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Comment by gumby | Hacker News Reader

Note that the monkey’s fist is an illegal knot everywhere in Australia and you can go to jail just for tying one.

This is [k]not true. You'll often find these at wharves in Australia. They can be viewed as an offensive weapon, so an aggravating factor in an assault (which is probably where the misunderstanding comes from), but the knot itself is perfectly legal and used by sailors as the weighted end of a heaving line.

In fact, sailors are required to use a monkey's fist in some cases under Australia federal law: https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/F2018L01173

The knot does not appear in the list of prohibited weapons: https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2018Q00081

Concerning sources:

I don't know about Australia, but in Germany this knot is illegal to own and carry this knot if it is additionally weighted with, for example, metal balls.

Sources:

Wikipedia: https://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Affenfaust&oldid=...

Primary source: https://www.bka.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/UnsereAufgaben/Au...

I don't see any sources on this, just some tongue in cheek Quora posts.

I did find something interesting about "the Slugshot" being illegal in some US states, but I would take this with a grain of salt considering the source.

http://www.oldsaltblog.com/2018/07/the-monkey-fists-nasty-co...

This might provide some context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtWl9Mz2SPg

A "self-defense" keychain with a 1 inch steel ball enclosed within a monkey fist knot at the end. At 0:18 the demonstrator smashes a laptop with it. I found that pretty funny.

Really? But they’re used on everything from fishing boats to cruise liners on the ends of heaving lines. You’re not supposed to weight them with lead, and if you’d done this and someone got hurt I think you’d be in trouble with health and safety but I’m sure they’re not illegal here. What do you put on the end of a heaving line in Aus?

Could you link to a formal document specifying the ban? I'm not Australian, never even been there, so I have no idea how the legal system works there, but I'm very skeptical that any knot could be illegal in any civilized country.

Wait until you hear of banned books.

You are free to discuss about books as you wish, but books are not knots.

Is banning a book more civilized than banning a knot?

I have no idea why are you talking about books in a thread about knots. Feel free to talk about books as much as you wish, but it sure would be more beneficial to do it somewhere else.

My comments are in reply to your statement about not understanding how a civilized country can ban knots. To spell it out, I'm saying that we love banning things, and banning a knot is in line with that: it's not even the most disturbing ban we have. For example, we ban symbols (e.g. swastikas).

And there's your mistake, thinking that knots would be the same as books. Knots are knots.

Buddy, you're a broken record.

I believe it. But source?

what??? Why?

Is it classified as a weapon or something?

Yes, it’s assumed you only make it as a weapon and possession is a presumption of intent to cause harm.

A colleague made one one so we could throw a rope over a beam. We all laughed about dobbing him in, then chopped it off and chucked it into the bin.

As has been noted elsewhere in the thread, the knot is NOT illegal in and of itself in Australia or anywhere else. The poster is exaggerating.

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