Should knives with points be banned?

[OonaStubbs]

All the recent attacks have been through stabbing, why not ban pointy knives and just sell knives with rounded ends? Or at least heavily, heavily restrict the sale of pointy knives to those who have a legitimate need for them, have them branded with serial numbers and prevent re-sale etc?

I think if the psycho who wants to maim and injure can’t find a pointy knife, they will just use something else instead.

Surely anything that reduces stabbing deaths is worth a try?

Well, no, not anything.

You could reduce stabbing deaths by enforcing a nationwide curfew, no one exits their house apart from delivery drivers and healthcare practitioners, everyone works from home and online dating and shopping are now mandatory.

But that would clearly be ridiculous. So we draw the line somewhere.

Banning pointed knives would have very few negative effects. Chefs and other people that have a legitimate need to use them but there would be strict rules about them, just like there is with guns.

So, a chef could use a knife in work, but not at home? Ridiculous.

I don’t think you are the brightest

Not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

Don't be daft

There's domestic kitchens and amateur cooks across the UK. We use pointed knives, have a lethal set of sushi knives.

It takes months to get a gun license. Do you really expect the police, doctors , to handle the amount of paperwork producing a knife license would produce?

Ban knives and criminals could use pointed sticks. Axes. Clubs.

Guns must stay banned as they can be used at a distance. You have to get really up close to use other weapons - much more "personal", danger of injury to the assailant and of course messy.

The type of knife isn't the problem, it's the carrying. Knives belong in kitchens and workshops, never out in public.

I think much harsher jail time for carrying - I'd say 10 years. If under 18 then Youth Detention until 18 then adult jail.

We use pointed knives on the bar to cut the fruit up
It would be ridiculous to have to licence everyone for that but make it incredibly hard to only licence some

Errr... I need my sharp pointy knives to cook food for my family. PLUS, can you imagine recalling all the knives?
Madness

How would that work anyway? There are amnesty box type things out there now already. They would fill up in minutes if everyone had to surrender anything other than butter knives.

It would only be pointy knives that would be banned. Knives with sharp edges but rounded points would still be allowed.

Do you cook?

All my knives have pointy ends, even my little peeling knife, I use the pointy bit to dig any eyes out. The pointed bit is an intrinsic part of the design. That’s why it’s pointed.

Yes, you've said this. The problem is that the sharp pointy ends of sharp pointy knives are used daily by many millions of people to prepare food.

You do realise you can still kill someone with a sharp edge? And you can stab someone with most blunt items given enough force.

This, you can't ban all pointy things

Surely anything that reduces stabbing deaths is worth a try?

They could try policing again I suppose. And not have derisory prison sentences.

I don’t think it’s a stupid suggestion at all. It has been suggested before by doctors and makes sense to me. A knife can be useful for prepping food if it has a sharp blade but the end does not need to be pointy. Anything that makes it harder to use a knife as a weapon is a good thing. Of course the knife could be sharpened to a point if someone wanted to go to the time and effort to do that. But taking away the point which causes so much damage and replacing it with a wider rounded tip makes it harder to do that initial breaking of skin.

Link to an old article, but there are more recent arguments for this out there.

www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/may/27/ukcrime.prisonsandprobation#:~:text=Writing%20in%20the%20British%20Medical,banned%20without%20unduly%20inconveniencing%20cooks.

But why would chefs be ok but not to cook at home?
Or builders when at work but not to then do DiY at home?
Or crafters who work at home?

What about scissors? Do we have to have scissors with roundy edges too, like 5 year olds?
What about screwdrivers? Hammers?
Terrorists drive vehicles into people, do we have to get rid of them too?

It's not a bad idea. I cook loads and barely use the point.

I barely cook, but do crafts where you need a point.

Okay, but off the top of my head, without a point how would you

• remove the tendon from a chicken fillet
• pierce potato skins
• score pastry
• devein a prawn
• pit an olive

people with a legitimate need....
so, anyone that cooks, for a start.
maybe supermarkets should only sell pre-chopped veg. if you grow your own veg, tough. all meat should be sold in bite sized cubes or slices only. ban every hobby that involves sharp points.

how are you going to chop harder vegetables, squashes etc, without a point to start the cutting?