Essay On Non Lethal Weapons

Non-lethal weapons, unlike lethal weapons, are not used to fatally injure people. They are primarily used to enforce law and order, in cities, neighborhoods, and even during war. Stephen Coleman’s TED Talk, Non-Lethal Weapons, A Moral Hazard?, outlines both the positive and negative outcomes from non-lethal weapons. Although some may argue that non-lethal weapons are immoral and shouldn’t be used, non-lethal weapons are morally correct because they ensure the safety of civilians, are not used to kill, and they decrease the rate of crime. Non-lethal weapons are the perfect compromise - weapons that have significant purpose an effect, but do not kill anybody. According to Webster’s New World Dictionary, morality is the “rightness or wrongness, as of an action” (420). The intent of non-lethal weapons is for the enforcement of law and order, which abides by good morality. Such weapons are used primarily by police forces, but by militaries as well. Other weapons, such as bombs and machine guns, generally have the purpose of killing, which is wrong; and, therefore, they are immoral. The Christian Science Monitor, a magazine …show more content…
Although they wouldn’t kill someone, they could produce an effect that could stun or disable someone temporarily. In Coleman’s TED Talk, he said that non-lethal weapons were “explicitly introduced to be an alternative to firearms” (00:10:32-00:10:36). This essentially means that even though it isn’t a firearm, it has the same psychological effect in the way that people are afraid to have it used on them and therefore, will comply with the law. Now that police forces have sidearms they can use more often, people became more fearful and didn’t participate in deplorable acts - and thus, the rate of crime decreased. This proves that non-lethal weapons air on the side of moral decorum. Such weapons cannot y be moral hazards if they help rid of criminal activity and help provide safety for