Blades, knives and razors are becoming increasingly accessible to children under 16…shop owners do not take the necessary precautions when selling a product of this category to a member of the public. Perhaps they don’t care whom the weapon is being sold to and simply they give in to accumulate that extra £30 to pay for a few extra pints at the weekend.

The easy to reach weapons are also available far to easily through the 21st century most successful media outlet… the internet. Websites such as e-bay don’t ask for id, they simply ask for a secure way in which to transfer the money in exchange for a deadly weapon. There is however a more glamorous way of receiving a blade, a short trip with the family to France could be the answer to the increase in knives held by youngsters in this country.

2,600 people in 1995 were convicted of possession of a blade…in 2000 that number rose to 3,600. Not only has the number of possession of blades increased but also so has the amount of stab injuries. These knives are being used as a threat or a status statement to gain a ‘rep’ on the street, but at a price. The consequences result in children not having fathers to walk them down the alleys, children not living past 15, and parents have to watch their sons and daughters die before them.

A retrospective cause for this swell in knife crime is again media outlets…so in the award winning series ‘Band of Brothers’ a German solider slaughters an American to protect his country, it may look ‘cool’ and be seen as the right thing to do at the time, but that was war. We as a society should be doing everything in our power to prevent elements in the war from being recreated. Movies such as American History X and Training Day may portray members of a ghetto protecting there territories by unwanted people but they're just movies…it doesn’t make it ok for everyone to recreate what they see. The graphic repercussions of carrying a blade is catastrophic and I find myself trying to make sense of citizens who think it is worth carrying blades, razors and knives even without the intention of using it.