The Department of Homeland Security is pursuing the introduction of a device known as the Security Bracelet, a wearable tag that would allow authorities to inflict pain compliance on suspects from a distance, while also recommending law enforcement applications and potential use in "crowd control situations".
Introduced ostensibly to combat airline terrorism, a creepy promo video courtesy of the patent holders Lamperd FTS exploits shocking 9/11 imagery to push the torture device as a solution to countering potential hijackers by inflicting "Electro-Muscular Disruption" and presumably giving the rest of the passengers a debilitating shock at the same time.
Watch the clip.
"Upon activation of the electric shock device, through receipt of an activating signal from the selectively operable remote control means, the passenger wearing that particular bracelet receives the disabling electrical shock from the electric shock device. Accordingly, the passenger becomes incapacitated for a few seconds or perhaps a few minutes, during which time the passenger can be fully subdued and handcuffed, if necessary. Depending on the type of transmission medium used to send the activating signal, other passengers may also become temporarily incapacitated, which is undesirable and unfortunate, but may be unavoidable," reads the patent for the device.
The claim that such a shock would "not cause permanent injury" is an insult to the hundreds of Taser victims who have lost their lives to so-called "non-lethal weapons" - devices whose abuse by authorities has led groups like Amnesty International to condemn them as an affront to basic human rights.
Why the terrorists wouldn't just remove the bracelet as soon as they boarded the plane isn't explained, but the perceived fallibility of the device isn't the issue - the heart of the matter is the fact that the Department of Homeland Security has publicly expressed an interest and is seeking funding to utilize the device against the "criminal element".
Letters exchanged between the company and DHS official Paul S. Ruwaldt show Homeland Security's intention to utilize the device for border control and, "indeed for anywhere else for which the temporarily restraint of large numbers of individuals in open area environments by a small number of agents or Law Enforcement Officers".
The letters confirm that funding is being sought for the widespread deployment of the device and that several state and local authorities have expressed an interest, as well as the DOD, the CDC, Department of Interior, Department of Agriculture Forestry service as well as unnamed law enforcement agencies.
In addition, according to the biography of Barry Lamperd, the owner of the company behind the device, carried on his own website, "His current focus is on products related to the use of less lethal weapons in crowd control situations".
Since revelations about warrantless secret surveillance of all U.S. citizens as well as millions of innocent Americans being included on the terror watch list have come to light, the new legal precedent of guilty until proven innocent has all but been established in the "land of the free".
So why not force protesters who insist on expressing what they claim is "freedom of speech" to wear the Security Bracelet? If they step outside of their free speech zone - zap them! How about making everyone who attends a Presidential inauguration or speech wear the bracelet in the interests of national security?
Since "crowd control situations" can easily be interchanged with "unauthorized demonstrations," why not force dissenters and undesirables to wear the bracelet so as to prevent civil unrest in times of national emergency?
Why not go the whole hog and just tag babies from birth in order to combat violent crime and robbery? If a crime is in progress, the police could just activate the shock from a safe distance and save lives.
The cost of enforcing any of these measures would of course be the complete and unmitigated death of any notion of liberty and freedom, but such concepts don't seem to concern advocates of the device.
Judging by comments left by You Tube viewers, most people are not going to "happily opt" to submit to the measures, as the promotional video claims, with respondents agreeing in unison that the device itself is "a lot scarier than terrorists".
"I'd rather be killed by terrorists then spend my life tracked and controlled by government "benefactors". Freedom always carries with it some risk of things going wrong.Who trusts the government enough to allow them to track citizens? If they start implementing this kind of technology, I just won't fly," writes one.
"What better way to assist terrorists (be they called "terrorists" or "police") to use you as tools at will than to do this? If "they" can subdue a few terrorists, than "they" can just as easily subdue the entire plane and use it as they see fit. Terrorists are scary? Please. Police (by all their names: KGB, SS, CIA, FBI) have killed far, far more people than any "terrorist" ever dreamed. So, lets give THEM more power, eh?" cautions another.
"Only the worst coward would subject himself to the indignity of such a device in the name of "security." Some things are more important than security, and one of those things is freedom. Free people do not allow themselves to be treated as criminals, guilty until proven innocent," writes another.
The way in which the promo invokes horrific images of 9/11 to sell the product also leaves viewers revolted.
"Fearmongering to sell a product. No thanks. But lets get them to keep demonstrating how the shocking someone part works on their own employees!" writes one respondent.
Listen Mikey, if corporate ratz who have to fly insist on keeping their high paying jobs are willing to wear the shock collar, and if rich kids who fly to Aspen for ski trips would rather wear the bracelet than forgo the status symbol of a prestigious lift ticket on their coat zipper, then, pork em!
It's already too absurd for me to ever think about flying, and frankly Americans deserve no more freedom than that which they're willing to fight and sacrifice for.
After the way people sat it out while the govt killed the poor people of New Orleans what more do you need to see to understand that the ninety percentile wouldn't waddle their fat asses across the street to save their country?
I live in a state where the average young man would rather be kicked by a Delaware State Trooper than to be knighted by the Queen. It's a state with no history of activism and no courageous gadflies or heroes since Caesar Rodney rode to Philadelphia to sign the Declaration Of Independence. (a fascinating read)
Our slogan is "THE FIRST STATE" because we were the first to ratify the constitution. We were also the last to abolish slavery upon passage of the 13th amendment, and we're supposed to be a Northern state! (although DE men fought on both sides) I wouldn't be surprised if Delaware is the first to sign the new charter that creates the 12 zones that replace the states and abolishes all rights.
Hell, even the tumultuous 1960's passed DE by because "the state police doesn't allow that kind of nonsense here!"
Nearly all of the corporations that rule the world are incorporated in Delaware. The people are as close to the Eloi as you'll ever see in an American state.