Don't bring a lawsuit to a knife fight

The cutting edge is one of the most important pieces of technology in the history of humanity. It makes the manufacture of other tools possible. It is invaluable for any number of day-to-day utility tasks. This is foundational technology, technology that makes the rest of humanity possible ... and it all started with a flaked stone edge in the hands of some ancient human ancestor.

Naturally, progressives want to ban it.

Liberals have never encountered a tool they didn't wish to prohibit. If something is useful, it must be stamped out. If something is popular, it must be made illegal. If a tool makes it possible for a human being to cope with adversity, rather than relying on the state, the collective, the all-powerful government, then it must be done away with. Liberals hate any technology that is outside their direct control. This is why they support any and all measures to restrict, outlaw and otherwise remove from our society the possession of cutting edges.

The libs, of course, always couch their hatred for tools in the name of the public good, in the name of saving the children or protecting society. Their attitudes have given rise to such dystopian horrors as the state of violence in the U.K., where possession of any weapon or tool is considered proof of ill intent. Violent crime in the U.K. has soared under these measures, which do nothing to protect citizens and everything to empower criminals. But so cowed by their statist masters are the subjects of the United Kingdom that they go so far as to "warn" a woman for daring to defend herself from potential home invaders.

That's right; when musician Myleene Klass was the victim of a home-invasion burglary, she very rightly feared for her safety. Her 2-year-old daughter was asleep upstairs in her house. Two young men attempted to break into a shed in her garden. In other words, they were on her property, attempting to force their way into it. The U.K. is a free-for-all of violence and rape these days, with citizens disarmed and largely helpless. Worse, their authorities treat innocent citizens as criminals, protecting the violent predators from citizens' attempts to defend themselves. When Klass waved a kitchen knife through the window of her home to scare the home invaders away, it apparently worked – but police warned her that this was a crime!

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Specifically, they told her that her kitchen knife, improvised in her defense, was an "offensive weapon," and that carrying one, even in her own home, was illegal. You read that correctly: Self-defense is effectively illegal in the U.K., as the tools of self-defense have been banned, up to and including anything you might improvise while defending yourself – even on your own property. So afraid of knives, of "offensive weapons," are the statist drones of the United Kingdom, that they would rather see a young woman and her daughter raped or murdered than allow that woman to pick up a kitchen knife and use it merely to warn off the predators.

This attitude is disgusting. It is because progressives in the United States harbor this same ill will toward self-defense, because they hate human life so much that they would rather ban knives and firearms than allow honest and law-abiding Americans to defend themselves, that grass-roots organizations like the NRA, AKTI (the American Knife and Tool Institute), and Doug Ritter's Knife Rights have been formed. These organizations fight to defend your right to possess the tools of utility and self-defense. They fight to prevent vicious, self-destructive libs from making self-defense illegal here in the same way it is now illegal in the United Kingdom.

But now elements within the knife industry itself are working to harm it. Specifically, knife and sword manufacturer Cold Steel, whose president, Lynn Thompson, has long been known for his bellicose marketing, is targeting fellow industry giant Columbia River Knife and Tool. The two companies are both very popular. Both were represented at the annual Blade Show in Atlanta, which occurred last weekend. The only thing is that one of them is suing the other, alleging that the company's marketing is false and misleading. That marketing does NOT target Cold Steel, which is important. Thompson and his company are not fighting falsehoods directed at their own company. Rather, they are claiming that one of their competitors is simply wrong to make claims for the strength of its own locking mechanisms and in so doing is attempting to "take out" a competitor through legal maneuvering rather than through direct market competition.

The columnist (left) with Cold Steel President Lynn Thompson at the annual Blade Show in Atlanta in 2014.

Cold Steel's own website claims that "CRKT's locking mechanisms perform 'worse than many other comparably priced knives, and far worse than lower cost knives manufactured by Cold Steel.' The complaint also alleges that Cold Steel is entitled to unspecified monetary damages caused by CRKT's 'blatantly false claims.' ..."

This is an almost unprecedented move. Unless I am mistaken, this is one of the few times that two major players in the knife industry have become embroiled in a legal battle over the conceptual nature of the sales pitch one of them uses. That pitch does not directly name or target the plaintiff. If I read the lawsuit summary correctly, Cold Steel is essentially claiming that CRKT's success, selling what Cold Steel considers inferior knives, must somehow come at Cold Steel's expense, so they want money for this.

Embattled industries like gun and knife manufacturers cannot afford to give the liberals ammunition. If they can claim knife makers are selling dangerous products with false advertising, they can gain more support for legislation restricting and banning knives. Bringing a competitor's conceptual sales tactics to the attention of our court system can therefore only hurt the knife industry.

The libs are already looking for any means of attacking knife owners and banning their tools. This is just what they have done with our guns. While the jury is still out, it looks like Lynn Thompson and Cold Steel may have handed the libs a very useful weapon in their war on your tools.

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