TASER C2 Parties Hit the Suburbs

In an interesting twist on the old Tupperware Party theme, 35-year-old Taser distributor Dana Shafman teaches potential customers how to protect themselves using an aluminum target. Her independent dealership, called Shieldher Inc. is out of Scottsdale, Arizona. She focuses on selling Tasers to women for their personal safety.

In an innovative technique ignored by the traditional firearms world, Taser is manufacturing a version of its stun gun to women. For the first time, non-lethal weapons (and we’re not talking about pocket knives) come in designer colors, including lipstick pink, two types of camouflage and animal prints.

These babies are small enough to fit in a pocket and pack a 50,000 volt wallop, making them easy enough for just about anyone to carry. For just under $400 it is possible to fit significant protection in a purse, tote bag, or backpack.

Recently, Shafman, a TASER-toting, can-do kind of a gal pitched her wares to suburban woman in Fairield, Connecticut while wearing red suede boots. A Second Amendment fan, she carries a TASER C2 in her handbag and reminds her audience that TASERs are legal in nearly every state. The Bureau of Firearms and Tobacco does not consider TASERs to be firearms. You may purchase one from Taser International as long as you are 18 years 9old and can pass a felony background check.

Although Fairfield is one of the safest communities in America, it is right next door to Bridgeport, one of the highest crime areas in the U.S. Shafman cited statistics that made her audience cringe: 28 murders, 69 forcible rapes, 659 robberies and 753 assaults in 2006. And if that didn’t reach the most conservative in the room, she brought up statistics on campus crime that made the parents and relatives of coeds shiver, most notably the TASER C2 party hostess. Her 20-year-old daughter attends college in Bridgeport.

Although Shafman contends that no death has ever been directly attributed to being Tased, over 200 people have died following being hit by some sort of electro-shock weapons.

The next activity on the party schedule is shooting. Everyone gets a chance to try their hand. When the electric shock hits the target, which is shaped like a human, it lights up.

While police TASERs only deliver a five second shock, these models deliver shocks that can go on for up to 30 seconds straight. Both models can be fired repeatedly by simply pulling the trigger again and again. The object of the exercise is to shock the bad guy a few times, at least long enough to disable him, then run away.

One of the attendees, Lisa Turnick, brought up what many consider to be the most often neglected safety precaution available to all Americans: awareness. “Most people are so consumed with their day-to-day lives; they’re oblivious to what’s going on.”

Although there were no sales that evening, Shafman reports selling “about one every day.”

When asked if she was trying to scare people into buying TASERs, Shafman responded, “Watch the news.”