Philosophical Debate

[MaGi kOz]

Death Penalty:
Should it be LEGAL or ILLEGAL? or
Are you FOR or AGAINST the death penalty?

When deciding think about the person being put to death. Then think about the victims in which the criminal is being put to death for.
Adds more confusion siding problems. =p


As for me... I think it should be completely ILLEGAL because any form of life taking is wrong, even if the criminal DID take a life or more himself. But I do believe in cruel and unusual punishment. =P

[Webbb Llama v1.5]

The death penalty is racist

[pv=nrt]

though the current capital punishment system is slow i think it works well. allowing enough appeals to allow those that didn't do it to be found. THough some of the older trials, like convicted in early 80s and late 70s might need to be retried overall due to advances in evidence collection.

[MaGi kOz]

Originally posted by pv=nrt
though the current capital punishment system is slow i think it works well. allowing enough appeals to allow those that didn't do it to be found. THough some of the older trials, like convicted in early 80s and late 70s might need to be retried overall due to advances in evidence collection.

so what? you for or against the death penalty? =P I WANT REASONS!

[Latrine]

From a logical standpoint I see where you are coming from. How does the solution, putting the murderer to death, solve the problem, the lost lives of the victim or victims? (By the way, is murder the only crime punishable by the death penalty in the United States?) All it does is fullfill the base human desire for vengence, a fulfillment found bitter-sweet by some. The US penal system was envisioned as a method of rehabilitation, a more humane system than Hammurabi's archaic justice of an eye for an eye. While usually there is no possible salvation for murderers, slaughtering them would violate our modern ideals. Of course, pragmatically speaking we could use the meat.

[MaGi kOz]

Originally posted by Latrine
From a logical standpoint I see where you are coming from. How does the solution, putting the murderer to death, solve the problem, the lost lives of the victim or victims? (By the way, is murder the only crime punishable by the death penalty in the United States?) All it does is fullfill the base human desire for vengence, a fulfillment found bitter-sweet by some. The US penal system was envisioned as a method of rehabilitation, a more humane system than Hammurabi's archaic justice of an eye for an eye. While usually there is no possible salvation for murderers, slaughtering them would violate our modern ideals. Of course, pragmatically speaking we could use the meat.

If you've seen the (American) movie, 'Dead Man Walking' with what's his name in it i forgot... they put a good example on the subject as to which side are you on? They show the man being put to death as he is stating his final words and crying and all that and being injected with the lethal poison and at the same time... flashes of his crime... back and forth back and forth.

[CrvenBan]

There is a difference between decisions made by single mind and decisions made by society in whole.
Commiting a criminal act, no matter how hard it may be, is a work of one mind that has been twisted (by our standards; to him it might be normal) enough to commit such things, as taking other persons life, raping, molesting.
Punishing that criminal by killing him is not a decision made by one mind, and that's where I think it fails, there is no justification for it when a group chooses to kill someone, given that if they all acted by themselves, they maybe wouldn't be able to go through with it. Being in a group gives you security and makes you not feel any guilt whatsoever because it was aproved by several other minds.
That way a criminal is just offer of his suroundings, his growing up, lack of morals and principles (which his parents are responsible for) and basically his society failing him while we, ones that are punishing him, are cold-blooded killers, because we do have morals and society treats us well and still we choose to take other individuals life. That's just wrong.

But I do feel that such crimes as child-molesting, raping, killing...for whatever reason; be it racial, be it financial, be it psychological should be punishable in next worst thing...maybe not death, but locking up for life. And even thou it does sound the same (killing today, or keeping locked for 50 years untill it dies) it is not...we just don't have the right to say you're gonna live and you're not.

[Superted]

Yeah I'm for it, more people should get it too so others learn, and if they don't then meh, at least people died.

[Azhran]

I'm against it, cuz:
1) It failed as a deterrent(sp?)
2) In my opinion it's sanctified murder, even though he(or she) himself has commited a grievous(sp? again) crime, you shouldn't convict someone to die.

[arrogance]

It's almost impossible to justify a death penalty as a deterrant, it always depends on where you get your statistics but the most recent that I've heard, and I've heard it consistently, is that homicide rates are the same or higher in countries and states that have the death penalty than in those that do not. I Canada after the dealth penalty was abolished sometime in the 70's I believe, the number of homicides decreased substantially. Can always be attributed to other factors, but still.

So if we set aside statistics and costs, as I've also heard it's much more expensive to execute someone than to keep them alive in prison for the rest of their lives, (also depends where you get your stats), all you can do is view it as a social practice. I don't understand how we can see it as anything but barbaric. Leave someone sitting in a cell for 10 or so years contemplating their impending death, get a bunch of witnesses together to watch person X die, strap them down in a chair, kill them, then hold a press conference. It's all quite disgusting.

And also if you have the dealth penalty in place there's no question that once in a great while you WILL execute an innocent person. There's no justification for that, IMO it's better to let every serial killer and pedophile rapist rot in a cell with taxpayers footing the bill for all eternity than to execute a single innocent person. Once we can acknowledge that as an acceptable loss then we can no longer live in a country and truly feel free.

You can only punish people for a handful of reasons, to protect society, to deterr the criminal from comitting the crime ever again, to rehabilitate them into a normal part of society again, and to satisy the victim or victim's family's lust for revenge. I wouldn't deny for a second that if someone raped and murdered my daughter/wife/sister whatever I'd want them dead and I'd probably want to see it happen, it's just punishment for the wrong reasons IMO.

[GuruMeditation]

The death penalty is a crime against religion and human rights -nt-

-nt-

[TelC@t]

Originally posted by arrogance
So if we set aside statistics and costs, as I've also heard it's much more expensive to execute someone than to keep them alive in prison for the rest of their lives

How???

Originally posted by arrogance
I Canada after the dealth penalty was abolished sometime in the 70's I believe, the number of homicides decreased substantially. Can always be attributed to other factors

Personally, I think death penalty is a form of homicide. The fact it is legal in some places doesn't mean it is not a meditated murder of a guilty citizen by the society.

[geekbot]

Originally posted by CrvenBan
Punishing that criminal by killing him is not a decision made by one mind, and that's where I think it fails, there is no justification for it when a group chooses to kill someone, given that if they all acted by themselves, they maybe wouldn't be able to go through with it. Being in a group gives you security and makes you not feel any guilt whatsoever because it was aproved by several other minds.

A society is not just a group of people acting together to be safe from the consequences of it's actions- that is a gang.

What is right for a person or even a group of people is different than what is right for a nation/society. Punishing a person for a crime is right that no one person has. But it is a right that a society has because the people in that society create the rules that govern it (themselves). That's why society has the right to lock up a criminal but a single person does not have that right.

A society does not do things simply because the group acting together has "security". It punishs a criminal because laws have been considered and created that say if someone commits this crime, they receive this penalty. If there are no enforceable laws, then there is no society.

Since I think it is agreed that society has the right to punish people, I think there are two parts to Magi's question- is the death penalty a just (fair, right, humane) penalty? If so, can the death penalty be practially enforced in a just way?

[arrogance]

Originally posted by TelC@t
How???

Sitting on death row for 10 or so years, immense legal fees for endless appeals, facilities where you can kill someone, things like that. (I would assume, I don't have actual figures)

[RogerMexico]

"Since I was a law student at Harvard, I have been against the death penalty. It does not deter. It is severely discriminatory against minorities, especially since they’re given no competent legal counsel defense in many cases. It’s a system that has to be perfect. You cannot execute one innocent person. No system is perfect. And to top it off, for those of you who are interested in the economics, it costs more to pursue a capital case toward execution than it does to have full life imprisonment without parole."( Ralph Nader, Meet the Press June 25, 2000)