Why are Balisongs Illegal In So Many Places?

J

joeG26er

Joined
Mar 29, 2000
Messages
297
I just don't understand what is so super dangerous about them that they have been made illegal to have in so many jurisdictions...

Have that many people been killed and terrorized by balisongs?

I just can't see the reasoning...

Thanks for any light that may be shed on this matter...

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RKBA!
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Why are automatic knives illegal, for that matter? Answer: because the sheeple are afraid, and seeing someone flip a bali or click an auto makes that person seem like some sort of expert, due to the way 'experts' are portrayed in the movies, etc. A real expert is graceful, but without that flair, but that doesn't sell tickets.

--JB

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e_utopia@hotmail.com
 
Yep
the answer is "Hollywood"
the average poor sod gets his/her knowledge of life from TV and the movies.
Hollywood tells them knives are "bad"..... then,they are bad.
Autos and bali songs are "badder" because badder people are portrayed using them.
And the remedy is......??
Buggered if I know, either.After all, Hollywood rules.



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BrianWE
 
Joe,

Laws require neither intelligence, logic, reason, nor just cause to exist, only legislators. Balisongs are shown as an evil and intimidating weapon in the movies, almost always used by the "bad guy". The idea that they require more skill, effort, and time (usually) to deploy than a regular knife doesn't seem to have been a consideration. It just doesen't look like the knife mom and dad used, so it must be dangerous. Ohio law is presently stuck in the stupid mode anyway.

Example: You can only hunt Deer with a shotgun. But, you can use any gun that you want (up to, and including .50-BMG caliber FMJ) for squirrels, groundhogs, coyotes, etc. And there is an open season on wild boar, which have yet to be shown to exist in Ohio. They say that the shotgun rule is because a slug won't travel as far as a rifle bullet. Well, that's true. So we should use high powered rifles to shoot up into trees for squirrels, across wide open fields for groundhogs, and use shotguns for Deer in deep woods shooting down or on the level, where the bullet couldn't go far anyway. OK...
rolleyes.gif


You can never legislate away stupidity, ignorance, or irrationality. You can only elect it to office.

See what you started with this question? I'm done ranting, for now.

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Dave
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Attention: Some assembly may be required. Batteries not included.
 
Knives are much more menacing to people than guns are; there is an atavistic response to a knife. This is worsened by rapid movement or a opening sound (such as a switchblade opening); balisongs share this unfortunate set of characteristics with switchblades, which any intelligent person knows are inherently evil. QED, balisongs are evil.
wink.gif


Walt
 
Regarding this topic can anyone quote an actual law in any state prohibiting these knives? We all know switchblades are illegal on the federal level since the 50's(1958?)I have heard that balisongs are illegal but have never read any specific laws relating to them. What do they fall under? I'm sure they are not included in the auto category. Is this a case of state law? If so does anyone have an example? Are they treated the samer as a double edge knives only as far as carry goes? Anyone?
Bob
 
My understanding from a local dealer is that balisongs are indeed switchblades according to U.S. Customs, and importation of them is therefore illegal.

Beyond that, legality, or illegality is a state or local issue. Some places there are no restrictions, some places they are illegal.

I recall that New York State mentions them in the same paragraph as switchblades and several other devices which are all illegal in New York.


Mike
 
Strider,

Our law states that any gravity operated, spring operated, or butterfly type knife is illegal. They spell it all out. Some states may have an interpretation issue. We're not that lucky.

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Dave
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Attention: Some assembly may be required. Batteries not included.
 
I've looked long and hard to find what terrible crimes have been committed with balisongs that they should be the object of so many laws. I can find nothing. I am aware of three murders that have been committed in the US and one in Japan (that one being just last year) with balisongs. When you think of the number of people who are murdered every year with other types of knives and then with just about any other object you can imagine, a balisong is one of the objects in our world least likely to be used in a crime.

It's all just fear, myth, and irrationalism. Unfortunately, to many legislators in our country allow themselves to be driven by irrational fears. To satisfy their fears, the rest of us give up our liberties.



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Chuck
Balisongs -- because it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing!
http://www.balisongcollector.com
 
Balisongs, nunchuks (sp.?), and throwing stars, all suffered from a rash of legislation in the late 1970's and early 1980's. It was in response to action movies, especially martial arts flicks which showed menacing "oriental" figures with these weapons. The reality is that with the ready availability of guns, why would a thug need a balisong etc.? Or why not just a kitchen knife or the cheap razor blade style box cutter? Politicians never ask people with expertise before they make policy, they just react.
 
Chuck, I'm sure more crimes and acts of violence are commited with cheap kitchen knives than either Bailisongs or autos. Don't look for logic when these laws (and/ or fears) are based on perception and nothing else.
 
And the choir sings "Amen!"

The US Customs Service seems to have seen balisongs as evil gravity knives on one day and as ordinary pocket knives on another. A decade or so back, some companies had trouble importing them, but now the US market if full of cheap PRC balisongs that move about openly in normal distribution channels. Perhaps their appeal is that in "grey area" jurisdictions, if a cop takes one away from somebody, it's too cheap to be worth going down to the station to argue that it's really legal and try to get it back.

I don't know of any specific laws against butterfly or balisong knives, but there may be some somewhere. In states with laws against Evil Gravity Knives, some states' appellate courts have said balisongs are OK, and some states' appellate courts have said they are not. California is one of the latter, and California authorities have made an issue of them. See People v. Quattrone.

The law is a "humble beast of burden."
frown.gif





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- JKM
www.chaicutlery.com
AKTI Member # SA00001
 
Penal Code section 653k makes it illegal to sell or offer for sale a switchblade knife having a blade over two inches in length. Switchblade is defined
as "a knife having the appearance of a pocketknife, and shall include a springblade knife, snap-blade knife, gravity knife or any other similar type knife,
the blade or blades of which are two or more inches long and which {Page 211 Cal.App.3d 1394} can be released automatically by a flick of a button,
pressure on the handle, flip of the wrist or other mechanical device, or is released by the weight of the blade or by any type of mechanism whatsoever."
(Pen. Code, § 653k.)
Click to expand...

Seems to me that most benchmades fall into the flick wrist opening category....

I would really like to know who proposed and passed this type of legislature...so we could make sure to vote them out of office...

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RKBA!
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[This message has been edited by joeG26er (edited 04-08-2000).]
 
Section 653K of the CA Penal Code was passed back in 1958, so everybody who was in the Legislature then is out of there by now. At least I don't think we have any California politicians with Strom Thurmond's endurance.

It was, however, re-passed in modified form to give us a thumb-operated one-hande exception, and, after "law enforcement" agreed not to oppose it, it passed almost unanimously (one ultra-liberal Democrat state senator voting against liberalizing it). Then it took a special weekend expedition by Buck's lobbyist to Republican Governor Wilson's office to let him play with some benign-looking one-handers to he wouldn't veto it because it legalized Evil Knives.

Laws against Evil Knives come equally from both "liberal" and "conservative" law and order types. The politics of knives are not the same as the politics of guns, though there is some overlap.


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- JKM
www.chaicutlery.com
AKTI Member # SA00001
 
I don't see a damn thing wrong with them
mad.gif
. They are just folders with one handed opening and they require conciderably more effort to open than grand dad's old Case. Does any one know what states they are mostly legal in? I looked at the Levine site a little but it didn't help much?
confused.gif

--Mykl

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Concentration, patience, and practice always lead to success.
 
As far as I can find the only thing we are specifically prevented from owning or carrying is a ballistic knife.

DaveJ

I forgot to mention that I'm in South Dakota.

[This message has been edited by DaveJ (edited 04-08-2000).]
 
Oh that's simple! I know why they are illegal to carry in so many states. My Greek friend referred to it as a phallós knife. I suppose it does look kind of like a phallós when it is closed
smile.gif
. So I'm giving those idiot legislators the benefit of the doubt by saying they banned them for public carry [in the state of Illinois] because of indecent exposure laws.
biggrin.gif
That is why I keep my phallós knife in my pants where it belongs. Some lawman might not like me waving that around in public! I feel inadequately "equipped" without it. I wonder why mine is blue... am I normal?

-Chang the Asian Janitorial Apparatus
 
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