The British are officially insane...

[Pie]

This is pretty sad. For the record, I am no fan of the NRA, but this is nuts. From today's NYTimes:

British Medical Experts Campaign for Long, Pointy Knife Control
By JOHN SCHWARTZ

Warning: Long, pointy knives may be hazardous to your health.

The authors of an editorial in the latest issue of the British Medical Journal have called for knife reform. The editorial, "Reducing knife crime: We need to ban the sale of long, pointed kitchen knives," notes that the knives are being used to stab people as well as roasts and the odd tin of Spam.

The authors of the essay - Drs. Emma Hern, Will Glazebrook and Mike Beckett of the West Middlesex University Hospital in London - called for laws requiring knife manufacturers to redesign their wares with rounded, blunt tips.

The researchers noted that the rate of violent crime in Britain rose nearly 18 percent from 2003 to 2004, and that in the first two weeks of 2005, 15 killings and 16 nonfatal attacks involved stabbings. In an unusual move for a scholarly work, the researchers cited a January headline from The Daily Express, a London tabloid: "Britain is in the grip of knives terror - third of murder victims are now stabbed to death." Dr. Hern said that "we came up with the idea and tossed it into the pot" to get people talking about crime reduction. "Whether it's a sensible solution to this problem or not, I'm not sure."

In the United States, where people are more likely to debate gun control than knife control, partisans on both sides sounded amused. Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of the National Rifle Association, asked, "Are they going to have everybody using plastic knives and forks and spoons in their own homes, like they do in airlines?"

Peter Hamm, a spokesman for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, which supports gun control, joked, "Can sharp stick control be far behind?" He said people in his movement were "envious" of England for having such problems. "In America, we can't even come to an agreement that guns are dangerous and we should make them safer," he said.
[...]

[Troubleshooter]

It's a window into the future people. Seriously.

[wolf]

In England you're not even allowed to poke people with a pointed stick in self defense ... they're going to be banning the fresh fruit next. Bananas first. Nasty things, bananas.

[Silent]

Originally Posted by wolf

Nasty things, bananas.

Almost as nasty as pinapples.

[wolf]

The actual medical journal article is much, much scarier than the NYT report.

From the British Medical Journal.

BMJ 2005;330:1221-1222 (28 May)
Editorial
Reducing knife crime
We need to ban the sale of long pointed kitchen knives

Violent crime in the United Kingdom is increasing; figures from London show a 17.9% increase from 2003 to 2004, (1) and one easily accessible weapon used in many incidents is the kitchen knife. Unfortunately, no data seem to have been collected to indicate how often kitchen knives are used in stabbings, but our own experience and that of police officers and pathologists we have spoken to indicates that they are used in at least half of all cases. UK government statistics show that 24% of 16 year old boys report carrying knives or other weapons and 19% admitting attacking someone with the intent to harm. (2) Although other weapons—such as baseball bats, screwdrivers, and chains—are also carried, by far the most common weapons are knives. (3) In the United Kingdom in the first two weeks of 2005 alone, 15 murders were attributed to stabbings and 16 other non-fatal attacks. (4)

To tackle this increasing problem, various measures are being considered by the government, particularly targeting the adolescent age group. These include raising the minimum age for purchasing a knife from 16 to 18 years and allowing head teachers the power to search pupils for knives. (5) However, not all crimes are committed with newly purchased knives, and every household and home economics department in schools contains a plethora of readily available weapons. The modern stainless steel kitchen knife has a high quality blade that makes it unnecessary to look further for another lethal weapon.

Most domestic kitchen knives are based on two designs, the dagger variety with a pointed tip—for example, vegetable knife or carving knife—and the blunt round nose variety—for example, bread knife. When using a knife to harm, a blunt nosed knife is unlikely to cause serious injury, as penetrating clothing and skin is difficult with it. Similarly an assault with a knife with a short blade such as a craft knife may cause a dramatic superficial wound but is unlikely to reach deep structures and cause death. A dagger type knife, however, can penetrate deeply. Once resistance from clothing and skin is overcome, little extra force is required to injure vital organs, increasing the chance of a fatality (likened to cutting into a ripe melon). (6)

As knives are so readily available, does a culinary reason exist for so many domestic knives to be of the dagger variety, or are we just sticking to tradition? Knives as we recognise them were made first from copper and bronze between 3000 and 700 bc, and some are very similar in design to those used today. Personal eating knives were first used in Britain in the 14th century and became commonplace during the 1800s when manufacturing processes improved. (7)

Knives were used to spear meat, lifting it from plate to mouth, so pointed tips were vital for this function. Also, with repeated sharpening of a flat blade, a pointed tip inevitably develops. However, now domestic knives do not need sharpening, and numerous other kitchen utensils can be used to spear food. The current practice of eating with forks and blunt ended table knives was introduced in the 18th century to reduce the injuries resulting from arguments in public eating houses. In 1669, King Louis XIV of France noted the association between pointed domestic knives and violence and passed a law demanding that the tips of all table and street knives be ground smooth. (8) Today many households have a block of kitchen knives of which several will be of the long pointed variety.

Perhaps the pointed kitchen knife has a culinary purpose that we have failed to appreciate? We contacted 10 chefs in the UK who are well known from their media activities and chefs working in the kitchens of five leading London restaurants. Some commented that a point is useful in the fine preparation of some meat and vegetables, but that this could be done with a short pointed knife (less than 5 cm in length). None gave a reason why the long pointed knife was essential. Domestic knife manufacturers (Harrison-Fisher Knife Company, England, personal communication, 2005) admit that their designs are based on traditional shapes and could give no functional reason why long pointed knives are needed. The average life of a kitchen knife is estimated to be about 10 years.

Many assaults are impulsive, often triggered by alcohol or misuse of other drugs, and the long pointed kitchen knife is an easily available potentially lethal weapon particularly in the domestic setting. Government action to ban the sale of such knives would drastically reduce their availability over the course of a few years. In addition, such legislation would make it harder to justify carrying such knives and prosecution easier.

The Home Office is looking for ways to reduce knife crime. We suggest that banning the sale of long pointed knives is a sensible and practical measure that would have this effect.

Emma Hern, specialist registrar in emergency medicine, Will Glazebrook, specialist registrar in emergency medicine Mike Beckett, consultant in emergency medicine
West Middlesex University Hospital, London TW7 6AF

References
1. Metropolitan Police Service. Latest crime figures for London. www.met.police.uk/crimefigures/ (accessed 20 Jan 2005).

2. Beinart S, Anderson B, Lee S, Utting D: Youth at risk? A national survey of risk factors, protective factors and problem behaviour among young people in England, Scotland and Wales. London, Communities that Care, 2002, JRF Findings 432.

3. Townsend M, Barnett A. Children of five who carry knives in class. Observer 2003, November 23. http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_ne...091441,00.html (accessed 21 Apr 2005)

4. BBC News Online (manual search). http://newssearch.bbc.co.uk/cgibin/s...ws&q=stabbings (accessed 20 Jan 2005).

5. Home Office. Off the streets and out of schools: Home Secretary's fight against knives. Press Release 389/2004. 15 December 2004. www.homeoffice.gov.uk/n_story.asp?item_id=1188 (accessed 30 Mar 2005).

6. Sadler D. Injuries of medico-legal importance. Lecture notes for LLB in Forensic Medicine, University of Dundee. http://www.Dundee.ac.uk/forensicmedi...sdws.htm#stabs (accessed 20 Jan 05).

7. The Sheffield cutlery industry. http://freespace.virgin.net/a.data/T...%20Cutlery.htm (accessed 20 Jan 2005).

8. Knives. http://www.eat-online.net/english/ed...ils/knives.htm (accessed 20 Jan 2005).

[Lady Sidhe]

Bad boys, bad boys, wat'cha gonna do...

[headsplice]

Sweet Mary! That's hilarious! The things some people will do to get into the news.
What about point-ed sticks?

[smoothmoniker]

I'm totally against banning knives.

Instead, what if they required knives to have large rounded rubber balls on the end, that could easily be removed by typing in a combination prior to using them to chop meat? It would probably also be a good idea to make people wait 15 days before buying a pointy knife, so that they aren't purchased and used in rage. Also, we would clearly want to limit the ability of collectors to purchase rare and antique pointy knifes at auctions and large knife shows, since there's no way to know who that guy dropping $50,000 on an original 1820's Snowden-made Bowie Knife really is.

This things make more sense. But we shouldn't ban pointy knifes, because when pointy knives become illegal, only criminals will have pointy knives.

-sm

[Undertoad]

I'm in favor of broad licensing and felony checks for awl purchases. Nobody *needs* to buy an awl so quickly, and they are only really used by professionals.

[Silent]

And ice picks. Who really uses an ice pick except criminals anyways?

[jaguar]

Ok this is however you look at it, fucking stupid. However.

In England you're not even allowed to poke people with a pointed stick in self defense ...

THIS ISN'T FUCKING TRUE WE'VE FUCKING GONE THOUGH THIS ABOUT A FUCKING MONTH AGO. We cannot arbitarily shoot people or carry firearms but you can kill in self defence and home defence as long as you're not over the top about it. End of fucking story. You can do it with legally purchased firearms, knives, golf clubs, cricket bats, outdated loaves of bread, piping, furniture, personal electronic equipment or the prestigious Oxford Dictionary and the only way you'll get in trouble with the law is if you keep going at it once they're down or they're already running away.

[Troubleshooter]

There are legally purchasable firearms in England?

[jaguar]

yes.

[Troubleshooter]

Help me out here.

Can you post a link to information about what's available and what you have to go through to get it?

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by jaguar

...
cannot arbitarily shoot people or carry firearms but you can kill in self defence and home defence as long as you're not over the top about it
...
You can do it with legally purchased firearms, knives, golf clubs, cricket bats, outdated loaves of bread, piping, furniture, personal electronic equipment or the prestigious Oxford Dictionary

Is it legal to do it with the American Heritage Dictionary?