dealing with friends who are not knife persons....

Here's a short conversation that transpired today at the local ice cream shop when two kids about my age noticed my Case fixed blade on my hip (my shirt rode up over it while I was riding my bike), and one decided to say something about it. Also, the knife only had a 4" blade, its not like it was a monster or anything. Btw., the kids weren't my friends, nor did I know them.

Other kid: "Wow dude, what do you have that knife on you for?"

Me: "For cutting things."

Other kid: "Like people?" *snickers to his pal*

Me: *Gets an annoyed look on my face* "Only when they annoy me."

Other kid: *Eyes going wide and backing up a step* "Oh... I see... uh, see ya' later. *Him and his pal walk away without the ice cream they just ordered* :D (It was an outside ordering window).

I had to quickly explain to the girl at the window that I just said that to get them to shut up, and that I would never dream of attacking someone with a knife.

Also, I know that wasn't the way to "win hearts and minds," and it definitely wasn't mature, but when someone just makes an off-color remark about my knife-carrying to get a reaction out of me (what would be considered trolling online), I tend to mess with them a little bit. If they seemed genuinely concerned, it would have been different.
 
macgregor22 said:
Oh I eat healthy, I just eat meat to.
Sometimes meat I have hunted and killed myself, which of course sets them off in a tizzy also.
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You should let them know that the meat you kill yourself is FAR healthier than what most grocery stores sell. You might also let them know that because of the imbalance of predator to prey which exists in much of the continental US.,
hunting is absolutely NECESSARY in order to keep a healthy prey population. (or maybe they'd rather see Bambi die of EBOLA!, or whatever)

(also, if you wanna freak em out)
Tell them that their instincts are predatory by nature and there's nothing they can do about it. :eek:
Then send them a very pretty knife for Christmas! :)
 
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LMAO, thats great Mick. :D
I may do that.
Yeah, I love lean meat.
Nothing like deer you shot and butchered that day cooked over a fire at camp.

Fucius, good to hear your making so many new friends with your Case.
Wait till you get a car, I think I have ten knives in mine.
 
macgregor22 said:
Fucius, good to hear your making so many new friends with your Case.
Wait till you get a car, I think I have ten knives in mine.
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The cool part is, I've only had the knife for about 2 days, and I've already got a story to go with it!:D

Too poor for a vehicle right now, so I ride my bike everywhere. Hey look on the bright side, at least I don't have to buy gas. :)
 
My father has always appreciated knives as did all the men in his family and I've alway had knives. My first was a fixed blade from Gibson's Dad got me when I was about 8 or 9. A Case skinner with a 5 inch blade. I grew up in the Deep South and Men and most teenagers I knew carried a pocket knife. Now I live in Maine and I don't know anyone that carry's a pocket knife. Heck, even the two guys that run the gun shop don't carry a pocket knife. But when I go home all my buddies have something in thier pocket (these guys are all college educated fellas too).

Maybe some of this problem is cultural as well as political as someone posted earlier. Anyway, I don't care if anybody likes my knife hobbies.

On the other hand, 1st cousin on my (mother's side) visited and I showed him a knife I recently made...nice 5" D2 fixed with micarta scale...and he said "I guess you can kill somebody with that" Idiot! So I said "Never thought of that, I was trying to make a skinner/camp knife" To wit he gives me a gotcha grin.

I have a Benchmade Skirmish that I don't carry around because it big and aggressive. That's to bad because its a fine piece of craftsmanship and a strong knife is always handy in my book. But I live in safe peaceful Maine and unless your going hunting or camping nobody sees much a need for that ole stockman in thier pocket.
 
Gunfucius said:
The cool part is, I've only had the knife for about 2 days, and I've already got a story to go with it!:D

Too poor for a vehicle right now, so I ride my bike everywhere. Hey look on the bright side, at least I don't have to buy gas. :)
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Hey Gunny! I never did thank you for the welcome you gave me to the forum a few weeks back. So, THANKS! :thumbup:

That's a good outlook you've got on the transport situation but I don't think you realize how lucky you really are.

If I didn't have to spend about $90. a week on gas, I'd have a lot more of the knives I want.
Probably ALL of them!! :D
 
Flatlander1963 said:
I live in the west now, but for quite a while I lived in the south. And I would say that pocket knives are definitely more a part of the culture there.
Of course Texas (it's sort of the south, but different) is a whole other story. I lived there for a short while and I met girls that not only carried pocket knives, but chewed and spit tobacco as well!!

Girls that know how to handle knives are a real turn on! (but the tobacco spittle in the corner of the mouth was a little tough for me to get past)

Anyhow, what it is, is that I don't know what it is. A lot of my friends out here carry pocket knives (I work with construction savages), but most of their kids (teenagers) aren't into it.

Geographical? Generational? . . . I dunno.


PS. Goin back to Georgia next winter to canoe the Okefenokee.
Can't hardly wait!!! (love them peaches!) :D
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jkarp_53 said:
Maybe it's a "generational" thing, where they weren't brought up with the need to have good cutlery around, other than dull butterknives, and so don't understand HOW important these things are to us.
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IMO part of it is generational in that anyone in school since the early 1990s and maybe late 1980s has been behaviorally conditioned by the school system to see knives only as weapons and weapons to be evil and associated with gangs. Some people are less effected by this conditioning, and then there are those that LIKE gangs/violence.

I've also noticed that adults during this time period became infected with PC programming even though they were not in school. They were normal in the 1980s and in the 1990s they seemed to accept PC programming as if they attended government schools themselves.

The need for good knives is even more than when I was a kid IMO. I remember the days of blister pack packages where all you had to do was tear the plastic blister pack off the cardboard backing. Now things have multiple layers of plastic that need to be cut away. It seems strange, but I actually end up using blades more at home than when outdoors, excluding yardwork.
 
Back in the late 70s, I was living about 30 miles outside of Washington D.C.
A friend of mine and I got a job doing some major renovation work in a couple of apartments, side by side. They were in a particularly "bad" part of D.C. and we were not the "predominate" color there. This may be politicly incorrect to mention, but thats just how it was and it definitely had an effect on how we were treated.
At lunch time we would walk about 1/2 mile to a Deli that was just out side of the "danger zone". For a while we were verbally threatened EVERY day while going to and from lunch. Once, we even had a large (30-40 lbs.) tree branch thrown at us from the roof of a 3 story apartment building! (it missed but it was close) The next day my buddy showed up at work with a US. Cavalry saber!
From then on, when we went to lunch he carried that saber in a sheath on his belt and I would carry my 22 oz. framing hammer on a belt loop. We were never threatened again.(although we never did feel any love either!) And only once did a cop on foot patrol (in the safe zone) ask us why we were carrying weapons. When we told him where we were working, all he said was "be careful". The owner of the deli never even blinked.

In July of 2001, I went into a State Court building in North Carolina. A security officer in the lobby simply ASKED me if I was carrying any weapons. When I pulled the 3" Buck folding knife from my pocket, he kind of shrugged and said "that's not a weapon".

But then we all know what happened about a month and a half or so later.

My point being that, IMO, the relatively recent change in attitudes towards carrying a knife is in LARGE part due to 17 Saudi's (plus 2,?) carrying box cutters.
 
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could be, man, could be.

The only people who have reacted negatively to my "gear"... whether it be guns or knives or my crossbow or whatever.. have been women and cops. And when I calmly explain to the cops what I have, they're usually ok with it. Women, OTOH, not so much.

I think once a cop sees that you're a respected member of society (assuming you are ;) ), he'll calm down. A sane middle class guy with a knife is one thing, an unstable psycho with a knife is something else. :eek:
 
crustaceanmick said:
My point being that, IMO, the relatively recent change in attitudes towards carrying a knife is in LARGE part due to 17 Saudi's (plus 2,?) carrying box cutters.
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For airports, yes, but not everything.

Kids who otherwise were not troublemakers or criminals have been arrested for carrying SAKs in schools since the early 1990s. Some have been arrested for butter knives in lunch boxes and there have been arrests for GI Joe action figure guns, which are obviously too small to be actual weapons. All this came from the "gangbanger scare" of the late 1980s/early 1990s.
 
crustaceanmick said:
Back in the late 70s, I was living about 30 miles outside of Washington D.C.
A friend of mine and I got a job doing some major renovation work in a couple of apartments, side by side. They were in a particularly "bad" part of D.C. and we were not the "predominate" color there. This may be politicly incorrect to mention, but thats just how it was and it definitely had an effect on how we were treated.
At lunch time we would walk about 1/2 mile to a Deli that was just out side of the "danger zone". For a while we were verbally threatened EVERY day while going to and from lunch. Once, we even had a large (30-40 lbs.) tree branch thrown at us from the roof of a 3 story apartment building! (it missed but it was close) The next day my buddy showed up at work with a US. Cavalry saber!
From then on, when we went to lunch he carried that saber in a sheath on his belt and I would carry my 22 oz. framing hammer on a belt loop. We were never threatened again.(although we never did feel any love either!) And only once did a cop on foot patrol (in the safe zone) ask us why we were carrying weapons. When we told him where we were working, all he said was "be careful". The owner of the deli never even blinked.

In July of 2001, I went into a State Court building in North Carolina. A security officer in the lobby simply ASKED me if I was carrying any weapons. When I pulled the 3" Buck folding knife from my pocket, he kind of shrugged and said "that's not a weapon".

But then we all know what happened about a month and a half or so later.

My point being that, IMO, the relatively recent change in attitudes towards carrying a knife is in LARGE part due to 17 Saudi's (plus 2,?) carrying box cutters.
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That's the thing, though, different times :(
 
Keep your friends close and your knife collection closer.

Just kidding. :D

I would just stay cool and not worry too much about what other people think.
It does help to have one or two really good friends though, otherwise you really can go nuts. ;)
 
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Benjamin Liu said:
The need for good knives is even more than when I was a kid IMO. I remember the days of blister pack packages where all you had to do was tear the plastic blister pack off the cardboard backing. Now things have multiple layers of plastic that need to be cut away. It seems strange, but I actually end up using blades more at home than when outdoors, excluding yardwork.
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And it's astonishing how many people will choose to continue wrestling with those Mega-Super-Theft-Proof-Container-Of-Doom blister packs instead of just picking up a small folding knife, or for heaven's sake a pair of safety scissors.

Something, anything. It's sad and amusing at the same time to watch the same people try to open a blister pack with their car keys for the umpteenth time, and still get as frustrated as ever, as if they can't understand why the thing won't just pop open.
 
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