Britain has currently got a knife amnesty in place. This where people are able to hand in their knives without the fear of prosecution, the amnesty is in place until the end of June. The hope is that it will reduce the amount of crimes involving knives including of course murders. The last amnesty was very successful according to the latest reports and one can only hope that this latest attempt also proves to be a success. Something needs to be done as I am hearing about more and more deaths at the hands of this knife culture and the problem seems to be getting out of control.

I have had personal experience about Britains knife culture. When I was about eighteen years of age I went out for a few drinks with a number of my close friends. We all ending up getting quite drunk and I ended up walking home with three of these friends. On the way home we passed a group of four men all in their twenties. They pushed passed us in an aggressive way making a number of nasty comments at the same time.

Despite being rather worse for wear, myself and my friends did not react. We were however very shocked as only a few moments later these four youths started to run towards us in quite a frightening way. We all started to run but one of my friends stumbled and fell over. I looked behind me and saw that these four men had surrounded him and were starting to punch him. I was not really sure what to do and was quite surprised to find myself going to his aid, rather brave or stupid I now think.

Luckily for me the youths ran off with my friend lying on the floor in agony. As I reached him I noticed that there was blood on the pavement at the place where he was lay. I asked him if he was OK and he said that he was. He had been stabbed in the stomach or chest area but had not realised. He thought that he had only been punched.

We managed to get him to the hospital where we later found out that he had been very lucky, even though he did have a punctured lung.

Even to this day which is years later, I find it hard to understand why the person decided to stab my friend. Why was a few punches not enough for him? It was not as if he was in any danger himself as there was four men against one. If he had killed my friend he could have been looking at a long stretch in prison and would have to live with the knowledge that he has killed a man for the rest of his life.

My advice to people is to leave your knives at home. By carrying a knife you could end a persons life, ruin the lives of that persons family and friends and even ruin your own life.

Over the last weekend, I have read about three murders on the streets of Britain via knife stabbings. I can not truly believe that the people carrying these knives left their houses with the intention to kill. The act was possibly influenced by alcohol or by some troubles in their own life. The people involved are likely to seriously regret their actions only a short time later. This however is too late for their victims.