Survivalist's love of "batoning" with a knife seems abusive & impractical

[stabman]

Are there people being idiotic about beating on knives? Sure. Many have seen the guy with the 8" x 6' log smashing in the general direction of a knife.

Driven on a freeway lately? Idiots are everywhere. That observation does not exhaust rational discussion of driving.

Well said.
Let's not have the discussion framed by the idiotic actions of idiots. :thumbup:

 

[Shotgun]

What's the problem?
Now you have two knives.

Seriously, if that broken knife means you die out there, you were just going to die anyway.

(Or think of it as now having a knife AND a wedge...everyone says wedges are good for splitting wood)

No joke. The vast majority of broken knives I've seen are still useable.

 

[stabman]

No joke. The vast majority of broken knives I've seen are still useable.

Actually, a friend of mine took the blade that broke of an old 1980's "survival knife" and repurposed it by scraping the bottom half dull on some cement, then wrapping it in some rags and shoelace.
He still has, and occasionally uses it to this day.

We tend to overthink things here, which is to be expected of knife knuts, but even a broken knife is more advanced than what many of our ancestors had to use to survive day to day.

 

[kniferbro]

It wasn't until I got on Bladeforums that I heard the term batoning. But just that, the term. Round here we just call it splitting a piece of wood with a knife. Been doing it since I was a kid. Whether it be with an actual baton, or the edge of my hand, it's just splitting wood. Now obviously it can be taken to the exteme like batoning logs and what not but what ever. I can understand people not wanting to do it, but to say it's "wrong" is ridiculous.

 

[JSwanagon]

While I was down in the Amazon earlier this year, the indigenous people (from deep in the Amazon) batoned long logs, for bow making, with a machete and a couple wedges. They would baton a little way down the log, then stick a couple wedges in and pull them apart a little to help split it and then baton some more until they were all the way down the log. This is a practice that has been going on for a very long time.

I had a good friend (who unfortunately passed away a few years ago) who was a wilderness survival instructor and he taught batoning. In fact, the knives he designed had batoning specifically in mind. His name was Ron Hood.

 

[RedLynx]

It's cool that you knew Hood. I don't have any of his knives and don't know a lot about him but I remember his passing.

 

[dejard]

"Survivalists, Preppers, and other sorts" Can we take it that those are derogatory labels?

Into which category do you put the USMC Gunny who taught us how to "split wood with a knife" fifty years ago? "Other sort"?

Let me be the first to christen this "Linton's Law." Namely:

As an online discussion of knives, survivalists and/or preppers grows longer, the probability of invoking "the soldier" as a rhetorical device approaches 1.

Congratulations, Mr. Linton.

 

[Thomas Linton]

Another one for the Ignore list.

Also ignore the fifty years part when discussing a "recent fad."

Helps to also ignore UDI's post.

All else failing, ignore the message and attack the messenger. :yawn:

 

[Shotgun]

Are there people being idiotic about beating on knives? Sure. Many have seen the guy with the 8" x 6' log smashing in the general direction of a knife.

Yeah. Youtube really isn't the best place to go for a "how to" on much of anything. Especially batoning or knife use in general. All the videos I've seen were rife with errors and/or bad judgement. Sometimes some good nuggets come through but they're few and far between. A random guy in say...Florida...beating the hell out of a knife through cord wood really doesn't speak to how I use my knife in Oregon to split out a few pieces of kindling. A guy who "can always find dry wood" in Caly can't really tell me that I can ALWAYS find something dry in Oregon. At least not without me chuckling a bit because sometimes you just can't. At least not in any realistic time frame. Half a day looking for something dry or 10 minutes with a knife? I doubt many here would actually say what I was doing with a baton is abuse to be honest though. I've seen more knife abuse in simple carving videos then what I do with a baton.

 

[Thomas Linton]

Yeah. Youtube really isn't the best place to go for a "how to" on much of anything. Especially batoning or knife use in general. All the videos I've seen were rife with errors and/or bad judgement. Sometimes some good nuggets come through but they're few and far between. A random guy in say...Florida...beating the hell out of a knife through cord wood really doesn't speak to how I use my knife in Oregon to split out a few pieces of kindling. A guy who "can always find dry wood" in Caly can't really tell me that I can ALWAYS find something dry in Oregon. At least not without me chuckling a bit because sometimes you just can't. At least not in any realistic time frame. Half a day looking for something dry or 10 minutes with a knife? I doubt many here would actually say what I was doing with a baton is abuse to be honest though. I've seen more knife abuse in simple carving videos then what I do with a baton.

"Low barriers to entry" mean that anyone can publish. At least, unlike ePrey, most mean well. Most.

 

[Shotgun]

Let me be the first to christen this "Linton's Law." Namely:

As an online discussion of knives, survivalists and/or preppers grows longer, the probability of invoking "the soldier" as a rhetorical device approaches 1.

Congratulations, Mr. Linton.

The vast majority of responses in this thread(and ones like it), on both sides, is;

"My way is better than yours even though I freely admit that I don't know what your way is."

I used to get miffed at these threads until I realized the person on the other side had no frame of reference for what I was actually doing. Now they're just funny. I baton, chop, saw, fuzz, smash etc. All the methods work. It's knowing when each works best for you and your environment that is key.

 

[sideways]

While I was down in the Amazon earlier this year, the indigenous people (from deep in the Amazon) batoned long logs, for bow making, with a machete and a couple wedges. They would baton a little way down the log, then stick a couple wedges in and pull them apart a little to help split it and then baton some more until they were all the way down the log. This is a practice that has been going on for a very long time.

I had a good friend (who unfortunately passed away a few years ago) who was a wilderness survival instructor and he taught batoning. In fact, the knives he designed had batoning specifically in mind. His name was Ron Hood.

Ron Hood was a cool guy and the buck hoodlum was a good knife.

 

[sideways]

Let me be the first to christen this "Linton's Law." Namely:

As an online discussion of knives, survivalists and/or preppers grows longer, the probability of invoking "the soldier" as a rhetorical device approaches 1.

Congratulations, Mr. Linton.

For those not in the know he is alluding to Godwin's law. I can't tell what the point is though.

 

[cchu518]

When camping I split wood with one of those home depot hatchets true tempered forged steel fiberglass handle. I whack it with a hammer. I've probably whacked mine a few thousand times and the head has never deformed. Just saying. ☺

 

[RX-79G]

For those not in the know he is alluding to Godwin's law. I can't tell what the point is though.

I think he's getting at the idea that there is a (false) hierarchy of authority figures used in discussions of things like guns and knives. It starts with the loathsome (and mythological) "mall ninja" and ends with either some corporately sponsored competitor/TV personality or elite military unit.

This hierarchy enables the invoker to debase one opinion by associating it with someone low on the list, while bolstering another opinion by associating it with someone higher up. "Prepper" = jackass, "USMC Gunny" = saintly figure. Forget the possibility that the Gunny might be a prepper.


It is tiresome on both sides, since we all know military crackpots as well as very smart "amateurs".

The argument that trumps all of this is that "batoning" is not new, even if its notoriety is. Neither are zombies, big field knives or doing things the hard way.

 

[stabman]

Now that the batonning issue is settled for a minute, on to the next dilemma...what is a "survivalist" really?

Has to be at least a few hundred ideas as to what it really means.

 

[Thomas Linton]

I think he's getting at the idea that there is a (false) hierarchy of authority figures used in discussions of things like guns and knives. It starts with the loathsome (and mythological) "mall ninja" and ends with either some corporately sponsored competitor/TV personality or elite military unit.

This hierarchy enables the invoker to debase one opinion by associating it with someone low on the list, while bolstering another opinion by associating it with someone higher up. "Prepper" = jackass, "USMC Gunny" = saintly figure. Forget the possibility that the Gunny might be a prepper.


It is tiresome on both sides, since we all know military crackpots as well as very smart "amateurs".

The argument that trumps all of this is that "batoning" is not new, even if its notoriety is. Neither are zombies, big field knives or doing things the hard way.

Illustrating how preconceptions interfere with communication.

Thesis: batoning is a recent fad.

Antithesis: batoning was being taught 50 - and many more - years ago by U.S.M.C. I.e.:

The argument that trumps all of this is that "batoning" is not new. . . .

Interesting Interpretation: A USMC Master Gunnery Sergeant teaching at a service survival school is falsely cited as "authority" but may be a poor source of information on acceptable technique for survival - perhaps even a "prepper."

I further mentioned the teacher, and Mors and Ray, not as authorities but to challenge the thesis that those teaching batoning may be dismissed as "Survivalists, Preppers, and other sorts."

 

[sideways]

Now that the batonning issue is settled for a minute, on to the next dilemma...what is a "survivalist" really?

Has to be at least a few hundred ideas as to what it really means.

I'm sure you can find at least 100 over here. http://survivalblog.com/

The answer is there are as many kinds of survivalists as there are survivalists, and they range on a scale from single urban mom, to empire building capitalist, to quack in the hills. Under a broad definition every person on the planet qualifies by virtue of being alive.

 

[JSwanagon]

It's cool that you knew Hood. I don't have any of his knives and don't know a lot about him but I remember his passing.

Ron Hood was a cool guy and the buck hoodlum was a good knife.

Ron really was an outstanding human being and one of the greats. Definitely missed.

I still have my TOPS Hoodlum, it was one of the first made. He sent it out to me as a gift and asked me to put it through the rounds and tell him what I thought. He gave me one of the first Buck Hoodlums too and I really liked it, but I still like my TOPS Hoodlum better and use it more often than not. When you look at the two next to each other it is obvious which one is my favorite.

I miss him a lot.

 

[craytab]

Now that the batonning issue is settled for a minute, on to the next dilemma...what is a "survivalist" really?

Has to be at least a few hundred ideas as to what it really means.

Wait, I survive nearly every single day here on earth. Does that make me a survivalist?

But let's not take all this too seriously. Life is still about having fun, right? Enjoyment? Who doesn't like smashing the crap out of stuff with a really big knife?