Taser Mounting PR Campaign to Sell Taser Stun Guns to General Public: Not a Good Idea

Taser is mounting a major campaign to get stun guns into the hands of the general public for self-defense purposes.

This is not a great idea.

The potential for abuse and misuse of these defensive weapons is so great that they should rethink what they're trying to do. In addition to Johnny or Jane Citizen having these stun guns, the bad guys will be able to buy them too.

Think about this: the police sometimes aren't sure when it's appropriate to use these weapons; in some very publicized cases, the weapons were used on children. Some of those children subsequently died from the electrical current causing major damage. Some adults have died too.

Schools are using them too to enforce discipline. This is an outrageous use of these devices whose short and long-term health effects are still being researched.

If the police use of stun guns sometimes causes death, what will happen when untrained Johnny or Jane use them to discipline their kids, or use them to impose their will on others? How many more problems will we be creating?

Using these weapons for anything other than outright self-defense against another human being should be a crime and the penalties should be very stiff if it's proven that someone used one of these devices on another person for no good reason.

It doesn't matter if the civilian versions will be weaker than the military and police ones. They still have to be strong enough to disable someone otherwise they're useless. Does "weaker" mean that it will only throw out 90,000 volts instead of 100,000 volts?

There will definitely be justifiable use of these devices, but how many people are going to get shocked for no good reason?

I think the police and military do need these devices, but I'm not sure that Johnny and Jane do.

What defensive measure does a police officer have against a Taser that is used against them by a criminal? Will the police officer be able to withstand the voltage, or will he or she be disabled like everyone else who gets hit with one of these devices?

This is a disaster waiting to happen.