WHAT DO YOU THINK???

narruc1,
GREAT topic and one I hadn't thought about much before. As far as the minor thing goes I pretty much agree with everyone else in that adults are just as likely, if not more so, to do dumb things as kids. However, just as someone mentioned above, it is illegal in some States/Counties to sell to minors. Being the Net I would think that most of the laws regarding sales from a responsible person to a 'minor' representing as an adult are something of a 'gray' area. Actually, I didn't read the small stuff when I signed on here but rather just agreed so I don't know if there is a statement in there like the ones on the sites which state.... "It is the responsibility of the Buyer NOT the Seller... etc.... to comply with all State and Federal Laws regarding an individual sale." So, I think that would cover you in case it were to become an issue 'once'. More than that and I would have no idea what would happen. As far as BladeAuction goes I've bought LOTS of knives there and never once, when initially signing up or later, been asked to prove my age in any manner and have conducted most transactions with MO/PayPal so there is no way to verify from the Sellers standpoint. Autos as well.... No problem. So, I don't know how accurate that story is about the DA and perhaps it was a good 'bluff' to scare someone. I don't know. As far as the Mail part goes and the Federal crime you could use UPS as it is 'privately' owned and not connected with the Federal Government. The laws do suck in many instances, I agree.

As far as minors having knives/guns I'll have to join the long list of Boy/Eagle Scouts out there who got my first knife when I was probably 7/8, first SAK at 9/10, first shotgun at 13, rifle at 15 and hunting big game at 16 for my birthday. Was shooting guns with family members WAY before I was old enough to own one and took 'Hunters Safety' in Middle School as a 'required' course. I think the best way to teach responsibility with guns is hunting..... When you're a little guy and you blast your first rabbit then go up to it and see it kickin' and screaming like a psychotic pic and you have to kneel down and slit its' throat to bleed it out then watch as the blood soaks into the sand, the legs twitch, and the eyes go ashy gray it sticks with you for awhile and you learn a newfound respect as you put two and two together in that it could be you or another 'human' on the ground just as easily. I'm not saying there is a 'wealth' of common sense out there but it would help. From conversations with people who I knew were minors around here and the general atmosphere we enjoy at BladeForums I think that the concern you brought up is a valid one but one that I will hope never needs to be taken into consideration and hope I/no-one else never/ever have to regret that decision. In fact, I think there should be a 'Teen' forum here as there seems to be a 'number' of people around who would enjoy it and be a cool place to socialize for them. The only thing I know for sure about my teenage years was it wasn't when I 'had' something to do or someplace to go that I got into trouble but rather when I was allowed to let my mind wander and 'look' for things to do. I think this place has enough structure to handle teenage members and it would take a pretty significant amound of maturity to communicate on this level and I think the 'ne-er do-wells' would quickly get bored and leave. I would really like to hear Mike/Sparks two cents on this issue though.

Shawn
 
narruc1 says:

1) Fact... It is against the law to sell a knife to a minor.
Click to expand...

This may (or may not) be a fact where narruc1 lives. I don't know. narruc1 does not say where he lives. If it is a fact there, narruc1 doesn't say how he knows it is a fact. Lots of people (even including LEOs) have erroneous ideas of what the law is. I've seen a recent thread about knife laws in California (I think it was actually on rec.knives) where almost all of the posts, although they were stated in a very positive tone, were actually erronious.

narruc1 may be correct about the law in his location, but since I don't know what law he believes he is referring to, I wouldn't put much credence in his simple statement that it is a "fact". A citation from, e.g., the Los Angeles municple code, would certainly clarify his position, but would also demonstrate that this is a local law rather than a universal one.

AFAIK, there is no such US federal law and it is unlikely that there would ever be.


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Paul Neubauer
prn@bsu.edu
If the odds are a million to one against something occurring, chances are 50-50 it will.
 
I know there is no CA state law prohibiting the selling of knives to minors. I also know that San Francisco Municipal code 17 prohibits selling or giving knives to minors (except table knives) by anyone other than the parent. I don't expect any problems with any of that here, especially with higher end knives, not when anyone can go to Bladeauction and buy a cheap auto for $15. Punks don't go for expensive knives. I wouldn't worry.


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Jason aka medusaoblongata
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"I have often laughed at the weaklings who call themselves kind because they have no claws"

- Zarathustra
 
Hello All,

I have been handling both guns and knives since I was 9 years old - no problems yet
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Don't worry - be happy
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regards.
 
Hello All,

Sorry - double post, something happened.
regards.


[This message has been edited by moonstone (edited 08-06-2000).]
 
Narruc1 is right. Black and white, no doubt about it.

Seems to me there was recently an issue with minors having weapons sold to them illegally--it happened in Columbine. The man who sold the weapons to these minors illegally had some culpability for their actions.

My example is a little extreme but you get the picture.

The problem is though, as others have stated, it is hard to regulate, and laws do vary from place to place.

I DO think that it is fairly reasonable to say that in most, or at very least in many places, you have to be 18 to buy a knife.

If a minor wants a knife badly enough for legitimate use, and is responsible enough to own one then I am sure that a parent or guardian would be willing to purchase it for him with the minor's money.

I like my knives, my guns, and all of my freedoms too, but I think that one needs to be reasonable and willing to accept some limitations and inconveniences for the good of the whole.

Matt
 
My dad bought me my first knife when I was around 6. A farm kid without a knife just didn't make much sense. I needed a knife to cut the twine on a bale of hay, open a sack of feed or fertilizer, etc. Up to that point I always had to borrow my dad's or brother's or uncle's knife. Yeah, I gave myself a few cuts growing up. It's a dangerous world out there. But it's better than living in a bubble. Teach your kids how to use a knife responsibly and then trust them. I was proud as hell of my first knife, my first gun, my first fishing rod. Give a kid a chance to have a little pride in ownership and it can mean a lot.

Of course, it's a different world out there today. Kids own so much and it's all high tech. Parent's are now competing with video games or worse yet, using video games like a drug to keep their kids occupied. Oh $hit I could go on and on but what's the point?



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Hoodoo

And so, to all outdoor folks, the knife is the most important item of equipment.

Ellsworth Jaeger - Wildwood Wisdom
 
Naruc I feel the same way about the teen issue. I had carried a folder or fixed blade as a teen all the time. I feel I was very responsible with it. However, these are different times.

Now with the "easy fix it" ideology of legisltors to respond to media sensasionalism of incidents. Make a new law something happened and a teen was involved!!! Just look at how legislation reacts to any gun incident. Hurry make a law is the ansewer to a much larger issue.
This only hurts the honest people.

Granted that most bad guys will not purchase an expensive, or collector knife to go out and do evil.But we should just check your buyer out. This is a sue happy america also...no need to explain on this. Just good advice to CYA!!!!

Just my .02


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[This message has been edited by Frank Castle (edited 08-06-2000).]
 
This is actually a great topic and one I thought of after Columbine. I'm in the medical field so I am acustom to thinking about liability issues. Narruc's question was very clear to me and I think he was absolutely correct about posting it. Don't fool yourself, if you sell a knife to someone under 18 and they get in trouble for it or get caught someone may come after you.

This has nothing to do with the young folks here, or who should have a knife or not. This has nothing to do with "I know kids that are more responsible than adults". The fact is an adult can't sue you for just selling him a knife. An irate parent, or district attorney may.

I ALWAYS state in my for-sale posts that I can only sell to someone over 18. It just makes sense to me. I as a parent would want to OK any sale my children make so I want to afford other parents the same opporunity. Incidentally my kids have tons of knives.

Mike Turber has a canned statement you can put into your emails that may protect you if you feel you need to be. Perhaps if Mike reads this, he will post it. It is lawyeresse but in the real world people are often after some quick cash and suing people is almost the norm now. If you don't think so you probably don't work in a highly liable field.

Didn't someone get a $$$ for spilling hot McDonald's coffee on their lap?

Good post...

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~Greg Mete~
Kodiak Alaska

[This message has been edited by Kodiak PA (edited 08-06-2000).]
 
Narruc1, I am a "minnor" and like most other individuals my age I try to act responsibly, and if I don't I fess up. Which probably attributes too my parents trusting attitude.

As a rule I don't buy online, although I have considered it. If I want a knife or a MA weapon I either have my mom or dad take me to a store and buy with my own money or have my instructor buy out of a catalog.

I not sure what the signup policy was like when you joined but they did ask for my age when I signed up recently.

I think problems don't actually lie in online vendors but in the lack of maturity in people my age as a whole.( there I said it.)

Keep in touch, Tut



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Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn my god do you learn.
C.S. Lewis
 
Narruc1,
Strider had a valid point at the beginning of this thread, let me elaborate. Okay maybe a minor can't buy a kitchen knife but all of them have kitchen knives in their home, most of them have machetes or axes or chainsaws or even screwdrivers in their garages. Are these implements any less dangerous? When I was a knife crazed minor I used to take cheap kitchen utensils and sharpen them on the grindstone in my garage. The point is I was/am responsible. I never stabbed or hurt anybody or myself. You can't keep knives or knife alternatives out of the hands of minors or anyone that wants them. Why on earth would a kid with trouble on his mind go to the trouble of buying knives on the forums. The world is full of dangers and a kid is really no more likely to hurt themselves with a knife than they are falling down the stairs and breaking their neck. If someone wants to hurt someone they're gonna do it, and if a kid doesn't have knife to cut themselves with they will find another way to do it.
It's just like guns: "Outlaw guns and the only peple that have them are outlaws."
 
As to the legality of the issue, It is the sole responsiblity of the buyer and/or the seller.
 
In response to Kodiak PA's bringing up Columbine, I'm almost positive they used guns not knives, and were both said to be mentally disturbed because of problems at home and outcasts among their peers. For the most part middle-class families are happy but now and then you get an odd bunch. Violence happens the world over everyday commited by people of all ages. One example would be the mining of Angola to deliberately harm civilians, but who ever hears about that, or how about the murders commited by adult in the big cities everyday.
First and foremost the problem dosen't lie in society as much as it does on the individual.

The part where society as a whole comes into blame is when individuals showing signs of mental instability, anger, and fear are left alone to grow even more volitile. But I also understand the argument made by the school boards that if a student needs help the have plenty of places to go to, but putting cops in the halls, along with cameras and locking the doors during the day dosen't help the problem it probably makes the few people that have these problems feel trapped and surrounded.

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Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn my god do you learn.
C.S. Lewis
 
After reading various responses here it seems to me and please correct me if I'm wrong that any minor can buy knives on line because frankly the seller has no way whatsoever of checking if said buyer is indeed a minor.Sure you can talk about legal issues and the seller having the buyer sign a facimile of age but what it really boils down to is there is no way in hell that a seller in N.H. can verify that the knife he is shipping a buyer in Deleware is of legal age. Which means that no matter how careful a seller is if he does sell to a minor inocently then he is open to all sorts of legal ramifications by the parents regardless of how many meaningless slips of paper he has that says the buyer was an adult. Besides asking for credit cards which quite a few young people now a days have how really is someone selling a knife over the inernet going to verify the information? Short of flying to the buyers state and hand delivering the knife.
Bob

[This message has been edited by Strider (edited 08-07-2000).]
 
For those of you that keep asking where I'm from, I will tell you it is New York; And in New York you cannot legally buy a knife under the age of 18. Now, The only reason I say this, and I'm not a lawyer, or anyone that really knows the law that well; But I was in a well known cutlery store, and they would not sell this minor that was in there, a butcher knife. I also know for a fact that box cutters are illegal to sell to minors also. I have also made inquiries in other stores around my area, and they all have the same policies... Weather they are enforced, or not, that is a different story.

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BC... For those who fought for it, Freedom has a flavor the protected will never know... Semper Fi
 
I bet that even in NYC a youth could throw a cheap butcher knife in with his supermarket groceries and the clerk wouldn't so much as blink. I've only run across restrictions in big cities like LA. Even those would only be enforced at a cutlery shop or at a store that sold guns and/or ammo. At Walmart you might be questioned if a clerk took a knife out of a case in the gun department, but probably not if you took a blister-packed product to a front register. Sometimes these are store policies or legal myths that are being adhered to rather than actual laws.
 
Is that a Massatwo****s law E? You can drive in your states at the age of 16 too. There must be some fact to what I said, if stores have a policy about it. Otherwise why would they even care?

Don't be so picky E, and just give your reply about the subject. All you did was dump on me... was there a reason for that?

us_marine_corps_md_clr.gif



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BC... For those who fought for it, Freedom has a flavor the protected will never know... Semper Fi
 
I think Kodiak made a strong point. I can see the headlines: Disturbed Teen Slashes Girlfriend With Knife He Bought ON THE INTERNET. Ouch...the dreaded Internet knife.

If kids want knives, I think their parents should buy them for them. But we should try to be careful about who we sell to in Cyberspace. I don't know what it would take to cover your butt but surely if you asked the buyer his or her age and they lied about it, it might help you if you had to go to court. Hard to tell, though, how much it would help you. When you are in the grips of our criminal injustice system, money talks and bull$hit walks, as they say.

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Hoodoo

And so, to all outdoor folks, the knife is the most important item of equipment.

Ellsworth Jaeger - Wildwood Wisdom
 
Narruc, that's the New York state knife laws, courtesy of Bernard Levine. As for reasons, it is most likely an insurance issue for the store; their insurance company won't cover them for liability involving minors buying 'weapons.' Please don't take offense, I wasn't 'dumping' on you, just making a request; we've all made assumptions about the law at one time or another, only to find out that we were mistaken. I'd just like you to be more careful (before I first replied here, I double-checked the Mass. and Maine laws, just to make sure I didn't miss anything).

--JB

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e_utopia@hotmail.com
 
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