Infographic: pepper spray facts

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Some stuff you might want to know about the pepper spray used by law enforcement.


embiggen

WGRD
Follow Blame it on the Voices on Twitter | Blame it on the Voices on Facebook

If you liked this post, you can subscribe to the Blame It On The Voices RSS feed and get your regular fix


4 comentarii:

Jess Huch said...

Didn't someone at Fox News say that pepper spray was a food product? I hope that they see this.

Jay Crawford said...

Having been exposed to both full-strength oleoresin capsicum (pepper) spray (as well as its predecessor irritant/lachrimatory agents CN and CS) I have only one rational response to this exaggerated "warning":
Bullsh*t.
Pepper sprays are the least harmful of several alternatives for police officers who are outnumbered by belligerant protesters. They may not have a completely non-lethal record but millions of uses over the last 25 years have left fewer than a hundred people dead...FAR fewer than ANY alternative means of close combat or defense.

Lt Pike was quite justified in using pepper spray on illegal protesters who were deliberately trying to detain the police officers and create an incident. The protesters knew that the police would try to break through the protesters' barrier ring to escape.
The officers' alternative was either
a) violent hand-to-hand fighting with protesters (which would cause bruising or broken bones at considerable risk to the exiting officers)
b) baton-clubbing of protesters (which would also cause bruising or broken bones but with less risk to the officers)
or
c) shock weapons like taser (which is unlikely to seriously injure protesters...but is still vastly more dangerous than OC pepper spray).
These factual other alternatives prove that the least harmful course of action was the use of pepper spray on unruly people (a mob) who were illegally detaining law officers who had done NOTHING to those unruly people.
In view of the popular lies told about the UC incident, I find myself half-wishing that the police had resorted to wrestling and (inevitably) eventually clubbing their would-be kidnappers.

Anonymous said...

Couldn't the police just have sat down on finding themselves surrounded?

Why do all three of your 'alternatives' necessitate violence in one form or another?

Anonymous said...

Not sure what video you've watched. In the video I watched, there was a clear exit path for the police to the left of the group.

I also now consider you "unruly" even though you've done nothing to me simply because it suits my argument. The seated "mob" was doing nothing more offensive than shouting "shame on you" and the like. Go troll elsewhere.

Post a Comment

Dear spammers! Please note that a nofollow attribute is automatically added to all the comment-related links!

You can use the following HTML tags: <b>, <i>, <a>