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| No | 46% | 264 votes | Total: 569 votes | |
| Yes | 54% | 305 votes |
Unfortunately, with so much new legislation passed in the series of Patriot Acts recently, it's hard to know exactly what the law is anymore. I feel the police having the ability to taser an unarmed citizen at will is a disaster for our society's purported freedoms, as they were initially understood in the first century after the American constitution was written.
Obviously, as demonstrated by the hundreds of reported incidents of death or injury attributed to taser attacks, there are many people who cannot physically tolerate the dangerous bite of being "tazed."
Tasers are not well understood by police. The way these tasers are used it doesn't seem that the police know the weapon holds much more lethal potential than their billyclubs. It seems like discretion is not used at all; I was at a fair recently where the police were tasering volunteers from the crowd. With so many deaths attributed to these tasers, how can the police treat them like toys by bringing them to the fair and tasering volunteers? I don't remember the last state fair that I went to and saw the police billyclubbing curious volunteers.
The fact is these tasers have the potential to cause the end of their victims' lives. The police use them like toys, or like convenient remote control restraint devices in any situation that calls for restraint, and that's dangerous. In any fair system of justice their use would either be not permitted or only permitted in cases of extreme justification.
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