very British way) out of court by the prosecution. In fact with the current mood in the UK the only mitigating plea for those circumstances is insanity.

btw I read the BBC app daily.
Knife Crime here is usually gang related or domestic. There is however and increasing occurrence of what appears to be random stabbing which I simply don’t understand.

Edited to add:
I don’t understand so called zombi knives either but banning them won’t alter anything.

 

[Broch]

Edited to add:
I don’t understand so called zombi knives either but banning them won’t alter anything.

I disagree slightly with this last sentence; it ignores the 'macho' look desire that the gang youths like to flaunt. No gang member would be see on the street with a plank with a nail in it but will wave around a curved blade with three holes and three points because of the look.

In exactly the same way that we covert a beautifully made blade handle and sheath for use in the woods they covert the size, shape, and impression power/strength that the Rambo and Zombie style knives give them.

I agree, a screwdriver is just as likely to kill someone when stabbed, but I can't see a yob going around boasting that his screwdriver is bigger/meaner than the next.

 

[Pattree]

@Broch
Agreed but if you take away the zombie it will just be replaced with the next most easily sourced manhood-compensator.

 

[DB-71]

So called zombie knives are crap, nobody wants them, uses them or even collects them, but this legislation is pathetic and ill thought out, and the stats don't back it up, more than half of all knife crime is committed with ordinary kitchen knives and its always been like that, these zombie knives account for less than 8%, thats lasts years figures, its another knee jerk appeasement exercise to satisfy the gullible into thinking it will make a blind bit of difference, but yeah get rid because of the sheer ugliness of them

 

[Broch]

So called zombie knives are crap, nobody wants them, uses them or even collects them, but this legislation is pathetic and ill thought out, and the stats don't back it up, more than half of all knife crime is committed with ordinary kitchen knives and its always been like that, these zombie knives account for less than 8%, thats lasts years figures, its another knee jerk appeasement exercise to satisfy the gullible into thinking it will make a blind bit of difference, but yeah get rid because of the sheer ugliness of them

Please supply the source of the kitchen knife data you quote - I am told that official statistics do not distinguish the blade type. I'd be keen to see more granular data.

 

[DB-71]

Please supply the source of the kitchen knife data you quote - I am told that official statistics do not distinguish the blade type. I'd be keen to see more granular data.

Google it mate I cant find the exact link, but Essex violence and vulnerability unit state that 74% of all knife crime is committed by ordinary kitchen knives, then you've got chisels, screwdrivers, folding knives etc, so actual zombie knives very little, this is inline with my own experiences of knife crime growing up, people using small bladed kitchen knives to stab someone multiple times then throw it away, completely untraceable, unlike a crime committed with an extravagant blade with all kinds of serrates etc which will leave a certain wound pattern which could potentially be traced to a certain type of knife, but yeh no argument from me get rid, but it wont make any difference in my opinion.

 

[Broch]

Google it mate I cant find the exact link, but Essex violence and vulnerability unit state that 74% of all knife crime is committed by ordinary kitchen knives, then you've got chisels, screwdrivers, folding knives etc, so actual zombie knives very little, this is inline with my own experiences of knife crime growing up, people using small bladed kitchen knives to stab someone multiple times then throw it away, completely untraceable, unlike a crime committed with an extravagant blade with all kinds of serrates etc which will leave a certain wound pattern which could potentially be traced to a certain type of knife, but yeh no argument from me get rid, but it wont make any difference in my opinion.

Ah, so we don't have a creditable data source for 'more than half of all knife crime is committed with ordinary kitchen knives'. - Media statistics IMO

 

[DB-71]

Ah, so we don't have a creditable data source for 'more than half of all knife crime is committed with ordinary kitchen knives'. - Media statistics IMO

I've just give you one? as well as personal experience like I said, your kidding yourself if you think it will make a ounce of difference, but whatever makes you feel good pal

 

[Herman30]

I really want to know if a dagger with blood draining grooves down the side

It´s called a fuller and has nothing to do with blood draining. It´s there to make the blade lighter.

 

[spokenword]

It´s called a fuller and has nothing to do with blood draining. It´s there to make the blade lighter.

Didn't know that Herman30. Thanks.

 

[grainweevil]

I agree, a screwdriver is just as likely to kill someone when stabbed, but I can't see a yob going around boasting that his screwdriver is bigger/meaner than the next.

Ooo, I dunno. One of the large size Yankee spiral ratchet screwdrivers could be a bit of a flex. I'm honestly surprised they haven't been banned; you don't even need to do anything but release the lock and let it spring out and puncture wounds could abound!

 

[C_Claycomb]

‘If mine is bigger, I’m going to win’: Getting zombie knives off the streets https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0kjvnd1728o

Noteworthy is the bit near the end where it shows mention of such big knives in crime reports has doubled since 2019.