Why Isn't Tear Gas Illegal?

[you gon always be my latin queen bitch]

It's a chemical weapon, isn't it?



Iranian security forces fired tear gas into crowds of anti-government protesters Thursday. Tear gas was also used in Sri Lanka this week and in Venezuela and Haiti last month. The State Department stockpiles it at embassies around the world. Aren't chemical weapons like tear gas illegal?




yes, but only in war. The 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention doesn't apply to domestic law enforcement. (The United States was a major proponent of the exemption, fearing that the convention might be interpreted to prohibit lethal injection.) The most common lacrimator used for riot control is a compound called 2-chlorobenzalmalononitrile, or CS. (It's not actually a gas so much as a powder that's usually mixed with smoke to create an airborne agent.) CS has no long-term effects when used properly, but the treaty still bans its use in battle since it's difficult to distinguish from more dangerous agents in the fog of war. (You don't want the other side to think they're being attacked with, say, sarin, and respond in kind.) It's also considered inhumane to deploy CS as a means of weakening enemy soldiers so they might be killed by conventional means—although that didn't stop the United States from using tear gas to flush the Viet Cong out of tunnels and then bombarding them as they fled.

[Muhfukka]

because its non lethal. just like how you can buy a can of pepperspray, that is a chemical weapon too

[you gon always be my latin queen bitch]

pepper spray is a chemical weapon....damn and they sell it

[QuietTruth]

Yeah but my mother had pepper-spray on her key chain, and cops confiscated it off her.

[you gon always be my latin queen bitch]

what state?

Yeah but my mother had pepper-spray on her key chain, and cops confiscated it off her.

[QuietTruth]

MA I think she was in.

[Sikotic™]

Tear gas is easy to make anyways.