Earlier quoted context omitted.
You shouldn't really sharpen kitchen knifes too sharp. And even if they're not super razor sharp (cutting a finger with no resistance), you should still warn people new to your kitchen or even family members/regular users right after each re-sharpening. Additionally, too low angle will make the knife very suspectible to blunting and/or require constant drawing on the sharpening steel¹. Unless you have super high qual…
> You shouldn't really sharpen kitchen knifes too sharp There is a sentence among cooks: "only with a stub/butt knife you cut yourself" - isnt this true anymore?
BUT!, once the knife is sharp enough for a job, and I mean for comfortable work, not just barely enough, then it's enough.
Giving somebody who never held a sharp knife in their life a knife that is so sharp it will cut their fingers without them feeling it (or even close to that sharp) is like telling somebody to run a coding agent on their system and not in a VM. Things can get bad really fast.
Most people (at least in central Poland where I come from) used semi blunt knives* for everything. Some would have a household knife sharpener or maybe even low quality sharpening steel like the ones you get in a knives set. Maybe they or their grandma had a butcher in the family. They will have nice sharp knives that can cut tomatoes without crushing them.
But with a knife that is sufficiently thin, a throwaway leather belt, a little skill and an hour or more of time, you can get a mirror-like polished blade that is so sharp you can amputate limbs in seconds. Just need to go through the joint at a correct angle.
That's how our grandfathers shaved.
* just realized I was typing plural for knives wrong - with an 'f'