There's something awe-inspiring (or perhaps just awful) in these product advertisements and catalogs for the latest in non-lethal "crowd management," "area denial," "pain compliance," and "threat stand-off" technologies. I'm also not sure whether the most disturbing ads are the ones that use highly technical jargon ("Configurations can be tailored to yeild a scaleable defense in depth with overlapping fields of fire when tearget opportunities may be layers deep or risk profiles dictate multiple event possibilities") or Sears catalog come-ons ("easy-to-fill design").
It certainly makes sense to have alternatives to either clubbing someone with a baton (think 1968 Chicago) or shooting them with a gun. But as the Brits learned with rubber bullets in Northern Ireland, sometimes "non-lethal" isn't (or "crippling" isn't seen as much better). Ditto with tazers today. And, of course, the more such weapons are used, the more the percent chance of something going wrong means actual victims.
And, of course, the potential needful use of such weaponry needs to be considered against the tendency to overuse them (e.g., the overuse of tazers and, increasingly, the overuse of pepper-spray). #ddtb
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Spray Anything: Marketing Crowd Control to Cops
Pepper spray machines, monster Tasers, "pain compliance rounds," and other toys to make occupiers obey.