[COLOR="Yellow"]Discussions regarding the death penalty can sometimes turn ugly and depressing so let's have fun with a simple and fun questionaire game Penn & Teller style. I'll ask some questions and for each answer you get right, draw a part of your hangman. Winner gets nothing, yay! Here we go:
1) Is it ever morally ok to kill a human being?
2) Should we be allowed to kill someone if we aren't at war or inmediatly threatened by them?
3) Is the biblical message of an eye for an eye a good moral code to abide by?
4) Does killing murderers and other serious crime offenders scare and stop others from committing similar crimes in the future?
5) Should we trust the government to never make a mistake and possibly kill an innocent person?
How'd you do? Did you get the correct answers? If you answered every single question with big fat NO, then congrats, you did get the right answers and you win the game. Because the death penalty isn't justice, it's vengeance. And to still live in a society where revenge is being carried out as a form of punishment is simply dumbfounding.[/COLOR]
Yeah pretty much.
Insert garble about the curiosity of American exceptionalism here (it's one of those many issues the US differs markedly from other western democracies on).
I would rather criminals rot then get off easy with a nice lethal injection.
how cute
1- it is morally right to kill a human being. If they present a danger to you or to your community and that whole "rehabilitation" thing seems like it's not a possibility, then yes. Additionally, in times of war? Kill or be killed? Stop being so naive. If you lefty crazoes can re-define the constitution and dissect it ten different ways, then so can I with "kill". "Murder" is a different meaning entirely.
2- So. . . you're basically saying "if we're not at war or immediately threatened by them." This is done to. . . insinuate that the latter two examples are instances in which we 'should' kill someone? Doesn't that kind of debunk your first question, smartypants?
3- Don't evoke the bible in such silly ways. The New Testament is meant to overwrite much of the old, and Jesus's whole "turn the other cheek" ideals overwrite those silly archaic Jewish ideals.
4- Prove to me that it doesn't.
5- Why have a court system at all?!? Someone could get jailed that is innocent! What would you suggest as a better means of distributing justice, whiney boy.
Penn and Teller would be greatly disappointed. The purpose of the justice system is to rehabilitate people, and keep those incapable of rehabilitation from being able to pose a risk to society. My father works in a prison, so I don't assume you'd know how A) Nice criminals have it, and B) How understaffed and overcrowded prisons are in this country. If someone's incapable of rehabilitation, or if their crimes are so heinous that it seems very unlikely that they will suddenly find Jesus or something and be good little citizens, then gas 'em and free up space for the weed peddlers.
Seriously, in between bashing bush and protecting criminals' and terrorists' rights, I don't know how you guys find enough time to eat and bathe.
[COLOR="Yellow"]1. If they get locked up for life they wouldn't be a danger to you or your community now would they, next.
2. If someone is trying to kill you, or someone starts a war against you (trying to kill you) then you have no choice but to defend yourself. It's self-defense against an inmediate threat unlike a criminal caught and imprisoned forever, next.
3. Oh yeah, i forgot how infallible G[COLOR="Yellow"]o[/COLOR]d was, so much so that his word can be rewritten by men and still preached, next.
4.Watch me work:
Murder Rate in Death Penalty States per 100,000 people (2004): 5.71
Murder Rate in Non-death Penalty States per 100,000 people (2004): 4.02
And if you thought that was some sort of fluke for 2004 alone, [URL="http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=12&did=168"]check out the statistics from previous years.[/URL] You think people would get the idea not to kill but they haven't. If that still doesn't do it for you try looking at the murder rate over the last 10 years for Texas compared to the rest of the nation.
Texas Rate: 6.7 per 100,000
National Rate: 6.23 per 100,000
Texas is the state that has executed the most number of inmates and has the second most number of people on death row yet they still have a huge murder rate. You'd think that Texans would get the idea not to commit murder but they haven't, why? Because deterrence does nothing.
5. I ain't talking about just getting jailed numbnuts, [URL="http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?did=412"]i'm talking about innocent people on death row[/URL], but i guess you're cool with innocent people being put on a death waiting list. And in case that's not good enough for you read [URL="http://www.truthinjustice.org/Alan-Gell.htm"]Alan Gell's story[/URL] (all of it) and see for yourself how corrupt the system can be.
Since prisons are understaffed and overcrowded then maybe the Government should put money into more prisons instead of wasting it on drug and prostitution laws, but that's too much to ask isn't it? Once criminals who purposely commit murder or other similar crimes are locked up, they can find Jesus if they want, i don't give a f[COLOR="Yellow"]u[/COLOR]ck, keep them locked up.
Advocating vengeance and killing isn't going to get you into heaven any faster BJ. Just think, what would Jesus do? :D[/COLOR]
I'm really getting tired of getting signed out of vgc when I'm trying to post a response and it erasing my entire response. This is bull****.
Aioros, as always, you made some very ****ty points which I will address AGAIN later when I'm less ****ed off at the website
For me the main issue is the state power one. As much as I dislike the vengeful lynch-mob talk-back populist attitude to criminal justice that is rife in society at the moment, the really troubling aspect of the death penalty is that the state gets to, after calm and careful deliberation, order somebody to take somebody else's life in a cold and deliberate fashion. That, to me is simply barbarism and simply beyond the pale.
People support abortion because it condones killing something they don't believe is a human being.
I support the death penalty because it is killing something that I do not believe is a human being.
To me the death penality isn't about deterance. It is about killing someone who doesn't deserve to life. Leathle injections is pussy **** if you ask me. Let them rot? Do you know how much it cost a year to house an inmate? Times that by 30, 40 years. Its a lot cheaper just to kill them. Yeah the justice system is flawed but what isn't. It is the working of man, man is flawed. We hope that the jury makes a good decision based on evidence(which is a lot better than 10 years ago). We need public hangings or the chair again. FRY BABY!
[COLOR="Yellow"]I don't believe in killing to make a point. It's expensive to jail a criminal yes, but we don't have a problem with the dopers that get unnecesary jailed on a daily basis. That's why i mentioned getting rid of marijuana and prostitution laws as a way to get tax money to go to better outlets, like prison security.[/COLOR]
[COLOR=Yellow]1) Is it ever morally ok to kill a human being?
[/COLOR]If someone is on the ground, mortally wounded and writhing in unbearable pain, then yes, I would think it would be okay to end it for him. You could also argue that cannabalism is okay if you were both going to die anyways.
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2) Should we be allowed to kill someone if we aren't at war or inmediatly threatened by them?
[/COLOR]Yes, see example above.
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3) Is the biblical message of an eye for an eye a good moral code to abide by?
[/COLOR]No, because the bible also says to turn the other cheek. Eye for an eye was old hat about 2000 years ago.
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4) Does killing murderers and other serious crime offenders scare and stop others from committing similar crimes in the future?
[/COLOR]Yes, because you're asking in the absolute. Obviously, if there was no guns in a prison, escape attempts would happen every other week.
[COLOR=Yellow] 5) Should we trust the government to never make a mistake and possibly kill an innocent person?
[/COLOR]No. This is an absurd question, as the government could not possibly be perfect in choosing who they want to kill. We already know they've killed innocent people- for example, civilians in Iraq.
I think I beat your quiz...
Cunt, I've been mislead. I honestly thought this'd be a hangman thread.
Prisons cost too much, lets just kill all the serious criminals. Whoops, we killed someone innocent. Just to save 30,000 a year.
It's funny how people call a lethal injection things like 'pussy ****', when they've never been told exactly when they're going to die, and dragged from their room to be killed. Depending on the person, it may cause severe psychological suffering.
And this is not the government indirectly, accidentally killing innocent civilians, it's the government directly killing innocents on purpose.
ANd with a jury, as always, they can be biased, even without knowing it. They can also be manipulated,and the eprson with the better lawyer also has a higher chance of winning.
If you were put onto death row even though you were innocent, I bet you wouldn't be saying 'We need public hangings or the chair again. FRY BABY!', I bet you'd be crying in a corner by execution time, and you'd be against the death penalty.
[COLOR="Yellow"][URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%81gnes_Heller#Books"]Agnes Heller[/URL] is most likely the person that got me to understand through her writing why it's our moral integrity to get rid of the death penalty. I adore this woman, she's a philosophy professor and a holocaust survivor. As a young girl in Hungary she managed to avoid deportation to Auschwitz, but her father wasn't as lucky. She has made it very clear that the desire to kill and the desire to want someone to kill is a barbaric instinct and never a lawful path.
"If you support the death penalty, and only one single innocent person is killed, and killing an innocent person is murder, then you also become murderers and so you deserve to be killed. This is the paradox of the death penalty and you cannot escape this paradox."~Agnes Heller[/COLOR]