Poll: An Argument for Capital Punishment

[Rolling Thunder]

Khell, I just destroyed your argument. Simply because some offenders can not be rehabiliated does not mean that all of them aren't.


Your arguments are not based on facts, logic, or common sense. They are nothing more than purified, vitrolic rant rendered into a form that resembled debate. You're not arguing, you're not presenting facts or discussing- You are presenting your view as "Right", and all others as weak, or wrong, or dangerously insane.

Read this before you open your electronic trap again.

http://www.csom.org/pubs/recidsexof.html

 

[RhinoTuna]

There is no such thing as good and no such thing as evil... remember that.

Uh.. yes there is.

 

[Mullahgrrl]

Make it mandatory!

 

[Dele]

No the death penalty does not reduce the amount of crimes. Look at the crime rate in Texas.

It does, however, reduce the number of criminals in existence that the moments following their execution.

My take is simply this - capital punishment is nothing more than state sanctioned murder. I have no moral outrage at the notion, but there is no sense in misabeling the procedure into something more palatable. Generally speaking, a person's take on the subject seems to be based almost entirely on what they perceive the purpose of the justice system is. Some people believe that the justice system exists to punish, other's believe it exists to rehabilitate - and this distinction seems to be the basis for the viewpoint on capital punishment in general.

Execution isn't punishment. Once someone is dead that is it, their punishment is finished. If the "punishment" being delivered in this case is the horror they feel during those final steps towards the execution room then that kind of punishment is inhumane beyond belief.

If anyone even thinks of coming back with "well they were inhumane" - seriously, don't. If your answer to this kind if inhumanity is more inhumanity, you are exactly the same as them, you only differ on the circumstances such treatment should be used on people.

If it's not punishment why call it capital punishment at all? In fact we should rename it to permanent rehabilitation.

There is no such thing as good and no such thing as evil... remember that.

Uh.. yes there is.

Subjective=Objective?
Please show me your logic.

 

[Beffudled Sheep]

There is no such thing as good and no such thing as evil... remember that.

Uh.. yes there is.

No there isn't. Good and evil are labels humans created. I don't know why we created these labels but in the grand scheme of things these labels are pointless.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Even one life lost because of a rehabilitated or released felon re-offending is unacceptable.

But one life lost because of a mistake in the justice system is?

 

[RhinoTuna]

There is no such thing as good and no such thing as evil... remember that.

Uh.. yes there is.

No there isn't. Good and evil are labels humans created. I don't know why we created these labels but in the grand scheme of things these labels are pointless.

Let's say you hurt someone, someone close to you. You would feel remorse, no? (unless you're a heartless bastard) That right there means what you did to hurt them was bad/evil. I know you're probably going to say something along the lines of "i'd only feel said remorse because of the labels we have created" but that doesn't mean they are pointless. Why do you think they are pointless?

 

[Beffudled Sheep]

There is no such thing as good and no such thing as evil... remember that.

Uh.. yes there is.

No there isn't. Good and evil are labels humans created. I don't know why we created these labels but in the grand scheme of things these labels are pointless.

Let's say you hurt someone, someone close to you. You would feel remorse, no? (unless you're a heartless bastard) That right there means what you did to hurt them was bad/evil. I know you're probably going to say something along the lines of "i'd only feel said remorse because of the labels we have created" but that doesn't mean they are pointless. Why do you think they are pointless?

You make a good argument but i am a heartless bastard.
As to why they are pointless.I don't know how to explain it. I mean i want to but i just can't find the words.

 

[Superbeast]

I'm anti-Captial Punishment - at least for the most part. I apologise if I outrage anyone with my posts - they'll be a mix of honest opinion, perhaps some facts and a small amount of hyperbole and strawman (though I'll try to point those out to avoid confusion).

Here's a hyperbole argument regarding the cost:

My taxes (UK) go towards the education system. The education system has to deal with all sorts of people, smart and dumb (whether through tough circumstances or sheer refusal to go to school). Therefore, since it is such a tax burden to me, anyone achieving less than a B (60% or so) should be shot - it'll boost intelligence and save billions of pounds a year, as the idiots will be dead and 1) wont be in school, saving the education system money/meaning the best education for the best students and 2) won't think drinking a bottle of bleach/putting a lit firework up their backside is a good idea, realeaving the burden on the NHS.

Sounds stupid, doesn't it? Well that's how the "I don' wanna pay fur dem criminals!" sounds to me. (end hyperbole/strawman).


In truth, I feel that Capital Punishment is not a deterrant. The crime rates haven't really changed much in this country (UK) with the abolition of it (though teenage crime, particularly knife related, is on the rise and I do feel the treatment is too soft - often 6yrs for a teenager killing another).

Rehabilitation does work, too - particularly for "crimes of passion" or "accidental hommicide" (where, say, a man pushes his wife back in an argument, she trips over and bangs her head on the kerb and dies from a brain hemmorage) - so surely that alone is a reason against capital punishment. If even half of criminals who could potentially face the death penalty can be rehabilitated (provided the rehabilitation is carried out properly, not like some of the fiasco that has happened in the past here), then it means half can once more be useful -and safe- to society, and that if captial punishment were the norm, then it is certainly a waste of human life (since they would be useful, they are not "waste").

However, I am tempted to say that capital punishment should be an option for serial/repeat offenders. If someone murders 15 people, it's likely they are either clinically psychotic (in which case they'll be institutionalised at the trial) or simply prove themselves unable to live with the rest of society, and perhaps the death sentence is the best option - since they would never be able to be rehabilitated.

Yet at the same time, I see death as the "easy way out". Spending the next 40-60 years of your life in a 6'x6'x6' concrete room with nothing but a bed, a sink and a toilet (with only an hour outside a day, and no contact with the outside world) - that's a punishment. Perhaps it is a drain in taxes, but I see it as a worthy drain. Of course, that means a reformation of the prison system; none of this gourmet christmas parties (ok it was a mental institute not a prison, but it housed child molesters etc), PS2s and TVs in the rooms etc - back to 'proper' prison where all people have is to sit in a confined space and think about their crime.

So I guess my opinion is as follows: I see capital punishment as an escape for violent criminals, as a risky process as it endangers innocents more than necessary, and simply as a popularity (and potentially highly abusable) tool for the Government, and as such should never be an option. Except in extreme circumstances (the aforementioned 15-victim murderer).

 

[Knight Templar]

It would be good to use them as a workforce and give them a choice, hard labor or death.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Superbeast, your hypothetical argument about shooting C-Average or worse students is not a fair comparison, but lets run with it...

A C or lower student still has a place in the world. C-level graduates make up the average white-collar and blue-collar jobs, real jobs not McJobs. The D-level and failed students, those are your McWorkers. We need both of these demographics, and they do contribute to society. Murderers don't.

Then what about paraplegics, chronic arthritis sufferers, old people, an the long term unemployed?

 

[GothmogII]

Superbeast, your hypothetical argument about shooting C-Average or worse students is not a fair comparison, but lets run with it...

A C or lower student still has a place in the world. C-level graduates make up the average white-collar and blue-collar jobs, real jobs not McJobs. The D-level and failed students, those are your McWorkers. We need both of these demographics, and they do contribute to society. Murderers don't.

Then why not make the murderers work? Granted...you wouldn't want a convicted murder sitting in the desk next to you from 9.00 to 5.00...but, if the cost is a big impetus to not keep such a person alive, then why not make them work to stay alive?

I don't know, I'm not talking exactly like a work release program, rather, why not set up facilities that, during the day the inmates maybe manufacture goods, or have an area set aside where they can continue whatever profession they held outside.

 

[Echo3Delta]

I'm against the death penalty, but for cruel punishment - as long as it's usual.

My reason for being against the death penalty has nothing to do with the state, the convicted, or the victim. I think about the doctor who injects the needle or the officer who flips the switch. It doesn't sit right with me that good, innocent people get up, go to work, and go to bed at night having killed a man. I believe that killing another person changes you and should never be done unless absolutely necessary.

As for the convicted, I would suggest a life of hard labor - perhaps some work that might benefit society. If they're disobedient, then indefinite solitary confinement with 6 eggs per day until they die. I believe that would satisfy the "deterrent" argument, and the horrible, horrible living conditions shouldn't cost too much either. Like I said: Cruel punishment, but exercised uniformly (the Constitution forbids cruel AND unusual punishment).

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Then what about paraplegics, chronic arthritis sufferers, old people, an the long term unemployed?

Butters Cuddly... It's just not a fair comparison. A paraplegic is still able to work, even a welfare leech really has done nothing wrong. Comparing innocent people to criminals for the sake of worth, innocent people are worth more simply by merit of their adherence to the law.

That is a can of worms you are opening up though Khell. Attaching monetary value to a human life. What we, as a society, are supposed to do is say "this is a human, this is what it means to be a human, and these are responsibilities towards other humans". Add the caveat "Unless" and you create a society where some are more valuble than others. Even if it starts off with murder, soon after it will be rape and then move onto sexual assault and then on to car crime and double parking. I know not everything is black and which in this world but I do feel this is a circumstance where it is. Are some human lives really worth less than a dollar amount?

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Cuddly do you like murderers or something?

Right - quote where I said that, or lurk more. This is The Escapist, we don't run that way here. This is not a forum for sarcastic barbs and persnickety little swipes.

Here I got an idea, why don't all the anti-capital punishment people pay for all those poor defenseless murderers. Sound fair? Oh wait, it isn't.

Agreed. As long as all pro-capital punishment people are put on a national database, and if they are found guilty of an offence where the death penalty can be administered they face that death penalty.

I'm sorry, some people have to die, why does it have to be the innocent, in such horrible slow manners like cancer, diease, and starvation? Yes even in the great land of america, there are people starving and dying of malnutrion, maybe not at the rate of say Ethopia, but consider we spend so much just to keep over a million violent criminals healthy, happy, and well fed with CABLE TV!

Are you saying that killing people convicted of murder will give you enough money to cure cancer, disease, and end starvation?

Or are you saying that those things are so horrific we should raise taxes to deal with them, which makes the point about criminals moot anyway?

Or are you just making an emotional appeal to justify state sponsored pre-meditated murder?

 

[Superbeast]

Cuddly do you like murderers or something?

Here I got an idea, why don't all the anti-capital punishment people pay for all those poor defenseless murderers. Sound fair? Oh wait, it isn't.

See, that's not fair, and bordering on flaming. Just because we disagree on executing/murdering murderers, it doesn't mean we want to hug them and think they're the best people in the universe. They're scum - but many murders are crimes of passion (and some would argue crimes of need, depending on the circumstances - whether for food/money or to suddenly keep something quiet), not full-on pre-meditated assassinations/slaughtering through half a village (if you read my post, they're the kind of people that I do advocate capital punishment for. So I'm a hypocrite, and?).

All I know is, I've seen, dealt and been around people too poor to afford the basic things a human needs to live. But in our fucked up society, apperently if they went out and killed some one, they'd get the healthcare, food, and shelter they need.

Are we running prisons or are we running a homeless shelter?

I'm sorry, some people have to die, why does it have to be the innocent, in such horrible slow manners like cancer, diease, and starvation? Yes even in the great land of america, there are people starving and dying of malnutrion, maybe not at the rate of say Ethopia, but consider we spend so much just to keep over a million violent criminals healthy, happy, and well fed with CABLE TV!

I don't think serious-crime criminals should get that many perks. I believe a reformation of the prison system (at least in the UK, I assume it's similar in the states) so that it is more punishment/rehab oreinted than Butlins holiday camp.

Another thing that gets me, and is another topic altogether, is why ARE people starving in the US - since it's claimed (though I've no idea how accurate the figures are) that the US has enough food to feed the world. Twice over. So just why are people starving in the US, let alone other countries?


Agreeing to disagree is fine. We both respect the other sides' opinions, even if we don't understand them - and it's not like this discussion is going to change anything within the justice system of our respective countries, so reaching a stalemate is fine and dandy.

It is honestly oxymoronic to kill some one for killing some one else, but life is confusing and fucked up like that. And it still doesn't change the fact, why am I toiling in the fields only to give the sweat from my brow to a murderer?

And for god sakes people comparing the crippled and d students too murders and rapists, is like comparing rabbits and puppies to fucking virsus and parasites. One group may require feeding and help, but for the most part, are harmless. The other group, will kill you unless you kill them first.

For the first paragraph, and the first part of the second paragraph, that was why I made my (and I did mention several times) over-the-top comparisson to C-standard-and-below students. Why should I spend my hard earned cash on them, when it should go to the brilliant students who will change things in the world? you can still work at MacD's with no qualifications at all (well, a basic skill in communication and counting). Yet again, this is hyperbole and assinine, but it's how I see the argument about taxes going towards something you don't want.

The last sentence, however, is sounding rather paranoid - murderers who killed someone either through negligent homicide, accidental homicide, or a crime of passion, aren't going to walk around the streets just looking for someone to kill - it was one mistake/emotion taken too far - and these are the types of murderer that are frequently, successfully rehabilitated. Again, however, it's why I think serial murderers (the rare, rare few who do just look for the next person to kill) do deserve capital punishment. I hope you don't take this as a personal attack, just a comment on the different ways we veiw murderers. When someone says 'murderer' to me, I think of the one-off kind, not the serial-kind, which is why in a general 'murder' topic/sense I think captial punishment is not a viable option (for all the reasons mentioned in my previous posts).


In summation, we can agree to disagree. I can appreciate that you don't think it's right that a portion of your money is taken to house these law-breakers, especially when so little is done to help the innocents in need, but I don't see how that is justification for capital punishment - rather it should be more a justification for a change/lobbying of government about how the lowest classes get treated (especially with all that extra food apparently lying around, yet people starve. As for health-care...well, the US is paranoid about 'socialist/communist health care' [as I've heard it labelled on this very board], but it does a very good job of helping the most in need of treatment in the UK, even if it is a bit overstretched - due to a bungling government, not because of the system itself). I appreciate I am not going to convince anyone over to my side (especially since I've repeated my intentionally over-exaggerated situation of the "less apt" students).