57190


In _Fail 20: I'm Not Popular, so I'll Make Preparations_ , Tomoko has some
kind of cutting instrument that I'm not familiar with. It's like a shaft-type
thing with a retractable, squarish blade on the end. It's got me curious about
what it is, but identifying it shouldn't be a difficult question, and I'm
actually more curious about whether it's something that's normal to have at
school. It doesn't seem like anyone else in the chapter is using one, just
regular scissors. This makes me wonder if she's even allowed to have one. And
considering what happens, it seems like Tomoko probably _shouldn't_ have it.

Where I'm from, people are pretty paranoid about letting kids have sharp
instruments. I had one teacher in middle school who didn't even trust us with
scissors. And about the only time I had a knife was for cutting linoleum for a
linocut print in a high school art class. I'm interested in the cultural
differences here.

So, what is this item, and is it normal to have one at school in Japan, or is
Tomoko in trouble?

[![Picture of cutting
instrument](https://i.stack.imgur.com/BF2k4.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/BF2k4.png)


CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-04-08T16:45:20.573
57189
2020-04-08T19:22:34.520
2020-04-08T17:05:39.363
19307
19307
question
culture watamote
What is this cutting instrument Tomoko has, and is she supposed to have it at school?


That's a [box cutter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utility_knife), more
commonly known as a utility knife. I'm unsure exactly _how_ common they are in
Japanese schools, but they're certainly not prohibited: off the top of my
head, _Charlotte_ and _Grisaia no Kajitsu_ are two other anime that depict box
cutter-wielding schoolgirls (albeit in more sinister contexts).

In real-world Japan, there was an [infamous
incident](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sasebo_slashing) in 2004 where an
11-year-old schoolgirl slashed a classmate to death using a box cutter. There
were discussions afterwards about whether to lower the age of criminal
responsibility, but I can find no record of any discussions about banning box
cutters from schools, which suggests to me that there is a cultural element to
their continued use, when other countries have banned them over far less.

(As an aside, I went to school in the UK and I do recall using box cutters
during secondary school craft lessons, but they would have been rounded up and
locked away with the other supplies after each lesson, and I'm pretty sure you
would have been in _massive_ trouble if you were caught walking around with
one outside of those lessons.)


CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-04-08T19:22:34.520
57190
2020-04-08T19:22:34.520
35679
57189
answer