I’ve been curious about why people are so opposed to a knife in public. Even a small Swiss Army knife makes some people squeamish.
Small Swiss Army knives make me squeamish.
I mean, like, why would I waste precious pocket space on a tool that is mostly unusable, when I could be carrying a Manix or a Police? Or even a Dragonfly?
I know we're talking about knives as tools, but a large portion (probably the vast majority) of the population today will NEVER carry a pocketknife, nor any kind of knife, for any reason. They don't see pocketknives as useful tools, they only see them as "illegal weapons." Whether the pocketknife in question is actually illegal or not. They've already made up their minds, or been indoctrinated to think a certain way (that carrying a pocketknife means you have ill intent), and no amount of intelligent reasoning is going to change that.
The video below is an example of the attitudes that people have around knives. They do not see them as useful tools, they see them only as weapons. In the video, the guy with the knife is trying to make a reasonable point at a PTA meeting, but IMO, he's doing it in the wrong way. And in doing so, he is both exposing and reinforcing the soy-laden mentalities of the other people in that room. The people crying out "That's illegal!" are the people who vote. The knife he pulled out was probably not even illegal or a switchblade. And the guy trying to make his point (no pun intended) only helped to further damage the image of knives as useful tools, while failing to make his intended point clear to any of the people present. BOTH sides were stupid. The guy could have easily made his point without pulling out a real knife, or any other object.
People are weird. I was on a 5-day backpacking trip last month and I helped someone fix their boots who had neither parachute cord nor a knife! Then I met someone who was ostensibly a thru-hiker who sarcastically asked why I had a knife when they saw my Stok! I told them that I used it for cutting cord, opening food bags, whatever needed cutting. That seemed to appease them.
I usually tell them "The last time I opened a bag of chips with my Glock, there were issues".
Thankfully, I live in a town where the largest employer is a meat packing plant. Half the town has made their living with a knife at some point, so no one freaks when I pull one out for something.
People are weird. I was on a 5-day backpacking trip last month and I helped someone fix their boots who had neither parachute cord nor a knife! Then I met someone who was ostensibly a thru-hiker who sarcastically asked why I had a knife when they saw my Stok! I told them that I used it for cutting cord, opening food bags, whatever needed cutting. That seemed to appease them.
That remnds me of a guy who posted that he regularly carried AT LEAST a Spyderco, a Leatherman, and a Victorinox, and met some people out camping in a National Park who only had some PLASTIC BUTTERKNIVES as their camping knife. He was shocked.
I know we're talking about knives as tools, but a large portion (probably the vast majority) of the population today will NEVER carry a pocketknife, nor any kind of knife, for any reason. They don't see pocketknives as useful tools, they only see them as "illegal weapons." Whether the pocketknife in question is actually illegal or not. They've already made up their minds, or been indoctrinated to think a certain way (that carrying a pocketknife means you have ill intent), and no amount of intelligent reasoning is going to change that.
The video below is an example of the attitudes that people have around knives. They do not see them as useful tools, they see them only as weapons. In the video, the guy with the knife is trying to make a reasonable point at a PTA meeting, but IMO, he's doing it in the wrong way. And in doing so, he is both exposing and reinforcing the soy-laden mentalities of the other people in that room. The people crying out "That's illegal!" are the people who vote. The knife he pulled out was probably not even illegal or a switchblade. And the guy trying to make his point (no pun intended) only helped to further damage the image of knives as useful tools, while failing to make his intended point clear to any of the people present. BOTH sides were stupid. The guy could have easily made his point without pulling out a real knife, or any other object.
Jim
Jim,
People are in general morons, I am not talking about the ones who see knives as weapons either.
Same with the progun crowd, most of them are complete idiots that sound like 3 year olds trying to defend some toy.
No, I am no kidding either.
These people in general do more damage just by being what they are than all the murders that happen every year just by being what they are, idiots.
On TV and in the movies, guns and knives are portrayed as weapons and in real life they are all used to kill people for real and the numbers are pretty high.
It doesn't matter were the knives and guns came from nor who is doing the killings or for what reasons.
The bottom line here is they are weapons and they are portrayed as such period.
Factor in the wannabe Rambos etc and other assorted knuckle draggers doing their thing, making things worse as they do.
The damage is done, and continues to be done every day, day in and day out all over the world.
Knives are just tools. There are a multitude of uses.
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This reminds me of a thing that happened at work a few years ago:
I was opening several boxes and plastic wrapped parts for some machinery and another engineer was helping me. I whipped out my work Leatherman out and sliced everything open. The engineer told me, "I have never been this close to a knife like that before. I am a bit uncomfortable with it."
This reminds me of a thing that happened at work a few years ago:
I was opening several boxes and plastic wrapped parts for some machinery and another engineer was helping me. I whipped out my work Leatherman out and sliced everything open. The engineer told me, "I have never been this close to a knife like that before. I am a bit uncomfortable with it."
OK
Wow. Thank you for being pro knife and a fellow Spyderco and Leatherman person. That is scary to me that some people have become so anti knife and fearful of our oldest tool. It confirms what our friends Ankerson and Naperville said above.
I wish pro knife education could reverse this. People try. Like Knife Rights and AKTI and others.
Some things I can open 5 to 10 times before one could get out a knife, open it then use it to open whatever.
This is true, and I try to make sure I don't use a knife when it's not necessary or even an advantage. That just looks silly.
That said, I'm not sure how I feel about most packaging now evolving toward not requiring tools. No doubt it's convenient, but it also incentivize people to not think ahead. Not think about the what if's. Not be expected to solve problems themselves. There will always be situations where a cutting tool is required, but as this becomes a more rare occurrence, it will be less obvious to people why they need personal tools at all, or even why it should be acceptable for others to be so equipped.
Lots of things can be used from keys, scissors and just about anything to break the tape on boxes if needed.
For many years I've been trying to teach my son (now early teens) to use things for their intended purpose. Using stuff for things they weren't made for will often result in something breaking or eventually no longer being useful for its main purpose.
So while in a pinch keys are better than no tool for opening packages, they're not really that great. And most importantly they're not intended for that type of use. And a key no longer providing its primary function could turn into a major inconvenience that will easily nullify any none-key task the key had solved to that point. Not a worthwhile risk in my opinion.
Though it's mostly hypothetical at this point. If my memory serves me right I haven't carried a key in my pockets for 9 years or so.
Chip bags can be opened very easy and quickly without the need of a knife.
This is true, but can you do it quietly?
If I'm opening a bag of chips and don't want to share it with my wife and a bunch of kids - a very sharp knife is the way to go.
I spent 13 years working at a wellness center. The two owners and almost all of my co-workers were not knife people, nor were any the type you would ever expect to be knife people.
All throughout that time, I carried and used a variety of knives for various tasks, like cutting strapping that held bundles of newly-delivered, laundered massage sheets, breaking down cardboard supply boxes, etc. Knives I used at work during that time included BM Axis Locks, Delicas, SE Tasman Salt, Police models, Military, PM2, Para 3, CRK large Insingo, etc. Not once during those 13 years did anybody ever complain about me or my knives, and some of them even remarked how useful they are.
They didn't mind because I just used them like normal, so they became normalized. I never flicked my knives open with a dramatic flair, nor ever tried to impress anybody with my knowledge of steels, etc. I never tried to evangelize to anybody about the usefulness of knives as tools, or said that everybody should carry a knife. I just quietly pulled them out, used them, then quietly put them back in my pocket. I never made a big deal out of it, so they never made a big deal out of it. They knew me long enough and well enough to know that I wasn't going to turn into Jason Voorhees and start running amok.
Without ever trying, or even thinking about it, I probably helped more non-knife people around me have a more down-to-earth perspective on the handiness of carrying a pocketknife than all of the proselytizing or forced knife education would have ever accomplished.
