Knife crime.
There's a new Home Office ad campaign - this page has some of the ad material.
In the programme tonight, we are planning to look at an angle not often discussed - the idea that if kitchen knives didn't have those sharp points, lives on the streets could be saved.
Listen to PM
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Don't forget forks, nasty pointy things.
And after knives have been blunted and forks depronged, youths will rampage around with spoons, and on that day only Uri Gellar will be safe.
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So now we're all expected to live on ready meals?
Knives have been available, both for culinary and non culinary, purposes since time immemorial, it's only attitudes that have varied.
A few decades ago it was flicknives that were the weapon of choice, but they were designed as weapons, so it was appropriate to outlaw them.
There's only so much you can do to protect mankind from its own stupidity.
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That's an interesting idea taking the point away from kitchen knives.
I'm trying to think about when was the last time I used the point of a kitchen knife and I cannot remember. And no SSC before you get in... I cook from ingredients about 5-6 times a week :o)
The most use for the 'sabatoeur' knife is as a chopping action. Peelers peel. Skewers test for temperature.
Do we need points on kitchen knives? Maybe not.
Anything to stop these senseless deaths.
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personally i wouldn't fancy being attacked with a peeler
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Oh, so slashing through an artery with the edge of the knife wouldn't be lethal then?
Darn! Up until this moment, I've believed everything I've seen on CSI.
Another myth bites the dust ;o(
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Does this mean that cars will be banned because reckless drivers can kill people, MPs sent home because they took this country to war killing countless Iraqi civilians and beaches will be fenced off in case someone might drown?
All that will happen is the average Joe will loose out. Guns are illegal but people still get shot...
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I have to disagree with the chef in the programme. I use the point of my kitchen knife on a regular basis, since (not being able to afford fancy Japanese ones!) it is not always easy to begin the cut on, say, a tomato.
You can use something like a mandolin for that, but this would only give you a certain kind of slice, and may not be what you want.
The next thing they'll be talking about is banning screwdrivers. Frankly, if somebody is bent on behaving badly, they'll find the weaponry.
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I regularly scour the shops for kitchen knives WITHOUT pointed ends because I am worried about people impaling themselves on them if the dishwasher is open and they are sticking up in the cutlery rack - even the small knives are very sharp. I used to be able to buy rounded-ended knives but haven't been able to get hold of any for the last few years.
Helen Hallpike
PS If you put them downwards the sharp point sticks through the cutlery basket and can scratch the rotating arm.
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Big Sis, me, too, re starting to cut a tomato. Pierce, then slice/divide.
Mandolins can be dangerous - you can take a nice sliver off your nail, if you're lucky, or fingertip/knuckle, if you're not.
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helenhallpike @ 8, I find that it takes me between three and eight seconds to wash a kitchen-knife, and if I put it into a dishwasher I would almost certainly need to take it out again for use five minutes later.
I've just been cooking supper, using three knives in the process. The one I find wonderful to use is one I inherited from my mother, whose mother had inherited it when she set up housekeeping. It has a bone handle and an iron blade (not stainless at all), rounded at the end and able to take an edge like a razor. If I want to slice an onion or tomato, that's what I use. I have another similar one that I am keeping in reserve uin case the first breaks: it cost me ten pence in a charity shop.
The other two, Sabatier-alikes, one with a seven-inch blade and the other a three-inch one, mostly have their points used only to break in to the otherwise impenetrable plastic wrapping round decent honest ingredients. They are for slicing things like meat that don't need to have the surface broken before they can be cut.
So I don't really use the points of knives when I am cooking. Even so, I would oppose any move to get rid of knives with points. It will make life just a bit more circumscribed and inconvenient for almost everyone, and it won't stop people from deliberately hurting each other. They'll just find something else: chisels? Stanley knives? (And the news has just talked about a severed thumb in a picture of a crime, which can't have been done with the point of a knife.)
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Chris: I have two such knives and they are, if regularly sharpened, simply superb. However, I suspect they'd also be lethal if misused.
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I agree - let's take all the points off all the knives. In fact we really shouldn't be allowed sharp things at all. You can do a lot of damage with a hatpin. we should also ban the carrying of matches and lighters, and only be allowed plastic crockery.
Or maybe we could all try growing up?
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I have been told by someone in the business that 'there is no such thing as a dangerous weapon: there are only dangerous men'. The person who said this knows three ways to kill someone with a chopstick, I think he has said, and speaks cheerfully about 'murder by plastic pocket-comb'. I don't ask whether he knows about these things from experience, and rather hope not, but clearly we should ban chopsticks and combs just in case.
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Big sis (7) I use a very small 3" serrated blade for tomatoes, mushrooms etc. It does not have a point and works well. Always in use.
I think the point (pardon the pun) is that if we were to stop selling pointed knives, fewer people would get stabbed. Also the notion that it is only guys who carry them is a myth. A long time ago I worked front of stage security at a rock festival. A very pretty girl said she'd dropped her metal comb over the scaff pole type barrier and could I pick it up and give it back to her. I bend down and it was a kitchen knife with a 4" blade. She was expecting to get it back!
I was astounded.
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I was really mad at eddie tonight, when talking to the knife guy about pointed knives, eddie let him get away with it, such tail wagging the dog polices, ie ban pointed knives, so 65 million people have to get rid of thier knives in case some little shit takes one out to get even with some other little shit. I amazed eddie let him get away with that ?????
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mygloriusleader (14) said:
"I think the point (pardon the pun) is that if we were to stop selling pointed knives, fewer people would get stabbed."
...and more people will get slashed. You might say that's likely to mean fewer fatal knife attacks, but I would say it'll mean more non-fatal knife attacks. Is it worth it?
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What was interesting was that the Dr said that the number of injuries hasn't increased, only the number of police reports of knife crime. If the man who has to deal with the consequences of pointed knives thinks unpointed knives are less likely to kill (albeit that they can kill) then we should take notice.
In the days when schools had metalworkshops youngsters would grind broken bandsaw blades to make fishing knives such a move would be pointless (Ahg!). But now, banning pointed knives from the kitchen would either reduce deaths or increase the ingenuity of youngsters. Lock up your grinders.
Perhaps we could start a craze for using tazers rather than knives.
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Quite a long time ago now a controlled experiment was conducted in which pre-shool (then: it meant 'younger than five') children were divided into two groups during play: those who were given toy guns among their other toys, and those who were not given toy guns. The ones with guns available pointed them at each other and said 'bang, you're dead'. The ones without guns did one of two things instead: they either made gun-like objects from their construction toys, pointed those at each other and said 'bang, you're dead', or if they lacked the manual skill to construct reasonably gun-like objects, they hit each other with other toys if they wanted to express the 'you're dead' part of the games they were playing.
Taking away the 'guns' in no case took away the violent game reaction, apparently; it just altered the way in which it was manifested.
If the pointed knives are taken away, that may stop stabbing-with-a-knife, but it won't stop the ingenuity that can make a lethal weapon out of a huge range of other household or readily-obtained objects, or simply use them to hit someone over the head with and crack his skull.
It does seem to me that the solitary member of the BMA who wants to have pointed knives banned really could direct his energy in a slightly less daft direction.
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Here's an idea . . .
Carry a knife = 5 years in prison.
Surely this would be a suitable deterrent??
Not enough space in prisons?? I'd gladly pay £1 more in tax to have them locked up and off the street.
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