We cannot board a flight with 100ml+ liquid and a rub down - despite being innocent. Sikhs should not be allowed to carry knives for the same reason.

[Ndd1356387]

We are all generally good - right?. And yet we all have to go through security checks at the airport. Despite the fact we are all generally good. But we cannot carry 150ml liquid on a flight. I get that and appreciate it and respect it. Sikhs now must respect that they all cannot carry knives. Surely ?
Edited

Bump

Our nearest airport no longer has these liquid restrictions anyway.

Rub down?

what kind of flights are you getting on?

I am astonished that so many people seemed so unaware of the kirpan exemption.

Although I had only known of small ones people carried. Not ones big enough to kill somebody. It’s one of the 5 Ks.

If im not allowed a derma blade why should a religious knife be any different?

In Scotland it's traditional for the men to wear a sgian-dubh in their kilt socks which they still do for weddings. Granted it's not everyday but they are still worn and part of our heritage. Would you have them banned to?

Sidenote - I do have to confess to having actually accidentally stabbed a lovely gentleman in the arm with his when drunk in my 20s. He was very nice about it but did need a couple of stitches... I was waving it around and it went straight in his bicep. Scottish parties are not to be tricked with 😂

But you weren't flying??

So blunt ones that can't slit the throat or sever any other arteries?

I'm not aware that there has ever been an incident of a Sikh stabbling someone on a plane. Nor that anyone has a religious need to carry more than 100ml of liquid with them.

It's therefore not something I've ever worried about. I'm pretty sure your chances of an engine malfunction or pilot error are probably higher.

I have no religion at all, but am happy to respect other people's beliefs, providing they don't impact on me at all. In this case, I'm pretty sure they don't.
Odd thing to worry about...

I agree! I thought any other person carrying a knife was a criminal offence? As my husband has a little knife thing for camping that he’s extremely careful about carrying around randomly in a rucksack in the unlikely event he ever gets pulled over! Is it illegal?! Why are Sikhs exempt?

There’s an elderly Sikh man who drops his grandchild off at our primary school and has his knife on his belt. It just feels wrong to me to be on a primary school playground with a weapon, religious symbol or not.

Completely missing the point! We don’t carry liquids over 100ml ‘just in case’. Sikhs should not carry knives ‘just in case’

Eh?

Digwa didn't stab Novak with his Kirpan though, he had a second knife that was bigger. His mum took it away to hide the evidence and his brother told him to say that it was done in self defense.

I read that Digwa had been told he wasn't welcome at his Gurdwara because of his behaviour, I wonder how serious that behaviour was and if reporting it could have helped prevent this. Probably the police wouldn't have done anything with the information anyway though.

I have never met a Sikh I didn’t like. I have been to a Sikh wedding where even tots had these daggers.
The Sikh community have said how ashamed they are and appalled at what this man has done.
One mans actions do not make all Sikh people violent about to attack people or bad.
Whether they will be permitted to carry their symbols I don’t know. But I just wanted to say all those I have ever met have been the nicest people.

You said not ones big enough to kill somebody.

So were they blunt then?

Because if the weren't, then of course they could kill somebody.

This comparison is nonsensical.

Astonished? Really? That's interesting. Why would you expect that the majority of British people knew about the kirpan exemption before the tragic news regarding Henry Nowak?

I totally agree, plus the irony is that kirpan is a physical reminder to stand against injustice and to defend the weak - it's not classified as a 'weapon'

Sikhs can also ride motorbikes without a crash helmet if they wear a turban. It's a religious exception made in law - if you disagree you can petition for change.

Plenty of places don't permit Sikhs to carry them on flights:
https://www.worldsikh.org/flying_with_your_kirpan

Also poor Henry Nowak wasn't murdered by a kirpan or on a plane. So apples and oranges here. The judge called it 'a long Sikh dagger' - he didn't even call it a kirpan and indeed the Sikh community have said that it clearly wasn't a kirpan.

Plus when people are running around the streets of big cities with zombie knives and machetes it seems churlish to make this an issue about Sikhs carrying symbols of faith. Reform UK wants to ban kirpans altogether... unsurprising.

This was not a crime related to religion. This was a crime committed by a violent knife obsessed lunatic.
And it was not committed using a kirpan.
Anyone could pick up a kitchen knife and go out and do the same, regardless of their religion.
Knifes are not capable of bringing down a plane and killing hundreds in one go.

I wish people would stop using this brutal murder as an excuse to stir up hatred. I see your agenda.

Isn't this a contradiction? Many people knew there was a thing about a knife, but I imagine they assumed that it was symbolic, and therefore not one that could kill. That's hardly a stupid assumption. And then you go on to admit that you weren't fully aware of exemptions either. So are you not surprised at your own ignorance?

Someone said on the other thread that they have always carried these blades. I'm not sure that's true: I see the Criminal Justice Act 1988, Section 139 mentioned as when it was legalised. Moreover, growing up in NI in the 70s and 80s, I had Sikh friends, and while their fathers wore turbans, I don't think they ever carried knives. It's possible that NI was different to GB in that respect (we weren't allowed fireworks, so...)

But even if it was only NI, that just shows that such a ban doesn't make life impossible for Sikhs.

But he didn't do it with a kitchen knife. Or a pair of scissors. He did it with a Sikh religious knife. The judge said so in his judgment - are you saying he was wrong?

And I don't think it matters whether he had two religious knives because clearly he (and maybe many other Sikhs for all we know) feel entitled to carry the second religious knife - after all, why one and not the other?

The point is that he used what is allegedly not a weapon but a ceremonial object as a weapon to murder an innocent teenager. And posters nitpicking that it's a shastar and not the kirpan that he was also carrying - equally part of his faith apparently, albeit not for all Sikhs, but part of his group - is really not the gotcha you seem to think.

What contradiction? I mean many seem shocked full stop. Like they had never heard of a kirpan.

Sikhs make up 0.9% percent of the UK. Why do you think the majority of British people would have any idea about anything related to sikhism?

They may not have known the name, and/or they may have assumed that it was a symbolic thing, not an actual knife. A bit like yourself assuming that it was only a tiny thing.

I knew there was a "ceremonial dagger" but I certainly didn't think kids would be allowed to take a sharp blade capable of doing serious harm into school. So I assumed it was some sort of symbolic version of the knife. I think that's a reasonable assumption to make. Why would anyone assume that even school pupils will never misuse actual blades? Teens do stupid things. Are teenage Sikhs genetically different?

And the contradiction is that you're surprised that people don't know what you know, but that your own level of very partial knowledge is "unsurprising". I suppose it's that thing of everyone thinking that they're of above average intelligence.