Taser Controversy

The Taser is law enforcement's new, and abused, weapon. In case you haven't seen the horrible ordeal from the police dash cam, let me paint you the picture. You see this seemingly innocent man, or woman, get shot with this horrible, gun-sounding weapon, and all of a sudden they freeze up, scream, and fall. This weapon MUST be terrible, right? I mean, look at the reactions! Look at the abuse!

Oh please.

Most people by now know what a Taser is. Especially from the media attention it has received (refer to the previous paragraph and that's how the media portrays it). A Taser is a weapon carried by most law enforcement officers and are also available to the public. It is a weapon that when shot will temporarily incapacitate whoever it hits. The taser shoots two probes that carry 50,000 volts into a person. It will lock up every muscle where the probes hit (so if the two probes hit on either side of your back, it will lock up your upper body. But, if one probe hits your upper back, and the other probe hits your right thigh, it will lock up everything inbetween, so your upper and lower body). The taser does not kill people, like many people think. The media portrays it as this terrible thing, but really, it's not. The taser has probably saved more lives than killed.

First off, the likelihood of the Taser actually killing someone is...slim to none. There have been numerous studies done to prove that the Taser is actually, for the most part, safe. But 50,000 volts sounds like, really bad doesn't it? Well, there's more voltage coming out of your light socket than the Taser. Also, it's the amount of amps that are being projected to worry about. Amps are actually what kills people, and the amount of amps in a Taser are very, very low. Not at all lethal.

There was a news report of a person being killed by the Taser. It happened in Missouri, and everybody flipped out. What was not really publicized later was the person who was "killed" by the Taser had overdosed on methamphetamine, as well as other drugs. So was it really the Taser that killed the person? No.

I say that the Taser has saved more people because it gives law enforcement a less lethal choice to control someone. I have seen situations where officers have used a Taser when they were warranted to use deadly force (in other words, use their gun and kill the person). The Taser is very effective in controlling someone and there's only a 1% chance that someone who is properly hit with a Taser won't be effected. In that situation, that's why there's more weapons on a cop's duty belt.

I have been tased (by a Taser X26). I can say that it honestly does not feel good. It was painful to a point, but more freaky because you can't move while you're being tased. The Taser is set up to only shoot in bursts of 5 seconds. Yes, it is the longest 5 seconds of your life, but after it's done, you're done. Basically, your body locks up, you feel this pulsating electricity go through your body (a very weird feeling) and when it's over, it feels like you just finished a very intensive workout. My abs felt like I did a million crunches and my back felt like I lifted 300 lbs, I was sore like that for maybe 10 minutes, but as soon as I was done being tased I could walk, even run if I wanted to. It was better than OC (Pepper) spray, where when you're sprayed you're incapacitated for a good hour or so. For me, I was incapacitated with OC spray for about 2 hours, and after the 2 hours I was walking around half blind. I was in pain from the OC for pretty much the entire day. So, I prefer the Taser over the Pepper Spray (although both of them don't feel good).

I think the Taser was a great invention, especially for cops.

X moralizedxcriminal X