Right, this post needs a big opening. Cue lights… Cue Scenary… Cue Richard Strauss…

And… ACTION!

Dahhh Dahhh Daaaaaaaaaaaaah Dah Dahhh (boom-boom boom-boom boom-boom boom-boom)

Dahhh Dahhh Daaaaaaaaaaaaah Da-Daaaaaaahhh (boom-boom boom-boom boom-boom boom-boom)

CUUUUUUTTTTT! Right, which one of you bastards forgot to order the apes?

…

There are times when it is necessary, if one to experience the full richness of blogging, that one acquires a genuine and finely-tuned sense of the surreal. There are bloggers, of course, who make surreality their speciality; one thinks immediately of Harry Hutton and Scaryduck both of whom could be said to approach the world from left-field… but only if that left-field happens to exist several dimensions away through a moebius wormhole.

Others find their inner surrealist entirely by accident. They enter the twilight zone of un-reality not by choice but by omission and neglect, following trains of thought that were derailed mere moments after leaving the station without ever noticing the spray of sparks they leave in their wake.

Ellee Seymour, press consultant, journalist, political and PR blogger, is not happy – and she has a graph to prove it…

Let’s ban the sale of knives

There can’t be a person in the land who wasn’t appalled and sickened by the pointless murder of Thomas ap Rhys Price who was stabbed to death for his mobile phone.

Poor Thomas was in the wrong place at the wrong time when he met his callous killers who showed him no mercy – and have shown no remorse since.

With our knife culture increasing, surely we should be banning their sale from shops. They should be as difficult to buy as guns. Those who require them for countryside pursuits or any genuine activity will have to prove it, get a letter of consent from local police.

I know these weapons will always be available at sources like the internet, but we must make them as inaccessible as possible. Many violent crimes are probably committed on the spur of the moment, they are done for kicks, a sad indictment of the age we live in. We need to respond to that. My fear is that one day it might be my son, it could even be your child, who is in the wrong place at the wrong time…

There is something of a central flaw in this argument, one that I strongly suspect you might have already noticed. Ellee hasn’t.

Still, all is not lost. Ellee has an open comments box and with the British being what they are, an island race with a keenly-honed sense of the prosaic, one can be assured that someone will be along in a moment to clue dear Ellee in on her mistake.
Comment 1.

Courtney Hamilton says:

…(t)he ban on knives would mean we would simply have to empty out our kitchen draws for the authorities.

Congratulations, Courtney, you named that flaw in one. But just in case Ellee needs a little more convincing…

Comment 2.

Gary Monro says:

Of course, making as difficult as possible the sale of knives to minors is a good idea but the killing isn’t just done by minors – and domestic meat knives are easy substitutes if we ban the hunting variety.

I wonder, can you see a common theme emerging yet?

Ellee returns to the fray with comment number 6, and her train just keeps on rollin’

Ellee says:

Let’s see if the tough prison sentences imposed yesterday will bring a reduction in this type of crime, I don’t think it is enough, these thugs don’t seem worried about the consequences. That’s why I feel they should be as inaccessible as possible, we have to try to make a visible difference, it’s one solution, though many more are needed.

Still something missing from Ellee’s argument – like the bleeding obvious, which brings Jim into the fray…

Comment 7.

Jim says:

I was going to say that I have about four knives in my kitchen knife block that would be lethal in the right hands. But the point seems to have been made several times, so I won’t make it again!

And not to be deterred, Ellee’s back again, just a couple of comments later…

Comment 9.

Ellee says:

Geoff, If crimes involving knives have increased 73% over the last year, this proves our laws are ineffective. I just heard the father of Thomas asking for a similar ban on knives.

Jim, I won’t have one of those knife blocks in my kitchen, I keep thinking what would happen if I surprised a burglar one night and his eyes caught the shining steel blade flickering in the light…

I may guessing here, Ellee, but I suspect that Halloween isn’t really your kind of movie. Right?

I must admit to struggling a little with some the reasoning here. You see I, like Jim, have a knife block in my kitchen, but I really can’t say that I’ve ever given too much thought to the idea of surprising a burglar one night and noticing his eye catch the shining block of stripped pine flickering in the light…

In fact, if the burglar were to see anything shining at all in my own domicile then its likely to be the aluminium baseball bat arcing toward his head… but that’s another story.

Reality peeps from behind the sofa, yet again, when we get to comment 12.

Out From Under says:

The vast majority of knife crimes are committed with kitchen knifes. Are you seriously suggesting banning the sale of kitchen knives?

And by comment 16, one senses that James is perhaps getting a tad frustrated…

james higham says:

…With our knife culture increasing, surely we should be banning their sale from shops. They should be as difficult to buy as guns…

They have done that over here. There are certain types and lengths which are off limits. That’s why they use guns instead now.

And still the indefatigable Ellee can’t quite bring herself to reach for the brakes.

Comment 19.

Ellee says:

Well I seem to be pretty much a lone voice on this, I appreciate the problem is that knives are only part of a much broader problem which has evolved from our changing society. I would still like to see our laws toughened up, I agree about the tougher sentences, but just wonder how effective they would be.

Once more into the breach? Comment 20.

Benedict White says:

Ban the sale of knives? What am I going to cook and eat with?

Quite.

…

I’ve not taken the time to check this out fully, but I suspect that the humble knife, that harbinger of doom that will shortly bring about the end of civilisation as we know it, may well represent the very first artificial tool or device that is uniquely of mankind’s own fabrication; the humble otter having beaten us to the hammer (a large rock) and our closest living relative, the chimpanzee having mastered both use of the pointy stick, for wheedling out termites, and the large branch as a generic clubbing device.

At least that’s the impression I get from watching David Attenborough.

It is tool of talismanic significance, emblematic of out first faltering steps on the long road to civilisation.

It is tool that was once given, lovingly, to every small boy by his father, who would then teach him the timeless art of whittling.

And only upon adulthood, in an time-honoured rite of passage, would one have been taught the art of sticking it into another human being… but only on express instructions of the government and only when firmly attached to the end of one’s Lee Enfield .303 rifle.

The knife is… oh fuck it, Benedict’s right.

How the fuck are we going to eat dinner if you ban the sale of knives? Just what the fuck do you live on, Ellee? Soup?

It seem to me that a demonstration is order. Ellee – next time you go out for dinner, just order yourself a nice, thick, juicy steak, rare or perhaps medium rare…

…and then try eating the fucking thing with a spoon.

Now do you understand why banning the sale of knives is a dumb idea.