When the ignorant are allowed to make the rules stupid things happen. Here's a true story;
My wife and I moved to Hawaii back in 1990 and being an avid SCUBA diver I was taking my diving gear including my spear gun. When we got to the airport in LA I removed the spear and all the bands used to fire the spear gun and all that was put in my checked luggage. I had no place to put the 'gun' part so I was going to carry it on. It was a small spear gun.
When we got to the baggage counter the lady looked at it and said "There ain't no way you're taking that on the plane!" I explained to her what it was and how it worked and that at present it was nothing more than a club. Her response? "Well it just looks scary so you can't take it on the plane."
We figured out a way to wrap it and check it with the other luggage.

KC