Capital Punishment For Murderers

[redsteve]

Hi,

killing a person is always a violation of human rights, no matter what the person has done. Death penalty is a barbarous and iniquitous penalty, which denies the fundamental worth of human life.

Regards,
Stephan (Germany)

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which denies the fundamental worth of human life.

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Wrong

[jjacky]

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which denies the fundamental worth of human life.

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Wrong

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plz elaborate

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I forgot to bold fundamental as well.

Humans have no inherent worth greater than that of any other creature. Prove otherwise without resorting religious texts.

[jjshabado]

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I think if you ask the vast majority of freed wrongly convicted people what they'd prefer they'd take losing some number of years of their life to losing all of the rest of their life.

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If you're sentenced to life without parole, you *do* lose all the rest of your life.

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I agree in cases where the conviction is never overturned. The point is though that convictions are overturned and wrongly convicted people are proven innocent. Its a whole hell of a lot better when those people are still alive and can enjoy a portion of their life then when they've been executed and get nothing.

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I don't deny its horrible to imprison someone unjustly, but to say its equivalent to killing them is ridiculous.

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My point is that if you take a system that wrongfully sentences people to death and turn it into one that wrongfully sentences people to life in prison, you've fixed the wrong problem.

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Again, only if that person is never proven innocent. Although I would imagine that wrongly convicted people would still generally prefer life in prison then being dead. They can still communicate with family and friends. Sure it has to be horrible being wrongly imprisoned, but I'd take it over death anyday.

[jjacky]

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I believe that the issue can be decided without emotions or high falootin philosophy or religion. Assuming we are talking about cold blooded murders, committed by "sane" defendents, I see the following four things as objective reasons to be for or against the punishment, as opposed to life without parole.


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i do strongly disagree.

some of the religious / philosophic questions are:

a) does life have an intrinsic value, no matter what a person does? (many christians believe in that)
b) is there a free will?

the answers to the questions matter a lot imo and they surely can't be decided without "emotions or high falootin philosophy or religion".

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The point is that the answers are not clearcut so they shouldn't be the basis for a decision when there are clearcut answers that can be a basis.

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i don't get the point.

say there are two sets of questions, A and B. set A contains all questions that are relevant for the issue and can clearly be answered. set B contains all relevant questions without a clearcut answer.

now you want to ignore all the questions of set B and declare the answers of the "A-questions" as a sufficient basis to solve the problem? even if many people think that the "B-questions" are more relevant? that doesn't make sense to me.

an example:
if the B-questions are ignored, the utility of a choice k (kill) is 1. the utility of k if only the B-questions are used for a measurement depends on philosophy and religion of the people. for 90% the unility is -10 and for the rest it is 5.
now the total utility (using sets A and B) is -9 for 90% of the people and 6 for 10% of the people.

in this case, one comes the the wrong conclusion if the B-questions are ignored.

[jjacky]

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I'd say cost shouldn't be a factor because we can afford it.

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We can? The death penalty has cost New Jersey a quarter billion since '83 and is one reason why the state is in financial crisis and AC shut down for a short period.

The hilarious thing about this is there have been nearly 200 capital cases with 60 death sentences given. Of the 60, 50 were later reversed, and of the 10 upheld, all 10 remain on death row. So a quarter billion wasted on the death penalty where not even one man was executed. What a system we have in place.

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are you kidding me? that is about 1.2$ per year and inhabitant. you can't afford that? shall i send you some food?

[jjacky]

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I'm fine with that. It is reasonable for people to have different values, but we should acknowledge that values are the basis for the disagreement, not powers of reasoning.

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i agree. i am curious if/how david will respond on that.

[AKAMRZERO]

Imagine someone very close to you, for example your 9 year old daughter, never comes home from school. You wonder where she is as panic rushes over you. It's probably nothing you tell yourself....After Amber Alerts are over and a couple of weeks pass, someone finds the body of a little girl in a forest preserve a few states away. It turns out to be your daughter. The man responsible for her murder has been accused of sexual crimes before, but until now, nothing has been able to stick. This case is different, there is 100% proof positive that his DNA was found on and inside her body. In a confession, he explained how he first came to notice her, and how he would drive by her bus stop a couple times a week. Many times he never set out to see her, but it seemed he would make his way in her direction nonetheless. On the day he abducted her, he was especially weak, and a triggering event put the wheels of fate in motion. He explained how once he had her in his car he was able to convince her he was taking her to see her mom at work, who sent him to get her. After an hour drive to a secluded place he knew of, he was fully transformed into the monster he has been trying to hold back. You see for him, it is about the power. The power of complete control over another human being. And one so fragile and innocent. But what makes him so dangerous, is his link of violence and sexual stimulation. He gets aroused sexually by exerting power over his victims; the more they fight, the more scared and terrified they become, the more aroused he becomes. He proceeded first by fondeling her in every way dispicable. When that wasn't enough, he rapes her. Although she fights, and crys, and doesen't understand it all, it feeds his aggression. After several hours of repeated sexual assaults, there she lays...violated in every way, bruised from her struggling, bleeding from his rape, and this is what she is experiencing in her soon to be final minutes. You see, he feels guilt from what he has done, he knows it's wrong, he knows what he has done, but to rid himself of his guilt, she must die. She has to die. Like a machine in motion, he grips his hands around her neck, and proceeds to choke away what life she has left in her. The last thing on this earth you beautiful daughter will see is the face of a monster. The last sensations she will have felt in her 9 short years are those of pain and domination. He is finished with her. He will tell himself he will never do this again, and maybe he really means it, but in time, he will find himself fighting with the monster inside again. After all, he has done this before.
Now, I understand you say we can deal with the issue of the death penality in a calculated, logical way; a way without the emotons and theological overtones. I do not agree. Emotions are what make us human. If any of us were her parents, we would want the sonofabitch dead. That goes double for the individual from Germany who said "we all have intrinsic value, etc." There are some people who deserve to be dead. This man is one of them. Im not positive, but I believe research shows that individuals who have linked violence with sexual gratification can almost never be completly rid of the urges. If left in society, they will re-commit. Individuals such as the one I have just described are not detered by the death penality nor can they be rehabilitated. That leaves one purpose left for the death penality or life in prison to serve: retribution. Something justly deserved, recompensate, something given or demanded in repayment. This is an emotional decision. Somewhere between a petty traffic offence and things such as what this man did to that little girl lies the line where the death penality is aptly applied, and I don't believe that line can be drawn by quantifiable conclusions alone. Just my opinion.

[silvershade]

[ QUOTE ]
Imagine someone very close to you, for example your 9 year old daughter, never comes home from school. You wonder where she is as panic rushes over you. It's probably nothing you tell yourself....After Amber Alerts are over and a couple of weeks pass, someone finds the body of a little girl in a forest preserve a few states away. It turns out to be your daughter. The man responsible for her murder has been accused of sexual crimes before, but until now, nothing has been able to stick. This case is different, there is 100% proof positive that his DNA was found on and inside her body. In a confession, he explained how he first came to notice her, and how he would drive by her bus stop a couple times a week. Many times he never set out to see her, but it seemed he would make his way in her direction nonetheless. On the day he abducted her, he was especially weak, and a triggering event put the wheels of fate in motion. He explained how once he had her in his car he was able to convince her he was taking her to see her mom at work, who sent him to get her. After an hour drive to a secluded place he knew of, he was fully transformed into the monster he has been trying to hold back. You see for him, it is about the power. The power of complete control over another human being. And one so fragile and innocent. But what makes him so dangerous, is his link of violence and sexual stimulation. He gets aroused sexually by exerting power over his victims; the more they fight, the more scared and terrified they become, the more aroused he becomes. He proceeded first by fondeling her in every way dispicable. When that wasn't enough, he rapes her. Although she fights, and crys, and doesen't understand it all, it feeds his aggression. After several hours of repeated sexual assaults, there she lays...violated in every way, bruised from her struggling, bleeding from his rape, and this is what she is experiencing in her soon to be final minutes. You see, he feels guilt from what he has done, he knows it's wrong, he knows what he has done, but to rid himself of his guilt, she must die. She has to die. Like a machine in motion, he grips his hands around her neck, and proceeds to choke away what life she has left in her. The last thing on this earth you beautiful daughter will see is the face of a monster. The last sensations she will have felt in her 9 short years are those of pain and domination. He is finished with her. He will tell himself he will never do this again, and maybe he really means it, but in time, he will find himself fighting with the monster inside again. After all, he has done this before.
Now, I understand you say we can deal with the issue of the death penality in a calculated, logical way; a way without the emotons and theological overtones. I do not agree. Emotions are what make us human. If any of us were her parents, we would want the sonofabitch dead. That goes double for the individual from Germany who said "we all have intrinsic value, etc." There are some people who deserve to be dead. This man is one of them. Im not positive, but I believe research shows that individuals who have linked violence with sexual gratification can almost never be completly rid of the urges. If left in society, they will re-commit. Individuals such as the one I have just described are not detered by the death penality nor can they be rehabilitated. That leaves one purpose left for the death penality or life in prison to serve: retribution. Something justly deserved, recompensate, something given or demanded in repayment. This is an emotional decision. Somewhere between a petty traffic offence and things such as what this man did to that little girl lies the line where the death penality is aptly applied, and I don't believe that line can be drawn by quantifiable conclusions alone. Just my opinion.

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This is an impossibly bad arguement for the death penalty relying almost wholly on invoking revulsion for the crime described. This is the same way in which lynch mobs used to form. Such a means of reaching a decision practically guarantees a flimsy and unreliable justice system as people abandon objectivity in favour of an ( admittedly understandable ) emotional response.

I think if you want to argue for capital punishment there are far better arguements than the simple emotional appeal you just made ( though i dont find those better arguements convincing either ).