Capital Punishment

[Reynard-Miri]

I have to admit that I am surprised that the number is as low as one in ten.

[Trifkin]

Could be higher and people just aren't reporting it.

Garrett - If everyone thought that way, nobody would end up deserving life. It's all or nothing here. You don't get to decide who gets to live and who deserves to die based on your personal opinions. I think rape is super horrible, too. I would be lying if I said I didn't think that castration wasn't a good solution for that, based on my personal experiences and opinions. But do I really want or expect that to become a public policy? No. Why? Because people make mistakes. People accuse others falsely. People frame people for things. It's too great a risk.

Aside from the accuracy of convictions, yes, I do think all life is precious. You don't see me running around demanding that every man who ever groped me have his hands cut off, do you? I have experienced reprehensible things at the hands of men, but I don't think those people deserve to die. I think they deserve to be punished, yes, but also comprehended. It isn't enough to simply eliminate the symptoms. The behavior itself is a symptom, and in order to truly stop it from happening in the future the actual underlying cause must be determined. Killing off anyone who does something bad removes our ability to examine what made them do it in the first place.

[Fenn-Tyr]

I've always felt that capital punishment is for the sole purpose of revenge, not punishment. It may offer a sense of closure or justice, but if you study the figures, it's been proven to not be that huge of a deterrent. Also, the average execution in the USA has been shown to be similar, if not more expensive, than the cost of an average life sentence. Plus, as Trifkin pointed out, there is always potential for errors. It always amazes me that society can view an act as deplorable, yet pay some unknown person to perform the same act.

[Reynard-Miri]

[WillowWolf]

[Fluffernuff]

I'm very much against the death penalty as a sentence. I feel there is no crime so disgusting or anything that warrants death as a punishment. I also feel there is no human who has any right to tell any other human when theyre allowed to live. period.

im not against removing someone for murder by any means.... but because humans are NOT perfect... since there a CHANCE to mess up... NOT A SINGLE PERSON. PERIOD> should ever hold someone else's lives in their hand... for ANY reason. murderer or not.

The issue I have is... death is too effective. it doesnt discriminate. you cant appeal death if youre innocent. human error is human error. it isnt right for some judge to send anyone off... they are literally no better. in fact, i would consider all involved worse. theyre murderers under protection, especially if such a decision was taken lightly by bored or anxious to move on jurors >_>

is it a good deterrent? sure? has it done some good? maybe? depends on your definition
as far as im concerned... justice never demands blood.

I dont have a solution or an alternative... humans will murder eachother... but i dont feel like murder for murder is right... not when theres even a .00001% of a misfire

if we're not common beasts, why are we so hung up on screaming for death?

so i guess im against it... but its not something i can or even will fight against.
its effective but morally unjust. which does a government really need?

[Reynard-Miri]

The death penalty is not murder. It's execution. If you're not okay with that, fine. But like Garrett said, it's not murder.

[zamisk]

So far I've heard two accounts of "it's not murder, because it's not murder."

What defines that to you guys? Merrriam-Webster defines it as unlawfully killing someone. I'd say it's someone with power killing someone with less power. When corrupt governments kill off citizens, are they murdering, or executing?

[Reynard-Miri]

Depending on circumstance, I would probably call that either assassination or execution, but I could see some cases where I might call it murder as well. A big part of murder is that it's outside the bounds of the law. There's more to it than that, but that's like a requisite. Execution at minimum requires due process of law (Whatever that means. I don't have everything figured out, people.) and the public announcement that you are going to execute this person for this crime.

[Fenn-Tyr]

Executions are still state-funded murder, imo. Taxpayers are basically saying it's okay to end someone's life. To me, it's no different than if I were to pay a hitman to eliminate someone. If one is illegal, why do so many people support the other? Yes, some crimes are abhorrent (murder, crimes against children, etc), but if I paid some guy to murder a pedophile, it would still be illegal. What is the difference?

[Reynard-Miri]

Murder is active. Executions are reactive. Even if EVERYTHING else was the same, this would still make the two fundamentally different.

[zamisk]

I don't think it's that black and white. There are people who murder reactively, a la vigilante justice, and governments who execute because someone did something they didn't like. America has more checks and balances to prevent that, but I don't like the government getting to decide to kill people because power is so often abused. When we hand over that power, reactions are only going to get more extreme from all sides.

[Reynard-Miri]

I thought you might bring something like that up, but I can't remember quite how I intended to respond... I'll try my best with as sleepy as I am.

Being reactive isn't the same as doing X because Y happened. I mean, otherwise arguably all actions are reactive because they followed from some previous event ("I killed my husband because he cheated on me").

[zamisk]

Reactive means "showing a response to a stimulis".

I'd guess it's safe to say the majority of killings in the world happen reactively. There's not that many Dexter types compared to the amount of people who get caught up in the heat of the moment and kill someone. My point is that beating someone to death and stalking and killing someone are both murder under the law, even if one is reactive and one is active. Is it any different to beat a child molester to death when you catch him in the act rather than when you detaining him to kill later? If so, is it any different if someone tracks down that same person and kills him in an alley? Both are unlawful, so why should a court decide if he should be killed? His death may be more humane but that's the only difference in my eyes.

Just because more than one person decides someone should die, I don't believe killing should be lawful unless one is protecting lives from someone posing a lethal threat at that moment. I'd like to hear your thoughts on this, I hope I'm not pestering you.

It's like how cops don't shoot out tires in a chase, ideally shots are only fired when people's lives are on the line. That seems like a good policy to me. Voting and then killing seems a bit uneccesary if we can lock them up.

[Reynard-Miri]