being scalded with hot water.

i was watching 60 minutes last night and saw a report that i’m not sure should be considered good news or bad news. dig the propaganda:

“You have to feel the ray gun to believe it,” says 60 Minutes correspondent David Martin, speaking about a non-lethal weapon the Pentagon has developed, “and there’s only one way to do that.”

Martin was reportedly “zapped” 17 times for this piece, demonstrating the effects, as well as the possibility that a person could reduce the impact with shields of various materials.

“The gun is really an antenna which shoots out this very high-frequency radio beam that penetrates the skin to a depth of 1/64 of an inch, which is just deep enough to hit the nerves,” says Martin. “And it creates this instantaneous sensation of heat which makes anyone who is hit with it try to get out of the way as fast as possible.

“And the second you do get out of the way, the pain goes away,” Martin continued. “And the point is that this gun, which has a range of roughly half a mile – the exact range is classified – can make you stop whatever it is you’re doing.”

It seems that is the intended benefit of this weapon, which Martin says causes the sensation of being scalded with hot water.

He asks, “How many innocent lives have been lost by someone approaching a check-point and not heeding the warning signs that American soldiers were giving them …? Now you have this gun. If you shoot that ray gun at someone and they keep coming you can safely assume that they have evil intent and have cleared the way to use more lethal force, which would be their rifle.” (LINK)

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watch the raygun in action.

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at first i thought the raygun was a hilariously good idea. invisible laser beams… they’re real? thats some dr. evil type shit right there. rappers are going to have to change up so much of their styles moving forward. busting a cap? thats so 20th century.

but if you think about it… zapping assholes with non-lethal heat beams seems better than fatally shooting them. if you provided this technology to the police think of all the amadou diallo type incidents that would never have been. also – instead of murdering crowds of rioters you could just laser beam them into keeping it moving.

good stuff, right?

then i got to thinking about how that heat raygun (better known as the active denial system) might actually be used. torturing people? breaking up student demonstrations on campuses? disrupting orgies? fucking up kobe bryant on the free-throw line? all kinds of mischief could be unleashed. i’m at a loss. is it better to have a non-lethal weapon replace guns at the risk of having it be misused as well? isn’t saving some people’s lives worth it?

either way, science has made this technology possible. it’s out there – and there is no un-ringing the bell. whether or not the raygun is a good idea is up for debate. to quote patton oswalt:
“we’re science: we’re all about ‘coulda’ not ‘shoulda.’” (listen to the audio clip)

your thoughts?