Stabbing Chatter

If you go by a German grocery, there tends to be around twenty to thirty magazines on the rack, which tend to be 'women's' magazines....mostly designed for women thirty to seventy years old.  Rarely do these get any press coverage, or any public notice.  But this month, something occurred.  A magazine called Illu der Frau, did a simple article to discuss what you need to do....in the event of a stabbing.

Now, prior to this, if you gone out to women (say over the age of forty) and asked them to rank first aid events, stabbings probably would have ranked with German women up around number 10,000 on the list of first aid events.  Its more likely that you fall off a bicycle, or suffer a dog-bite. 

But the editors with this women's magazine decided to carry this brief first aid page, and explain stabbings, and how to handle them.

Some folks took to this first aid episode, and asked about public safety, and if stabbings are increasing.  To be honest, if you go and attempt to use national numbers....the German cops haven't really categorized stabbings alone in one single column.  It's a rather new trend.  As far as I can remember (even going back to the late 1970s)....knife fights in Germany were just awful rare.  At some point in 1979, I came upon some beer-bottle fight in Frankfurt between two drunk Germans....which I thought was pretty risky behavior (both eventually were calmed down by their associates and the messy affair ended peacefully). 

To be honest though, there just weren't gang-related fights or one-on-one 'combat' on German streets.  You started to notice some serious fights around thirty years ago.....as drug-usage crept upward, and football hooliganism thrived.

At some point last year in Wiesbaden, the number of knife reports/violence....reached some point where the city council said 'enough', and they made up a first of its kind....a no-knife 'zone' (mostly in the shopping district).  If you walk in that district and cops approach you....they can demand a search of your person, and a knife will cost you 5,000 Euro (at least they hint the fine might go that high).

So what will this first aid article trigger?  Well....some women are going to ask the question....are stabbings increasing, and the true answer is....if you live in a metropolitan area, then yes, they are increasing in frequency.  Course, the other issue is that these magazines are all looking for some trigger to get more consumption or increased sales.