Are knives weapons, or are they tools?

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K.O.D. said:
Those kind of people just can't be reasoned with.
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EXACTLY! That's why in the end it does no good to pussyfoot around and try to be PC and please them. It doesn't matter if it's a 3.5" blade. They would be just as offended if it was 3" or 2.5" or smaller. And no matter how you insist it "is not a weapon" they will see it as one. Well, the world is full of them, get used to it.
 
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Blades are weapons and tools, as are many things, such as people. I keep a small Stanley Fubar under the driver's seat.
 
In this day and age a cupcake could be considered a weapon. So could a screw driver or a knife. It all depends how it's used.
 
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Bastler said:
You would be best served to say, "I don't have any weapons, but I do have a pocket knife." Never admit to law enforcement that you carry a knife with the intent to use it as a weapon.
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This is actually exactly what I say more or less. I say no I don't have a weapon but I do have a legal knife in my right pocket, and another small legal knife in my fifth right pocket.
 
Bastler said:
You would be best served to say, "I don't have any weapons, but I do have a pocket knife." Never admit to law enforcement that you carry a knife with the intent to use it as a weapon.
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If it isn't a weapon you could honestly just say no, though. But it is.
 
JAM said:
Anything can be used as a weapon, sure. Weapons are tools.

Take a picture of a Buck 119 and a picture of a wrench and ask random people which one is a weapon or which one is a tool. We all know what they will say is which and why.

If you are pulled over by a cop and he asks if you have any weapons on you and you have a 3" folder clipped to your pocket you are going to say yes. We all know why. If you say no and you are asked to step out and he sees the clip he'll be pissed. Because you lied. You can say "I never thought of it as a weapon" but he knows you lied, you know you lied, we all know you lied and we all know why.
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In many places in the USA, a 3" pocket knife is specifically called out as not being a weapon in statute, and when interacting with a police officer there is no duty to inform. Many times the question during a pat down or terry stop is - "do you have any weapons, knives, or needles?"

Georgia knife law is largely dependent of three statutory definitions. § 16–11–125.1. Definitions contains definitions for “knife” and “weapon”:

As used in this part, the term:
. . .
(2) “Knife” means a cutting instrument designed for the purpose of offense and defense consisting of a blade that is greater than 12 inches in length which is fastened to a handle.
. . .
(5) “Weapon” means a knife or handgun.

There are three elements to the § 16–11–125.1 (2) definition of knife. It is:

  1. A cutting instrument,
  2. Designed for the purpose of offense and defense, and
  3. Has a blade greater than 12 inches in length
  1. Note that the second listed element – “designed for the purpose of offense and defense” – does not contain a qualifying adverb such as “primarily.” As written and enacted it specifies designed for the purpose of offense and defense. It should not apply to knives designed for kitchen and food service tasks. It should also not apply to the category of implements referred to as machetes which are designed for agricultural purposes. It should also be noted that there is no circumstance of possession aspect which allows for elastic interpretation.

  2. The wording of the above “knife” definition was enacted on 2010, although at that time the blade length limit was five (5) inches. The length was extended to 12 inches in 2018 with no other change in the wording.

    If a cutting instrument meets the above criteria, it is considered a “weapon” for the purposes of Part 3, Article 4, Chapter 11 of the Georgia Crimes Code.
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I got arrested while carrying a Spyderco Military. The officer asked if I had any weapons, I sad no but I did have a pocket knife. He nodded and asked me to hand it to him. Then he asked me the make and model, gave me a receipt, and told me he would hold onto it because it would disappear in the property holding office of the county jail.
 
JAM said:
If it isn't a weapon you could honestly just say no, though. But it is.
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Where I live that will actually incriminate yourself if you say your knife is a weapon, that's how the law works here. If you say your knife is a tool and it is legal then you have not broken the law. If you say yes I have a weapon I have a knife, then you have just admitted you carry a knife with the intention to wound people with it under legal definition.
The law might be different where you live but that's how it works here.
I carry knives as tools for and on the record, and they are legal.
 
Bastler said:
Suit yourself. I will continue to act on the advice of my attorney.
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As well you should. I never said to deny you have a knife. I said it's a weapon, and that's why you tell them you have one. Deny it's a weapon while you are informing him of the weapons he asked about if it makes you feel better. But we all know why you admit it's there. Because he considers it a weapon. Because, well, it's a weapon.
 
The_Knife_Man said:
Gonna have pretty biased answers due to being on a knife forum.

I'd say its a tool until it's used as a weapon. And as of current, I've never used a pocket knife, or any knife for that matter, as a weapon. They are tools in my eyes.
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Even if you use a 2 inch blade on a Swiss Army knife as a weapon, it doesn't make the multi tool SAK a designed weapon. I can bash somebody over the head with a frozen fish it doesn't mean a fish is a weapon. Otherwise everything in the universe is a weapon and the word is just redundant and means nothing.
A weapon to me is something that was designed and made to inflict harm and kill.
An Improvised weapon and a specially designed weapon are not the same.
 
JAM said:
As well you should. I never said to deny you have a knife. I said it's a weapon, and that's why you tell them you have one. Deny it's a weapon while you are informing him of the weapons he asked about if it makes you feel better. But we all know why you admit it's there. Because he considers it a weapon. Because, well, it's a weapon.
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Do you consider my Rough Ryder novelty key charm knife a weapon, even though the blade length is abour 3-4mm.
 
Tool.

As others have said, almost anything can be used as an improvised weapon. I was in court one day, a case came up for a woman that had been arrested for DWI. When the officer arrested her, she became upset and "attacked" him. In addition to DWI and resisting arrest, she was charged with "assault with a deadly weapon". The "deadly weapon"? A metal hairbrush she had in her car.

So perhaps this begs another question: Is a hairbrush a tool? or a weapon?
 
rje58 said:
Tool.

As others have said, almost anything can be used as an improvised weapon. I was in court one day, a case came up for a woman that had been arrested for DWI. When the officer arrested her, she became upset and "attacked" him. In addition to DWI and resisting arrest, she was charged with "assault with a deadly weapon". The "deadly weapon"? A metal hairbrush she had in her car.

So perhaps this begs another question: Is a hairbrush a tool? or a weapon?
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The fact I can pick up a piece of pipe and smash someone's skull in with it has no bearing on whether a knife is a weapon.
 
TOOLS

Knives are tool for cutting, slicing, and peeling.

Can they be used as a weapon? Yes. So can (and are) a screwdriver, hammer, wrench, and a rock or stick.
 
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The way we use language reveals the truth about the actual definition of the word weapon. Why do we have the term "Improvised Weapon"?. Because we are acknowledging that it is not a "Real Weapon" designed for fighting. It is something we are making do with in place of an actual weapon that was made to do the job properly. It was taken and made up on the spot in a pinch. It doesn't even have to be technical and a masterpiece to be a designed weapon, it just has to have an element of design and thought put into it that makes it better at performing as a weapon, and being a weapon is its primary use. A wooden branch pulled off a tree can be used as an improvised weapon, but it would never be as good as a Mace or war club if you refined it to become one. Like a long blunt pole makes a handy improvised weapon, but if you sharpened the end and turned it into a pointy stick, you have just designed a spear and put thought into it's intended use to make it perform well at poking people from a long distance.
The same goes with knives, yeah a Japanese Yanagiba looks like a sword and you could probably chop somebody with it, but it's a pretty shitty improvised sword, and it wouldn't have lasted on an actual battlefield and would probably snap after you clonked somebody with it hard enough. It's never going to be a Katana which was designed to chop people in half as an actual weapon.
You can pick up a pointy bit of glass and shank somebody with it, but it's not anything like having a real 17th century Italian Stiletto dagger which was designed to thrust people.
A SAK multi tool is clearly not a fighting knife, it was never designed to be a weapon, even if you jab somebody in the shoulder with it and it closes on your fingers and cuts them open, it's still not an actual weapon.
 
The problem really starts with lack of understanding and a bias towards a preconceived notion of some people.

I grew up and was taught how to use knives as tools just the same as I was taught how to use a screwdriver or a wrench. In some parts of the world where violence is prevalent they might learn early how to use a knife as a weapon for protection or survival.

In our current world where we have lived in convenience with prepackaged food and relative safety the culture has for a large part lost the basic knowledge and skills for using tools we used 50 years ago for the intended purposes. But there are criminals who use knives as a weapon to rob and steal or carry out a vendetta. And those instances get the attention of the media and the public is spoon fed the dramatic version. Then some people are scared silly of any knife.

Now days a small pocket knife with a one inch blade is feared as a weapon by some over reactive persons. Whereas in my days in school just about every boy had a pocket knife and knew how to use it and what it was intended for and it was just accepted as the normal.

So, what it really comes down to is the mindset of the population in general and how knives are perceived to be regardless of the intent.
 
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