State Laws restricting pepper spray and air tasers?!

[NickBallard]

I know that this post isn't guns, but since it has a lot to do with the legality of self-defense, I thought it would be appropriate. What does everyone think about state laws that restrict pepper spray and air tasers? Pepper spray is legal in all 50 states, but some states have some unnecessary and harmful restrictions on owning pepper spray. Massachusetts says you have to buy pepper spray from a licensed firearm's dealer within the state. The state of New York also does not allow you to have pepper spray unless you purchase it from a licensed firearm's dealer within the state of NY. Various states require you to get a firearms identification card before you can have pepper spray, which often take a few weeks. So let's say you travel around that area? Those states are so small that you can end up in another state just like that. You travel to NYC just for a day, and you get mugged because you couldn't get your registration done quickly enough. Or from there you go to Massachusetts and you have to buy another pepper spray from a firearms dealer right as you leave New Hampshire. Then you have to buy another pepper spray, and so forth. Then there are some states that ban air tasers, New York and Massachusetts being among them.

 

[NickBallard]

Why Pepper Spray?

Pepper spray is non-lethal. It leaves no permanent damage. Yes, it was used in some rare instances where a while later the arrested suspect died, but only a few times when a competent professional said that it was the pepper spray, while many experts still dispute that OC was the cause in those next to none incidents. There have been many experiments with OC and placebo groups to see if pepper spray causes suffocation, by measuring the blood oxygen levels. Pepper spray didn't lower the blood oxygen levels in these experiments, but having someone lay on their stomachs and being handcuffed did! So just like Science has shown the earth isn't flat and that certain bacterium and viruses cause disease (instead of other weird ideas), it has shown pepper spray to be quite safe. Sure, a few very rare individuals are so allergic to red peppers that they die if they eat one just like some people die from eating bananas and jello! Some people have died from drinking so much water that it went into their lungs and suffocated them! Does that mean jello and bananas are deadly weapons and people should restrict the amount of water they drink? Why the need for these restrictions on self-defense that causes no permanent harm to assailants?!

 

[NickBallard]

Why Air Tasers?

As far as air tasers go, I don't have the exact numbers right now, but thousands are sold every year and thousands save lives every year, but less than ten are used in crimes every year. Plus, it would be a lot safer for a criminal to shoot someone or even an LEO with an air taser than a handgun! Not only are they designed for self-defense and not offense only, but they are used for those purposes only with just a few rare occasions that are not that dangerous. Many who have done extensive research at medical centers say it is not air tasers that cause deaths itself, it's the falling down onto certain places or the suspect just dies because he would have died anyway (such as having so intoxicated with drugs that just the slightest bit of struggle with police causes fatality). When you compare the rates of those who die after being tasered vs. those who are not but just seized and arrested by officers, air tasers are no more dangerous, so the air taser doesn't appear to be very lethal. Many cardiologists say that if someone dies from electrocution, they die right away, not a half-hour or hour later, like the rare times when suspects die after being tasered and some ask if it was the taser. Anyway, citizens have a right to defend themselves, so why do these certain states ban air tasers?

 

[geekWithA.45]

NJ prohibits chemical sprays larger than 3/4 of an ounce, unless for "protection from bears".

It also prohibits "stun guns", which apparently includes hand held contact type stunners.

What do I think?

I think that the message is clear:

Such states hold their citizens and their citizen's very lives in contempt.