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Caros posted:
Just another idiot arguing in bad faith.
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Dec 31, 2014 15:37
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You really are a horrible person. You know that right?
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N. Senada posted:I would contend that maybe anybody who would be willing to kill somebody is in need of some mental help To be "fair" I think these people distance themselves from the actual idea of killing another human being (i.e. they know they won't be the ones pulling the switch) that it makes it more palatable. Just like the idea of suggesting we start a war is a lot easier when you won't be the one on the front lines. Confronted with the reality of it I think it might be a little harder but you would always have the types who justify that they "deserved it".
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Dec 31, 2014 15:42
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Here is something from a book I once read, in which a person talks to a crowd who do not believe in killing for any reason, including defending themselves from murderers and rapists. Just putting this here as food for thoughts, leaving everyone to make their opinions. ¨They have forfeited their right to be heard. There is no moral dilemma involved, no ethical question open to debate; they must be ground into dust. There is no greater value than life - and that's what you partially recognize by your confused notion of mercy. Their conscious, deliberate act of murder takes the irreplaceable value of life from another. A murderer, by his own choice to kill, forfeits the right to his own life. Mercy for such evil is nothing short of excusing it and thus allowing evil to prevail- it codifies the taking of innocent life by not making the murderer forfeit their own guilty life.¨ ¨Mercy grants value to the life of a killer, while, at the same time, it strips away the value of the life of the innocent victim. It makes the life of a killer more important than the life of an innocent. It is thus a trade of the good to the evil. It is the victory of death over life.¨ ¨Compromising with murderers, which is precisely what you are suggesting, grants them moral equivalence where none can rightfully exist. Moral equivalence says that you are no better than they; therefore, their belief - that they should be able to torture, tape or murder you - is just as morally valid as your view-- that you have the right to life free of their violence. Moral compromise rejects the concept of right and wrong. It says that everyone is equal, all desires are equally valid, all actions are equally valid, so everyone should compromise to get along.¨ ¨Where could you compromise with those who torture, rape and murder people? In the number of days a week you will be tortured? In the number of men to be allowed to rape your loved ones? In how many of your family are to be murdered? No moral equivalence exits in that situation, nor can it exits, so there can be no compromise, only suicide. To even suggest compromise can exist with such men is to sanction murder.If you once thought that I enjoy killing, let me assure you that you are very wrong. I hate it. I do it to defend life. I would never expect you to relish killing. It is a necessity to do it, not to enjoy doing it. I expect you to relish life and do what is necessary to preserve it¨
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Dec 31, 2014 16:44
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Albert Camus posted:Capital punishment is the most premeditated of murders, to which no criminal’s deed, however calculated, can be compared. For there to be an equivalency, the death penalty would have to punish a criminal who had warned his victim of the date on which he would inflict a horrible death on him and who, from that moment onward, had confined him at his mercy for months. Such a monster is not to be encountered in private life.
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Dec 31, 2014 16:48
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I'm not a fan of the death penalty, despite being a Texan and a lawyer. But as a human, I understand the desire for vengeance. I'm interested in it through morbid curiosity though. If you really read through that site, not just the ones you can fund linked on buzzfeed or Huffington post "top ten executions" you really find some heartbreaking cases, both on the part of victims, families, and the condemned. Most of the executed give thanks to a (former?) Ut professor who fights death penalty cases hard.
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Dec 31, 2014 16:53
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quote:Date of Execution:
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Dec 31, 2014 17:48
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"On the morning of November 29, 1975, tragedy struck. Henry Martinez Porter of San Antonio, 43, shot Officer Henry Paul Mailloux, 28, after officer Mailloux had asked Martinez to pull his car over. Martinez was shot in the side during the struggle and then shot Mailloux claiming that he pulled the trigger in self-defense. Martinez claimed that Mailloux said that he was going to kill him for the robberies that had taken place in that area."
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Dec 31, 2014 17:57
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Dalael posted:Here is something from a book I once read, in which a person talks to a crowd who do not believe in killing for any reason, including defending themselves from murderers and rapists. Just putting this here as food for thoughts, leaving everyone to make their opinions. Is the guy speaking an executioner? It feels like that whole speech was made only to convince himself that he is not some sort of monster, and he does it by making the value of life into some sort of Zero-sum game, where not taking the life of a murderer somehow devalues the life of the victim. I also find the whole "if you compromise with murderers/etc you are granting them moral equivalence" argument to be rubbish. Why does the state have to become murderers themselves, shouldn't imprisoning them be enough? There's nobody arguing for that murderers and rapists should just go free. Not to mention what should happen if someone gets innocently executed in his world. Anyway, this whole discussion reminded me of this:  (Sorry for the watermark, was the only one I could find) "He, who willfully ends another life by means of violence, and thereby commits a murder, shall be killed by the bidding of the law."
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Dec 31, 2014 17:57
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Broken Cog posted:Is the guy speaking an executioner? It feels like that whole speech was made only to convince himself that he is not some sort of monster, and he does it by making the value of life into some sort of Zero-sum game, where not taking the life of a murderer somehow devalues the life of the victim. I think it might be Heinlein during one of his Full Fascist phases, but I don't know. I can understand the desire for vengeance as an individual, but a state is specifically erected to be a dispassionate and objective organism. Like, the entire foundation of modern states is that they are (ostensibly) independent and to a degree, even disinterested arbiters. Vengeance should absolutely never be a factor in anything they do. Plus of course executing a single innocent person is far worse than letting a thousand guilty go entirely free.
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Dec 31, 2014 18:49
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Uh is that from the Sword of Truth books because uh...
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Dec 31, 2014 18:59
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Camus is wrong - there are plenty of killers who have done this. For that matter ISIS routinely puts exactly this on Youtube. Capital punishment as it's practiced in Texas is terrible because of the procedural shortcuts and racism inherent in the system. On a philosophical level I've never bought the anti-retributive argument. Why is retribution a "wrong" motive from a justice perspective?
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Dec 31, 2014 19:36
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i'm in support of the death penalty if and only if the condemned are killed gruesomely in a public spectacle, like being disembowled and burned alive, broadcast across all major networks during dinner
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Dec 31, 2014 20:27
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Dalael posted:Here is something from a book I once read, in which a person talks to a crowd who do not believe in killing for any reason, including defending themselves from murderers and rapists. Just putting this here as food for thoughts, leaving everyone to make their opinions. quote:Uh is that from the Sword of Truth books because uh... Winner winner! Those quotes are written by a person who follows Ayn Rand's Objectivist philosophy, which is essentially Sociopathy: The Moral and Ethical system. Ayn Rand had a personal obsession with a man who mutilated a twelve year old girl and considered him to be the pinnacle of humanity because he did what he wanted, when he wanted without giving a single gently caress. That all said the simple answer to all of that is we aren't granting mercy to killers by refusing to execute them. People who would be executed would simply spend the rest of their lives in prison at less cost, without us morally sinking to their level by executing them. quote:Capital punishment as it's practiced in Texas is terrible because of the procedural shortcuts and racism inherent in the system. On a philosophical level I've never bought the anti-retributive argument. Why is retribution a "wrong" motive from a justice perspective? Because retributive justice isn't justice, its vengance. Our system of justice largely exists as a utilitarian one with three primary goals: Deterrence, Rehabilitation, and Security. None of the primary goals of our justice system are met by murdering a murderer, and indeed we cheapen our justice if we do so because it takes it away from an impartial good of society into something that lashes out in vengeance. quote:i'm in support of the death penalty if and only if the condemned are killed gruesomely in a public spectacle, like being disembowled and burned alive, broadcast across all major networks during dinner https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hyph_DZa_GQ
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Dec 31, 2014 20:28
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Adar posted:Camus is wrong - there are plenty of killers who have done this. For that matter ISIS routinely puts exactly this on Youtube. The question is more about what good retribution actually provides, if any. Popular Thug Drink posted:i'm in support of the death penalty if and only if the condemned are killed gruesomely in a public spectacle, like being disembowled and burned alive, broadcast across all major networks during dinner Bring back the carving of the blood eagle and I'm on board.
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Dec 31, 2014 20:38
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Caros posted:That all said the simple answer to all of that is we aren't granting mercy to killers by refusing to execute them. People who would be executed would simply spend the rest of their lives in prison at less cost, without us morally sinking to their level by executing them. But what if the criminal escapes and kills someone? Then our justice system would be morally culpable for allowing an innocent person to die. We must cut short the appeals process and remove as many safeguards as possible from capital cases to avert such a frightful calamity.
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Dec 31, 2014 21:16
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Adar posted:Capital punishment as it's practiced in Texas is terrible because of the procedural shortcuts and racism inherent in the system. On a philosophical level I've never bought the anti-retributive argument. Why is retribution a "wrong" motive from a justice perspective? What purpose does it serve? If you can answer that in a satisfactory way, then I would relent my anti-retribution stance. But I have yet to encounter anyone who can describe to me the good to be found in capital punishment in a way that doesn't seek to rely entirely on pathos and hypotheticals.
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Dec 31, 2014 21:48
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I don't really mind the idea of most of these murderers getting killed, but actually having a death penalty in a world where innocent people get convicted of crimes all the time is pretty hosed up. Probably most of the guys on the list deserved it and I don't really feel too bad about them getting executed, but the fact that 4% or more didn't deserve it makes it pretty inexcusable. But hey, it's Texas. What're you gonna do?
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Dec 31, 2014 21:55
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Adar posted:Camus is wrong - there are plenty of killers who have done this. For that matter ISIS routinely puts exactly this on Youtube. One might dispute the value or utility of a justice that would respond to say, theft, by making no effort to repay the person who is stolen from, but instead takes something of equal value from the thief, and says everything is settled.
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Dec 31, 2014 22:13
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OwlFancier posted:One might dispute the value or utility of a justice that would respond to say, theft, by making no effort to repay the person who is stolen from, but instead takes something of equal value from the thief, and says everything is settled. Except we have things like insurance and other means to make things equitable for those damaged by thefts...? I mean, there's nothing really stopping you from doing both.
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Dec 31, 2014 23:38
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The point of executing a murderer is to be sure he'll never even have the opportunity to do it again, which is of course justice. Now some silly liberals will tell you that cutting the hands off of a thief is unjust and barbaric or whatever crybaby poo poo, but he ain't exactly gonna be stealing no more if he don't got no hands! Justice! 
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Jan 1, 2015 00:07
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420DD Butts posted:What purpose does it serve? If you can answer that in a satisfactory way, then I would relent my anti-retribution stance. But I have yet to encounter anyone who can describe to me the good to be found in capital punishment in a way that doesn't seek to rely entirely on pathos and hypotheticals. Some would argue (not me, of course) that each and every government function is some extension of the will of the people, and if the will of the people is retribution, then government exaction of the same is proper.
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Jan 1, 2015 00:24
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You dumb butts, how is it your rugged individualist state kept in check by the people's armed militia also allows its government to murder citizens? I guess nothing keeps hundreds of millions of people in check better than a good ol' execution, plus theres the cash in contracting out the lethal injection.
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Jan 1, 2015 00:44
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Note: Rugged individualism may not be right for everyone. Rugged individualism is not recommended for those who don't own enough human beings to do all the hard work for them or can't depend on a huge military to murder any natives in the way of the good land. Always take rugged individualism with food and with an overbearing police state that turns minorities guilty of nonviolent crimes into a source of cheap prison labor. Consult your doctor.
VitalSigns fucked around with this message at 00:52 on Jan 1, 2015 |
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Jan 1, 2015 00:48
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The death penalty is a perfectly just response to the murder of another human being. Now, it unfortunately appears that the government of Texas has wrongfully killed four innocent people. So I'm going to need all police officers, prosecutors, judges, officials of the Dept of Criminal Justice, and every post-1976 governor still living to put their names into this here hat, and I'll draw four. Sorry guys but fair's fair, justice is blind and all that.
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Jan 1, 2015 02:02
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Klyith posted:The death penalty is a perfectly just response to the murder of another human being. Nawh, it's cool. If the families can prove that they were wrongfully executed, they can get a few bucks from the State. It all works out in the end.
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Jan 1, 2015 02:09
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Klyith posted:The death penalty is a perfectly just response to the murder of another human being. This, but without the barest trace of irony.
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Jan 1, 2015 02:59
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I don't think the problem is the death penalty itself, rather its the system that administer it. It shouldn't be left to just one or two guys to decide what evidence is presented or which witness qualifies. Prosecutors who withhold evidence, or put witness on the stand that have no right to be there, need to have someone checking over their shoulder. And the penalty for being such a douchebag that you are willing to send an innocent to death just to win your case needs to be so severe, that these guys will not risk it, especially if someone is checking over them. I also think that when a lawyer claims to have new evidence that could save his client, it should not be left to a politician to decide to stay the execution. Politicians have proven times and times again that they cannot be left to make important decisions, much less the right decision. In the end, no system will ever be perfect and there are innocents who will die. But it is our responsability to try and keep that number as low as possible and constantly re-evaluate the system to improve it and minimize error. Killing prisoners is not ideal, but some people are just too dangerous to ever be released back in the population. Left in prison, they are dangerous towards other criminals who may have been charged for a much lesser crime. Let prisons be for criminals, and the death penalty for murderers.
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Jan 1, 2015 04:17
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Mister Adequate posted:I think it might be Heinlein during one of his Full Fascist phases, but I don't know. States are in no way capable of being disinterested.
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Jan 1, 2015 05:07
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Badera posted:States are in no way capable of being disinterested. Of course they can't be, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't try to come as close as possible to it. I don't feel that capital punishment accomplishes anything positive. I can imagine theoretical situations in which it might save the lives of innocent people by killing the guilty, but in the real world it's just killing people who are no longer a threat for essentially emotional reasons. Dalael's point about murder in prison is an interesting one, but such murders are actually surprisingly rare in practice.
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Jan 1, 2015 05:15
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Why not repeal the death penalty, but have there only be a fine for killing someone who has committed a murder. That way, if families really want revenge, they can go for it.
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Jan 1, 2015 05:16
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Broken Cog posted:What's the requirement for ending up on death row anyway? Short answer: Be poor, be black or kill a white person. Only the first is required, the next two just up your chances. Longer answer: In 1972, the US Supreme Court declared the death penalty unconstitutional as implemented. The two main problems the Court recognized were: Broken Cog posted:A lot of these people seem to have been found guilty of one or two murders, which, while horrible, seems excessive to sentence them to death for. Quite a few of them also seem to have been crimes of passion which historically have a very low reoffending rate. The second problem was that there was also often no consideration of factors in a defendant's individual circumstances that might mitigate against the death penalty. The American Law Institute (ALI), a group of really smart academics and lawyers, including defense counsel, prosecutors and judges, had came up with a proposed fair death penalty process that was put into effect by many states after the 1972 Supreme Court decision, and in 1976 the new procedures were OK'd by the Supreme Court and the death penalty was back in business. In 1977 the death penalty was limited to murder cases. The 'objective' aggravating factors that authorize the death penalty in a case were meant to ensure that a case became a death penalty case because it really was a horrible, terrible case; to remove arbitrary factors from the decision to pursue the death penalty. The individualized consideration of a defendant's circumstances was to ensure that a defendant would not be killed if there were any mitigating circumstances in his/her life. Unfortunately, the aggravating factors are not in the slightest bit objective in practice, because they have been interpreted to include just about every murder that is committed. Let's take Oklahoma's for example. [comments in brackets are court and legislative interpretations/definitions of the factors] The death penalty is authorized if a jury finds at least one of the following to be true beyond a reasonable doubt: 1. The defendant was previously convicted of a felony involving the use or threat of violence to the person; 2. The defendant knowingly created a great risk of death to more than one person; [i.e., was there more than one victim or potential victim?] 3. The person committed the murder for remuneration or the promise of remuneration or employed another to commit the murder for remuneration or the promise of remuneration; 4. The murder was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel; [i.e., did the victim suffer in any way whatsoever?] 5. The murder was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest or prosecution; [e.g., did the defendant leave or try to leave the scene] 6. The murder was committed by a person while serving a sentence of imprisonment on conviction of a felony; 7. The existence of a probability that the defendant would commit criminal acts of violence that would constitute a continuing threat to society; or [FREE SPACE! Has the defendant ever done anything bad in their life, ever? (Even if it never resulted in a criminal conviction)] 8. The victim of the murder was a peace officer as defined by Section 99 of this title, or correctional employee of an institution under the control of the Department of Corrections, and such person was killed while in performance of official duty. With regard to individualized consideration of mitigating factors, this evidence is expensive (in time and money) to collect. Most defendants looking at the death penalty have had utterly lovely, forgotten, fractured lives. Explaining why this is mitigating to a jury of white-collar workers and upper and middle class retirees is difficult and expensive. Unfortunately, people facing the death penalty are almost without exception indigent. Neither the defendants nor the public defender offices can afford to mount as complete of a case in mitigation as is required. [Case in point: earlier today, my lovely state-supplied work station crashed, taking with it a somewhat longer effort post than this one] If jury finds that the aggravating factors outweigh the mitigating factors they can sentence a defendant to death. It was this arbitrariness in aggravating factors (almost any murder can be capital) and the inability to present individualized mitigating factors (though primarily the former) that caused the ALI in 2009 to abandon support for the current death penalty procedures (the ones they invented in the first place) Broken Cog posted:Edit: A lot of them also seem to have had mental problems. blarzgh posted:Some would argue (not me, of course) that each and every government function is some extension of the will of the people, and if the will of the people is retribution, then government exaction of the same is proper. Government is a function of the social contract which seeks to remove the emotion and caprice from resolving interpersonal conflict (including murder) through aspiring to objective, fair, unemotional, socially productive and proportionate means to resolve interpersonal conflict. Retribution is the call for vengeance by an aggrieved individual (or a Tumblr'd mob) and doesn't belong in government.
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Jan 1, 2015 05:18
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I always wondered, if you were to strip away all legal protections from judge, jury and executioner, after they were involved in executing an innocent man, what would they be morally guilty of? For example, deciding to work as an executioner seems like some really shady poo poo to me, since you are fully aware that you will have to kill innocent people as part of your job. And nobody is forcing a judge to give out a death sentence if he feels like there might be a certain doubt left about the guilt.
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Jan 1, 2015 06:15
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waitwhatno posted:I always wondered, if you were to strip away all legal protections from judge, jury and executioner, after they were involved in executing an innocent man, what would they be morally guilty of? The AMA specifically states that their members should not participate in executions. I don't know if they actually ban those who do so.
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Jan 1, 2015 07:47
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Dalael posted:I don't think the problem is the death penalty itself, rather its the system that administer it. It shouldn't be left to just one or two guys to decide what evidence is presented or which witness qualifies. Prosecutors who withhold evidence, or put witness on the stand that have no right to be there, need to have someone checking over their shoulder. And the penalty for being such a douchebag that you are willing to send an innocent to death just to win your case needs to be so severe, that these guys will not risk it, especially if someone is checking over them. The people who are put on death row are not anymore of a danger to other criminals than any other run of the mill murderer. Jeffrey Dahmer wasn't some massive risk to other prisoners, if anything he was in danger from other prisoners who would have killed him if given the chance. We are perfectly capable of putting murderers in jail without it becoming some sort of Escape from New York situation where every day criminals are at the hands of murderers. And lets be clear, if we keep the death penalty we are going to kill innocent people. That is an inescapable fact of the death penalty so long as justice is administered by something other than a perfected version of Minority Report Pre-Crime. As far as I am concerned, one innocent person begin killed by the state in the search of pointless (and expensive) vengeance is too many. I understand the desire, I look at people like Paul Bernardo and think to myself, why can't we just shoot this motherfucker. Then I look at people like Cameron Todd Willingham and go Oh yeah, because innocent men will end up dead.
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Jan 1, 2015 07:58
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It's baffling to me that miserable pointless decades locked in a shithole American prison with no hope of release is seen as more merciful than death. I know which one I'd choose
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Jan 1, 2015 08:17
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Torka posted:It's baffling to me that miserable pointless decades locked in a shithole American prison with no hope of release is seen as more merciful than death. I know which one I'd choose Death penalty in the US also includes miserable pointless decades (or at least years) locked in a shithole American prison with no hope of release plus the knowledge that you're almost certainly gonna get killed sooner or later, so I don't see why it should be considered much more humane even in theory.
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Jan 1, 2015 09:30
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Badera posted:States are in no way capable of being disinterested. Of course they're not, but they should still try. To note, I don't mean disinterested in the sense that they don't care whether justice is done or not, but that they don't have any interest in a given outcome, which is pretty violently contravened by a state like Texas which is killing people for avowedly vindictive purposes, even if they're factually innocent.
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Jan 1, 2015 17:04
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Mister Adequate posted:Of course they're not, but they should still try. Please show me your example of the last point.
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Jan 1, 2015 17:59
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Mister Adequate posted:Of course they're not, but they should still try. But they do have interest in a given outcome. It's just the nature of the beast. http://www.democracynow.org/2015/1/1/who_goes_to_jail_matt_taibbi Sorry for linking to Matt Taibbi, but the point still stands.
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Jan 1, 2015 18:46
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Hot Dog Day #91 posted:Please show me your example of the last point. Oh I'm sorry, I used the term "factual innocence" and states are absolutely interested in an objective and unbiased review of such cases, in no way deliberately sabotaging efforts to demonstrate a wrongful conviction. So the actual legal term factual innocence is not something I can demonstrate and, of course, this means no innocent person, or person whose prosecution falls far short of the truly high bar needed to warrant execution, has ever been executed. e; ^^^ Of course they do, that's what I'm bloody well angry about. I'm saying they shouldn't. I don't honestly know if that is possible, but it should be aimed for nevertheless.
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Jan 1, 2015 18:58
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