uuummm,
 

I'm serious! If passengers knowingly boarded a plane rigged to go off in the event of trouble, they would more than likely take care of issues themselves. Insurance companies may frown upon this though.

One could argue that Boston would have been safer the other night without the police (at least for the poor girl shot and killed by a "non-lethal" projectile).

Many passengers would already react that way without the presence of a self destruct switch.

Accidents are bound to happen in any situation when you are trying to contain a large mass of moving people. And a one in how-many situation was that? Think of the harm these people may have done to others had there been no police around.

Accidents are bound to happen when testosterone-pumped police shoot "non-lethal" projectiles into crowds of people. But ve must preserve ze ordnung! All I know is a young college girl is dead. For what?

Maybe armed agents on a plane is not such a good idea after all.

I was on a flight to DCA last week (sitting next to an easy to spod Fed, I might add). The Captain announced at -30 the "No Pee Rule" and then the FA came on again and reiterated it. As the other FA was walking down the isle, I asked her if it was necessary to repeat it so many times. She stated "yeah; you'd be surprised how many people don't hear it and get up. Mostly elderly people who don't speak English."

Hmm... So they have to repeat it in English so the elderly people who don't speak English can hear it???

I'd hate to see an elderly, non English speaker taken at gun point by a FAM for getting up to Pee on a DCA flight. I'd hate to see "non-lethal" force applied in this situation.

I assume this was a U.S. FA, but as an Englishwoman, I always thought that was my nationality's response to foreigners: "If they don't understand you the first time, speak LOUDER and S L O W E R" :D

So when an innocent girl is killed, it's OK to use the "a one in how-many" argument, but not when an aircraft is flown in to a building?

I'm sure that neither you nor I are qualified to justify anything since neither one of us were there - but it was a potential riot situation that had it not been contained, could've been ugly. That's one situation. Now you want to compare it to 9/11? Which while 9/11 happened in one day - how many lives were lost and how many more were ruined over what happened? And had there been FAMs there - maybe none of it would've happened.

There are many non-lethal projectiles which can be potentially lethal. You could get a lawn-dart in your eye if you really want to get specific. But at least "non-lethal projectiles" greatly mitigate the chances of casualties. You read about one person and want to apply it to the whole, but look at how such occurrences have been reduced from say, the Kent State era.

Paintball itself can be lethal under the right conditions. I got hit in the nads :( and almost died from the pain.

And there were those spitballs in Mr. Hoffman's 5th grade math class. I got hit in the eye a couple of times and we were too young to have testosterone running wild back then! ;)