Forums → WEPR → Death penalty: yes or no
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What do you think, should there be a death penalty?
Perssonalni I am against it,because of these things:
1.Death penalty vs liftime jail (well death penalty is kind of reward in this case)
2. How are we bether then him/her? Where is ours moral?
3. We must think about moral of executor.
So what do you think?
- 96 Replies
4. it's still murder...No it isn't.
It is. He is Dead.
But lets say you are complatly right. But there is still moral. And here is a question for you: Are you ready to kill an unarmed man with wife and kids? Are you?
I am strongly against death penalty. The reason of existence of our legal system is punishing crimes, not avenging the dead. 'An eye for an eye' has never helped anyone. The reason Le Pen is now babbling about wanting death penalty to be reintroduced in France is pure arbitrariness and appeal to emotions, and has nothing to do with an objective legal system.
Several people have brought up the possibility of executing an innocent person as a reason not to have the death penalty, but I doubt they realize exactly how unlikely that is.
Exactly how unlikely, then? There's reason enough to think it is not unreasonably rare.
That appeals process, however, ends up being far more expensive and time consuming than just letting the prisoner die in their cell because of all the extra labor involved (lawyers, judges, clerks, secretaries, paralegals, transport costs, and probably a few things I just can't think of off the top of my head right now) in actively deciding whether a person who's about to die was deprived of any legal chance to be acquitted.
It may seem much, but the legal system should not have the right to send people to death on a whim during a summary process. Death sentence is a grave decision and the accused should have the right to appeal.
But then, these costs have to be taken into account no matter what; it does mean that death penalty as a sentence ends up being more costly, even though the costs are not intrinsic to the killing procedure itself.
lifetime jail is a death penalty, thus an execution.
No it isn't. Incarceration is not execution.
It is. He is Dead.
If you go to the 'Do not kill or do not murder' thread, you will see they defined murder as 'wrongful killing'. Before calling the death penalty murder, you have to show it is wrongful; you cannot say it is murder in order to make it wrongful, that would be circular logic.
And here is a question for you: Are you ready to kill an unarmed man with wife and kids? Are you?
Appealing to his having a family does not lessen his crimes, though. A sentence should be decided based on the act, not the person.
And here is a question for you: Are you ready to kill an unarmed man with wife and kids? Are you?Appealing to his having a family does not lessen his crimes, though. A sentence should be decided based on the act, not the person.
Of corse it doesn't leeser the crimes. This was question for Fish Preffender but anyone can answer. The point of the question is in emotions and moral. Can you crush moral and go over emocions and kill someone (it is more emocional if he has a family).
The reason of existence of our legal system is punishing crimes, not avenging the dead.
Does death not punish the crime? You can't exactly do anything worse than killing somebody without torturing them. And what about those left behind? What about the people who have to mourn the loss of their loved ones after a mass murderer or serial killer or racist gets done murdering the people around them? Don't the living get a sense of closure from seeing someone responsible for so many other deaths die? Isn't there a sense of security in knowing that those people can never escape, never convince some parole board they've changed only to go out and kill again? It only takes one death to affect hundreds of lives, more if that person plays some role in politics that causes their life to affect the public.
Exactly how unlikely, then? There's reason enough to think it is not unreasonably rare.
Unlikely enough that the vast majority of stories you'll here on the subject involve someone too meek or young to resist being coerced into confessing to a crime they didn't commit 20 years ago after someone lied or incorrectly identified them as the criminal. Such a confession would be instantly thrown out by a judge these days and if it didn't the appeals court would be demanding a new trial a week after the first one ended. In fact, there is a database of people exonerated of crimes they didn't commit since 1989 when DNA became a part of criminal investigations. From Abbit to Zomber the total count of exonerated individuals in the past 36 years is just over 1500 with another 1100 not included in the database because police corruption scandals caused their cases to be overturned. http://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/browse.aspx
But then, these costs have to be taken into account no matter what; it does mean that death penalty as a sentence ends up being more costly, even though the costs are not intrinsic to the killing procedure itself.
Not necessarily. Those on death row will appeal everything they can in the hopes of getting lucky and finding a judge against the death penalty who's willing to transfer their sentence from death to life. Appeals courts aren't about digging up new facts, they're about looking at the case from a legal perspective. Were rights violated? Was any evidence the judge didn't allow that they should have? Was the defendants lawyer competent? If there was a standard for death row appeals that would either stop frivolous appeals or at least charge a lawyer the cost for filing a frivolous appeal the cost could be significantly reduced.
A sentence should be decided based on the act, not the person.
Which is exactly why I support the death penalty. A crime, any crime, is the act of willfully depriving another person of their rights. I believe it's only fair that the punishment fit the crime and that the state should be willing to take away the same rights that a criminal has taken from other people. Not that every manslaughter case should end in summary execution, but that those people who kill for their own pleasure have given up any claim to the right of life.
Does death not punish the crime?
Does life sentence not punish the crime just as well? Killing the person is nothing more than revenge, and that shouldn't be the purpose of our laws.
You can't exactly do anything worse than killing somebody without torturing them.
Put them in prison and to manual labour for the rest of their lives.
What about the people who have to mourn the loss of their loved ones after a mass murderer or serial killer or racist gets done murdering the people around them?
Appeal to emotionality. The relatives have a right to justice, not revenge. Besides, what about the relatives of the con****ed? In jail at least, they can visit the prisoner. Don't they have that right?
Unlikely enough that the vast majority of stories you'll here on the subject involve someone too meek or young to resist being coerced into confessing to a crime they didn't commit 20 years ago after someone lied or incorrectly identified them as the criminal.
Another subject is the visual identification of the suspect by a victim. It is known that such testimonies are completely unreliable due to the way our memory works, and yet last time I heard it was still vastly in use. I have no idea how many cases of this exist, admittedly, but it is an issue.
If there was a standard for death row appeals that would either stop frivolous appeals or at least charge a lawyer the cost for filing a frivolous appeal the cost could be significantly reduced.
Unlikely to happen anytime soon. And there would still be substantial base costs left. An easier way is to abandon the whole death penalty thing entirely But as mentioned, costs should not predominate the argument for or against.
Which is exactly why I support the death penalty. A crime, any crime, is the act of willfully depriving another person of their rights. I believe it's only fair that the punishment fit the crime and that the state should be willing to take away the same rights that a criminal has taken from other people. Not that every manslaughter case should end in summary execution, but that those people who kill for their own pleasure have given up any claim to the right of life.
As already mentioned, an eye for an eye is not the way to go.
Appeal to emotionality. The relatives have a right to justice, not revenge. Besides, what about the relatives of the con****ed? In jail at least, they can visit the prisoner. Don't they have that right?
Appealing to the rights of the living rather than the dead. Good work glossing over the matter of security and finality that comes with the death penalty. As for the relatives of the condemned, most don't want to visit the prisoner. People in prison in general quickly start to lose contact with the outside world. It takes a lot of work to visit someone in prison and most people don't put in that effort for long to meet with convicted criminals. After only a few years the most likely visitor any prisoner is going to have is their lawyer.
Put them in prison and to manual labour for the rest of their lives.
For the vast majority of people that's much better than death, which is why people on death row work so hard just hoping to receive life in prison rather than dying. It's also why prosecutors will offer something like 25-life as a plea bargain when the death penalty is a possible sentence the judge could give.
Unlikely to happen anytime soon.
Unlikely to happen ever, but it is still a potential solution. There's probably others I don't know the system well enough to come up with. Just because the current system results in high costs doesn't mean there isn't any way to change that.
As already mentioned, an eye for an eye is not the way to go.
Just desserts is a more accurate description. It isn't the dead or the families of the dead handing out the death penalty, it's 12 jurors and a judge. Even if it's done for their benefit they're not a deciding factor in the death penalty being handed out, it's the actions of the criminal and whether 13 separate people believe those actions and their motives warrant lethal response. Actions have consequences and there's no reason those consequences shouldn't fit the scale of the action. That's a basic principle of nature, a very law of physics, every action has an equal and opposite reaction.
- lifetime jail is a death penalty, thus an execution.
No, it isn't. The incarceration itself is generally not the cause of death. Even those acquitted are going to die at some point.
Are you ready to kill an unarmed man with wife and kids?
Evidently, I lack the medical training required. There's also a bit of red tape around gaining citizenship in a nation which has capital punishment.
Are you?
(see above)
Can you crush moral and go over emocions and kill someone [...]
Yes.
A crime, any crime, is the act of willfully depriving another person of their rights.
There is such a thing as crime without intent.
Killing the person is nothing more than revenge, and that shouldn't be the purpose of our laws.
In what way is life-without-parole anything other than revenge? Will it change that person into a decent law-abiding citizen? No; you have it back to front.
Suppose Atilla the Hun, Adolph Hitler, or some similarly infamous and dangerous personage were captured alive. The evidence of their crimes is truly overwhelming. They admit to everything. They say they'd do it all a dozen times over. They are deemed legally sane. Tossing them in a cell and treating them like filth isn't going to fix anything. Killing them just removes them from the picture altogether.
Put them in prison and to manual labour for the rest of their lives.
In other words, you would rather they suffer more. Id est, your preference is for vengeance, not justice.
Actions have consequences and there's no reason those consequences shouldn't fit the scale of the action.
Actually, there's plenty of reason. Demanding that the consequences 'fit' the crime is an eye-for-an-eye rationale. Having them suffer because they caused others to suffer is just adding to the overall suffering without achieving anything productive.
This is exactly why I advocate the death penalty under certain extreme circumstances. It just disposes of them, rather than trying (or pretending) to punish them. I also advocate giving any person with a sentence of more than 20 years the option of lethal injection anyway.
That's a basic principle of nature, a very law of physics, every action has an equal and opposite reaction.
Um. No, it isn't. Nature does not mandate fairness or equal repercussion. Minus the rhetorical fluff, the third law states only that the total force of interaction between two or more objects has equal magnitude in all directions.
Good work glossing over the matter of security and finality that comes with the death penalty.
I assume it is irrelevant. If a captive manages to escape, then that means the prisons are not secure enough and the necessary measures should be undertaken to make them secure enough. It is in no way an argument for death penalty; in this context, this would be mere symptom treatment. Besides, using your argument, every prison sentence should be turned to death penalty in order to prevent escape.
As for the relatives of the condemned, most don't want to visit the prisoner.
How does it matter if most don't want to visit, and how do you know that?
In what way is life-without-parole anything other than revenge? Will it change that person into a decent law-abiding citizen? No; you have it back to front.
Deprivation of freedom and monetary fines are the usual punishments for a crime; incarceration also serves to protect the law-abiding citizen from recidivists. Death penalty is, as you said yourself, an eye-for-an-eye rationale that is "just adding to the overall suffering without achieving anything productive".
There is such a thing as crime without intent.
The only example I can think of is manslaughter, and even that requires such a massive neglect for safety and reasonable action as to be criminally liable for the death of another.
Actually, there's plenty of reason. Demanding that the consequences 'fit' the crime is an eye-for-an-eye rationale.
Demanding that the consequences fit the crime is the very purpose of codified law. Before laws became a written absolute within nations they were a loose group of ideas that punished individuals for who they were and not for the crime committed. Farmers would be put to death for looking at royalty while nobles could slaughter peasants and face nothing more than a fine. It's the same concept that gives murderers a harsher sentence than those convicted of manslaughter who receive a harsher sentence than thieves etc. etc. etc. Anything other than having the scale of the punishment fit the crime is just a way for inequality to perpetuate itself within a society.
Um. No, it isn't. Nature does not mandate fairness or equal repercussion.
Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it isn't there. Action and reaction, equivalent exchange, balance, cause and effect. These concepts are ingrained within everything. It can be seen in chemical reactions, in the social interactions of animals, in the very fabric of the universe itself. Life only seems unfair when looking at a single minute fraction of the whole. There is always a consequence to actions, always a ripple of effects that leads back to the cause. This is why hindsight is 20/20, after enough time the full range of effects are visible and it's easy to see the consequences of actions.
Action and reaction, equivalent exchange, balance, cause and effect. These concepts are ingrained within everything. It can be seen in chemical reactions, in the social interactions of animals, in the very fabric of the universe itself.
Action and reaction is a principle of physics explaining forces and counterforces - and that's it. You cannot apply it to things so complicated like social interactions.
Deprivation of freedom and monetary fines are the usual punishments for a crime;
And they have a chance of working when you actually intend to release them back into society. That is the whole purpose of punishment.
incarceration also serves to protect the law-abiding citizen from recidivists.
So does death, incidentally.
Death penalty is, as you said yourself, an eye-for-an-eye rationale that is "just adding to the overall suffering without achieving anything productive".
No. The "consequences [fitting] the scale of the action" that Ishtaron was expounding is an eye-for-an-eye rationale. You don't execute them more than once, and there are now humane ways of doing it.
Demanding that the consequences fit the crime is the very purpose of codified law.
No it isn't.
Anything other than having the scale of the punishment fit the crime is just a way for inequality to perpetuate itself within a society.
No it isn't.
Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it isn't there.
Correct. It's the fact that it's irrational, unnecessary, and completely impossible that means it isn't there.
These concepts are ingrained within everything. It can be seen in chemical reactions, in the social interactions of animals, in the very fabric of the universe itself.
There is always a consequence to actions, always a ripple of effects that leads back to the cause.
None of which has any bearing on crime and punishment.
This is why hindsight is 20/20, after enough time the full range of effects are visible and it's easy to see the consequences of actions.
No, it isn't. We cannot ever know the exact consequences of any action, or the full extent of those consequences at any time. Hindsight is as accurate as peering the wrong way through heavily scratched binoculars by candlelight at a dusty chalkboard trying to decipher a double encrypted message somebody had erased and written several things over top of in three different languages.
No it isn't.
Oh, goody. We're back to this. You disagree so you simply say that I'm wrong without ever explaining your point of view and seemingly holding an opinion that is the exact opposite of reality. It feels like I just explained a progressive tax system and you responded by calling it a flat tax. We're not even on opposite sides of the discussion here and yet still you sit there and tell me I'm wrong to have what is essentially the same opinion as you, that certain murderers deserve to be executed.
None of which has any bearing on crime and punishment.
Crime is an action, punishment is one of the consequences of said action. How is that not relevant? I'm curious, did you actually read and disagree with what I wrote or do you simply dismiss me the moment you see my name in the forums? Is it really just me? Am I seeing things. @Moegreche and @Guest_Pegasus1234 I wouldn't mind if a couple people who have proven to be open to genuine debate would look through the past couple pages and tell me if I'm just crazy or if this argument is going in circles for no reason.
And they have a chance of working when you actually intend to release them back into society. That is the whole purpose of punishment.
So if I may caricaturize a bit, you're saying it is ok to stamp people with an "Unfit to live" seal and eliminate them.
So does death, incidentally.
Agreed, but there's a substantial difference for the accused. Obviously.
You don't execute them more than once, and there are now humane ways of doing it.
The way an execution is performed, while humane is always better / more ethic than brutal, is only a facet of the discussion. I just think a governmental organ should not be allowed to kill people unless other lives are directly threatened (which isn't the case with an inmate).
Is it really just me? Am I seeing things.
It seems plain to me that he disagrees with your reasons to support death penalty. As far as my impression goes, Fish usually has good reasons to state "No it isn't". You may just as well answer with a simple "Why?", or state your reasons to think that yes, it is.
It seems plain to me that he disagrees with your reasons to support death penalty. As far as my impression goes, Fish usually has good reasons to state "No it isn't". You may just as well answer with a simple "Why?", or state your reasons to think that yes, it is.
I can see that he disagrees with my reasons but not why he disagrees. He states that my reasoning is no different from taking revenge yet we stand on the exact same point in our support of the death penalty. Some people have taken actions that warrant their death. And if he's ever had good reason to state "No it isn't" I wouldn't mind actually seeing it. In my experience he explains nothing even when asked to do so.
Demanding that the consequences fit the crime is the very purpose of codified law.
Anything other than having the scale of the punishment fit the crime is just a way for inequality to perpetuate itself within a society.
Well, it isn't. The purpose of these laws, or any punishment, for that matter, is to reform offenders. It is not to seek retribution against them.
We're not even on opposite sides of the discussion here and yet still you sit there and tell me I'm wrong to have what is essentially the same opinion as you, that certain murderers deserve to be executed.
There are no sides. Even in ethics, we need not be in complete agreement to argue the same point. I find the grounds of your argument to be flawed. Therefore, I reject them.
So if I may caricaturize a bit, you're saying it is ok to stamp people with an "Unfit to live" seal and eliminate them.
Essentially, yes.
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