this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2024
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submitted 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
 

Why are knife control laws so strong in the United States as opposed to gun control?

I was realizing it would be nice to have a knife with auto opening for boxes, etc., basically a switch blade or similar, and I found out that they are super illegal in my state (and/or there are length restrictions, or both sides of the blade can't be sharp, etc), but I can go into a sporting goods store and buy a pistol and ammo in under 30min.

Shooting open an Amazon box seems inefficient. What is up with restrictive knife-control laws??

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[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 months ago

I feel you, I needed a bread knife to slice a loaf and there is a 4 day waiting period before I can go down to my FKL and pickup my turbo-bread-saw 9000.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Just get one anyway. It won’t do you any favors if a cop finds it but knife control isn’t a big priority for most law enforcement

EDIT: I am not a lawyer

[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Because knife control doesn’t have an entry on the constitution.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 months ago

Because there is no National Knife Association to lobby for knife rights.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 3 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

Right, wouldn't a hand grenade or a suicide vest count as arms? But I get shit for exercising my 2nd. SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED!!

[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 months ago

Similarly to religion and the bible, words mean whatever people want them to mean.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (4 children)

Butterfly knives only became legal in NY and MA about 4 years ago. There's virtually zero reason to ban them other than protecting stupid people from accidentally cutting themselves

(I'm one of those stupid people)

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

They were banned because racism. Not because of any particular danger to the user.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago

I had one of those in high school and took it with me to a school trip in my back pack. We were at camp (think log houses) for three nights and I started spinning the blade daily. Lots of cuts (mostly on my hands) later I've learned to flip it like a pro. I can still do it to this day if someone hands me one. It's like biking or swimming. Once you learn it, you don't forget.

The teacher that was with us never said anything besides watching my progress. He was the coolest dude ever. I miss you, Mr Jones.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

Same reason they banned pinball in Chicago and NY. To distract the people away from what names politicians money.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (3 children)

I got one of those things at a state fair when I was a little kid and set about immediately cutting myself trying to flip it open and look cool. My mom took it from me shortly thereafter. That ended the short saga of WoahWoah and the butterfly knife.

At this point, I can't think of any reason I would want one. People that can use them well look pretty cool, but as a purposeful knife, they seem pointlessly complicated and prone to user error.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

What a glorious ninja-career that could have been.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

Yeah, but I'd love to have a switch blade. Seems really convenient to me.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

I use one as my daily! I practice with it a lot and have a trainer to practice. Funny enough, I actually just modeled mine today in a photoshoot (am a circus performer)

As a daily they function as any other knife. If you're experienced with them, you don't even think about open or closing. There's a tiny bit of security in knowing that most people are too afraid to hold one. I do also like that they absolutely can't close on you while holding it.

I have cut myself though. The worst was when I did a toss that landed tip-down on my palm. But small harm doesn't bother me.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I moved to Japan where knives are also heavily restricted. If you live in Japan, you need a permit to purchase anything with a fixed blade over 15cm and it must be kept in the home. You can't legally carry a pocket knife with a blade longer than 6cm (I think 8cm if it's a folding but not fixed blade) and even then, if stopped, you need to have a specific reason for carrying it around.

It was really weird to me, as someone who carried a pocket knife basically everywhere. I did learn, though, that "in case I need to open boxes" is a case that has come up like twice in 10 years.

As for guns here, handguns are not allowed at all. There are licenses for airguns (pellet guns), rifles, and shotguns. Separately, there are licenses for trapping and hunting that do grant some permissions outside of what I wrote above (hunting/trapping license but no gun license means you're going to be killing your catch with knife, spear, strangulation, drowning, or electrocution).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

The permit requirement does not apply to kitchen knives, does it? Been some time, but I travelled to Tokio quite frequently for work, and always made it a point to go to kappabashi and get a nice cooking knife, some of the longer than 20 cm.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

There's a tourist exemption, but the knives have to be packaged and legally can't be opened.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago

Interesting. I will say, I use my pocket knife usually at least once a day for one thing or another. They're surprisingly useful for all sorts of tasks.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 3 months ago

If you look at the timing of most the laws against specific types of knives… you’re going to notice a pattern where there was some scare involving some minority or alt group.

Switch blades were outlaws after Hollywood depicted African American villains as gangsters with them.

Same with ballisongs and Asian gangsters/villians.

All of that said, auto-openers have a hair trigger and I would suggest instead getting a good flipper you can easily flick open. Benchmade bugout is my EDC (not for fighting, it’s light and solid.)

[–] [email protected] 16 points 3 months ago

Shooting open an Amazon box seems inefficient.

True, but it's the American way.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 3 months ago

There are actually some legal movements to reduce unnecessary knife laws, because a lot of them are based around the idea of 50s punks and don't make actual logical sense.

But yeah, it depends entirely on the state. The only knife laws in my state is you can't conceal carry a Bowie knife, but all other knives (OTF, automatics, balisongs, etc) are legal.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 months ago

There is a "Knife Rights" organization that works to overturn these laws. From what I hear, they tend to be pretty successful, since there isn't a ton of attention on the issue and there isn't much in the way of entrenched opposition the way there is on the guns issue.

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