One of the points the show made was very profound: It said that the good news was that with such weapons people could be deterred without having to kill them. The bad news was that since you're *not* killing them (and in some cases causing no lasting harm at all), governments would be far more willing to use them, since they wouldn't have to worry about the backlash that simply mowing down a crowd would cause.
The reason this is troubling is because it would encourage governments to use oppressive measures to "keep the peace" or simply suppress dissent whenever it arose. It's easy to picture a government developing a "if anyone causes trouble, zap 'em until they quiet down" policy. It makes the slippery slope towards a police state and/or dictatorship that much steeper and more slippery.
You stole my thunder. I saw the same show. I believe it was on TechTV. At first, I thought, ...how cool! Then, they talked about a police state. I thought of what it would be like if Barbra Boxer or Hillary were in power. You might protest their policy a time or two, but then you might think long and hard about protest again after suffering through these "Non-leathal" weapons. Most people would just submit after a time or two, convinced that giving up the 2nd amendment ain't so bad. Who cares if you pay 80% taxes, after all its for the children. We would be just mindless robots for them to control. Any resistance would just be met yet again, with "minimal force." If they can get "Hate Crime laws" passed, they can make everything illegal.