Every Man Needs To Own A Pocket Knife

Return of Kings ^ | February 13, 2018 | CR Smith

[vannrox]

Even though a permit is not required to have one, I admit to not carrying a pocket knife until 2015. I had realized that I became part of a generational sea change on this item, which I now view as being much more than just a male accessory choice.

It all started when I was at a Garden Center store looking for a trellis, but when I found one, it was bound to several others by nylon zip-ties. I knew I couldn’t saw it free with my keys, so I started to look for some help. I soon saw an old man walking down the aisle and instinctively thought he would have a knife on him, but he didn’t, nor did another man I asked. I then found a store worker who cut them free and off I went with my trellis, though not feeling good about myself or the state of male civilization.

As a kid in the 1970’s, almost every boy carried a pocket knife. It wasn’t a weapon or for showing off, unless it was new. Sometimes you had to actually cut something and scissors just wouldn’t do.

When you were bored, you’d whittle a stick or a piece of wood with it. I have a simple walking stick carved by my great grandfather, and I recall the mystique of watching and helping as he sharpened his knife. In my keepsake box, I have a pocket knife of my father and grandfather. Interestingly, along with a Confederate $5 bank note, Lincoln had one in his pocket the night he was shot.

But times have changed, and I stopped bearing the humble tool that naturally accompanied my forefathers. I am not alone here, and think this happened for various reasons and with certain outcomes.

1. Fewer Men Work With Their Hands Or At Jobs That Need Them

My farmer and forester ancestors needed knives at any potential moment, but for my generation of desk jockeys and mind workers, scissors and box cutters do just fine. This is a banal, demographic reason, but the next ones cut to the core of a man’s soul.

2. The Expanded Safety Culture

Safety is a great thing for us all. Seat belts and even OSHA have had some benefit. In my job as a scientist, we take precautions scientists never gave thought to a few decades ago. People like me in occupations with built-in physical hazards are happy for that.

But when we live our everyday lives with a requirement of eliminating all hazards, we get ridiculous. This leads to safety Nazis who apply their same calculus to pocket knives as they do to guns: viewed solely as a dangerous object to be feared and avoided, and not as an everyday tool that has hazards to be respected.

There’s a reason the 2006 book The Dangerous Book For Boys included topics on uses of knives. The safety culture agitates against even reasonable male daring, much less carrying a tool that could be used as a weapon. This mindset turned rancid as it became codified absurdity through.

3. Zero Tolerance Policies In Schools

It sounds tough, but it’s a cop-out. Adults who abandoned the need of using discriminating wisdom and good judgment implemented “no sharp objects allowed on campus” rules, as opposed to something like “pocket knives may be three inches or shorter” with strict enforcement (liberty with reasonable limits that is age appropriate).

Intractable un-Solomon-like thinking leads to such silly results as boys being expelled for bringing a kitchen knife to school to cut an onion for a science project and for biting a pop tart into the shape of a gun.

You soon realize that when adults don’t use adult discretion, kids don’t learn the right lessons and are trained to have foolish fears. Humble pocket knives became an easy victim. The do-gooders imagined they were protecting kids from switchblade or machete melees, but they forgot that Grace Kelly used scissors to kill the intruder in Hitchcock’s Dial M for Murder.

4. The 9/11 Attacks

The pocket knife culture was already feeble, but 9/11 gave it a grievous blow. Swiss Army Knife sales fell by 35% as a result of the attacks. The hijackers interestingly used not knives, but the culturally un-feared box cutter to do their evil deeds: they used our overblown fears against us. Since then, many a pocket knife has been melted into plowshares by the TSA, I assume, after confiscation at airports, including one of mine. All of these contributors have led to another sad consequence…

5. The Emasculation Of Men

I believe the culmination of these factors have led men to be changed and lessened. The old man from whom I asked for a pocket knife at the garden store looked embarrassed to admit his knifelessness, as he knew from whence he had fallen. I felt no better as I had to get assistance from a female store employee, no less, who got some scissors (what else) to cut lose my quarry (what a daring name for a trellis). To complete my humiliation, she had to do the cutting… corporate safety rules, I guess.

As is human nature, some rebel against our anti-knife culture and dive headlong into getting more, bigger and longer blades, but most of us just rolled over, and we were figuratively castrated.

But I’ve decided to not roll over anymore. I didn’t need an impressive knife like my son’s, which doubles as a gun bayonet, but I did ask him to get me a traditional pocket knife for Christmas, and now I carry one with me always.

The two knives I have now are quite different and illustrate the types that are suitable for many guys. My small one is barely 2-1/2 inches long when closed and is a sleek 3/8 inches wide, with two thumbnail opening blades. It serves for minor and general use at work and doesn’t fill my pocket. It looks and works better than a stupid freebee keychain Victorinox-wannabe with bad scissors.

My other knife is almost four inches closed with a full-bellied blade and can be opened with one hand by a thumb stud. It is more useful for chores around the house or in the woods.

A thick, multi-tool Swiss Army knife is useful, but can be too bulky for a pocket, which is why if you have one, it’s likely in your dresser drawer. Just start with your needs and avoid the urge to go full-bore Crocodile Dundee. You may rarely need it, but when you do, you’ll feel better for having your own pocket knife.

Read More: How To Keep Your Knives Blazing Sharp

[ronnie raygun]

The social emasculation of men has given us Sweden and Norway, yes they were once Vikings!

[Telepathic Intruder]

That's not a knife.

This is a knife:

[FreedomPoster]

I’ve carried a decent knife, typically a Spyderco Delica, clipped to my pocket for about 20 years. Before then I usually carried a small Swiss Army knife suitable for opening a box or cleaning your fingernails, but not much else. Then the pocket folder impinged on my consciousness, and I realized it expanded my concealed carry game, and I’ve been there ever since.

If I deploy it, typically to open a box, and horrified blissninnies ask WHY DO YOU HAVE THAT!? I answer “I have Amazon Prime” and that mollifies them.

At this point, I feel naked without it. Hate it when we do a weekend trip with carryon luggage only, and I don’t have one with me. That missing piece of kit really bugs me.

[iontheball]

I carry a Benchmade Triage my son bought me years ago. It has become a part of me, I miss it as soon as I’m not carrying it. I prefer to carry it in a belt holster next to my trusty Streamlight. You would be surprised how often each day a good knife and flashlight come in handy.

[HighSierra5]

I’ve carried an old Buck tool for the last 25 years. Made in America. Won’t leave home without it.

[snoringbear]

“At this point, I feel naked without it. Hate it when we do a weekend trip with carryon luggage only, and I don’t have one with me. That missing piece of kit really bugs me”

Yah, I think the “no knife rule” in carry on or person has a lot to do with the demise of men carrying a pocket knife. I know it did with me. After graduating from college I went to work for a major corporation and soon began flying regularly in the course of my job. So, not wanting to worry about inadvertently having a knife on me I quit packing. But, I do have several pocket and fold-backs of which some are kept in a bowl on my dresser along with several other misc objects that finds their way into my pockets. Anyway, now that I’m retired and rarely fly anymore I find myself dropping a knife in my pocket more often. I also keep three or folders in my pickup for various folders. Interestingly, awhile back I gave my twin adult daughters each a Swiss knife (a modest one with just most frequent needed features). They are both hikers and campers outdoorsy types. And, they tell me that often they are the only person in the group who has a knife on them - which makes them stars of the group. Btw, for first timers who are interest in getting buying a knife; suggest you go on line and read up on your state and city knife laws. If you think gun laws are quirky wait till you start reading up on knife laws, they’re bazzare. Fortunate, my state, Texas, finally at long last passed new legislation that finally cleaned up our knife laws a bunch.

[glock rocks]

I get the same reaction from my Zero Tolerance 350. My edc is the Benchmade axis flipper.

[USS Alaska]

This is a knife.

[Candor7]

I always carry 2: one a leather-man tool with razor sharp blade and pliers, the other an NRA folder wooden scales stainless , brass lined with a 4 inch blade, also razor sharp.

They are indispensable on our farm.

If you are looking for decent work knives at fair prices I recommend three sites:

1) Smoky Mountain Knife works: https://www.smkw.com/

2) BudK: http://www.budk.com

3) Atlanta Cutlery: https://www.atlantacutlery.com/

[niteowl77]

My EDC knife is a Victorinox alox-scaled "Soldier" (four blades: knife, bottle opener, can opener, awl) with a 1986 date stamp; this one was made without a bail. Two of the blades double as screwdrivers, and the awl makes a passable scraper. I have carried this knife to work nearly every day for almost 30 years. When it is not in my pocket, the knife rests on a counter in the kitchen where it serves as a utility-grade "cutter/opener of almost anything."

It is getting a bit salty looking now, as is its owner.

Mr. niteowl77

[Telepathic Intruder]

Notice how he’s carrying that. Edge up, index finger over the guard. That’s Jim Bowie’s fighting style, and he once killed 3 people in a knife fight that way. But although this style of knife is called a Bowie, it’s not really known what his knife actually looked like. But it was big, and not made of modern 440C.

[CenTex]

My old faithful Buck 110 knife has been at my side for 35 years. I have worn out three scabbards with it. On more formal occasions, I carry a small pocket knife...

We are country folks and I probably use the knife at least 5 times a day...

[heterosupremacist]

I have a Smith & Wesson M&P (assisted opening) which used be illegal in NY as it was considered a ‘switchblade’ a 3.5” partially serrated blade, I keep it VERY sharp and I don’t go anywhere without it.

Is it a weapon? It could do lots of damage, but I only use it as a tool...

[heterosupremacist]

I too, have 2 Spydercos. Can’t beat them for the price I paid...

[chrisser]

I stopped carrying after 9/11 because I didn’t want to forget to leave it at home while flying.

But flying became such a royal pita, that I purposely have chosen jobs that don’t require it. With rare exceptions, if I can’t drive, I don’t go.

Now I carry daily and it’s a rare day when I don’t use it at least once, usually to open a box or some stupid packaging.

My wife got me a little locking Kershaw. It’s small enough that it doesn’t scare the meek, but I can do plenty with it. If it’s not big enough, I probably ought to get a better tool than a pocket knife anyway.

[TangoLimaSierra]

I forget my phone a lot, but never my knife. Or gun.

[Psalm 73]

I carry a small Swiss Army knife - 2 blades, can opener, bottle opener, sewing awl, tweezers, etc - only slightly large than my middle finger. Useful as all get-out.

Had it for ages - almost lost it to TSA a few years back. Left it in my laptop bag - agent found it and told me to hurry back out while he called the baggage guys and had them pull my checked bag for me so I could toss it in then come back through.
So there are actually a few good TSA folk.

[HartleyMBaldwin]

I have long said that the most reliable way to distinguish humans from baboons is that a human always carries a knife and a way to make fire.

[aomagrat]

I carry a small Swiss Army knife also. I forgot about it and found it in my pocket in the TSA line. I tossed it in the small bowl with my pocket change and keys and sent it through the metal detector and picked it up on the other side. TSA must have missed it.