Posthuman Blues

The Army is Screaming

"While using lethal force to respond to protests is likely to attract the attention and indignation of the international community, non-lethal options can be deployed more frequently and more widely, often with total impunity. Thus, the temptation is great to use such weapons to suppress non-violent protests, political gatherings that would have been left unmolested in the absence of non-lethal means.

"The AP wire story itself already demonstrates the tendency of the media to cast a forgiving eye on non-lethal military interventions, suggesting that the use of The Scream does not qualify as 'resorting to force.' Is it not 'force' to assaulting a person's inner ear until he or she is disoriented, vomiting, and unable to remain in the affected vicinity? In a world where torture is officially no longer torture, but merely 'abuse,' perhaps even this is possible."

Related:

Wonder Weapons, $20 a Pop

"Cloaked in the dull skepticism of a flat-earther, I naively thought that advances like 'Electro-Hypnotizers' and 'Ion Ray Guns' were the stuff of science fiction, or merely hoaxes."