Enough to make one support the death penalty...

[Trakar]

Again I agree with you: it's the culture that's the problem, one that sees women as less wothy than men and open to abuse. Changing that culture is a slow process. Heck, reading the thread about sexual allegations against Shermer and others shows me we still have major issues with this in 2014 North America,

"We do not hang horse thieves because they steal horses. We hang them so that horses may not be stolen."

I'll repeat my question, but phrase it differently. What should society do with these men? They've committed an awful crime against these two teen-aged girls, their families, and the village in which they lived. Is not some sort of punishment in order? Or should they just be given a severe talking to and let go?

Killing other human beings is something that "punishment" cannot address. If your goal is to remove the possibility of them repeating these actions then they must be separated from the society to be protected. The most obvious choices for the primary perpetrators are confinement, banishment, or death.

 

[SUSpilot]

Hopefully, these misdirected fellows won't be jailed for their "uncivil" behavior, since forced imprisonment is a form of violence... and we certainly wouldn't want to "out do" their violent behavior. After all, they were under the impression that savagely gang raping terrified teenage girls, and then stringing them up until they died in unimaginable agony was an act of moral integrity. These slightly confused men need a little reeducation, not more violence in the form of forced imprisonment as a demonstration of moral and ethical righteousness.

I think you got the entire plot of A Clockwork Orange into one paragraph.

 

[trustbutverify]

I think you got the entire plot of A Clockwork Orange into one paragraph.

Anyone familiar with the current musical preferences of Indian gang rapists/murderers?

 

[marplots]

If we were looking for an "eye for an eye" solution, they would round up the daughters of the perps, rape them and murder them. Which is pretty much why E4E doesn't seem like the right path to take.

 

[MontagK505]

If you don't mind me asking it in a different context. If you were defending yourself from a violent attack and there was a way to subdue your attacker and survive without killing them, would you resort to that method first?

Treating it as a real world situation, it depends on the degree of risk involved for myself, the respective weapons involved, how much time I had to make a decision etc. For example, if the attacker were equipped with a firearm, I would use whatever deadly force I could bring to bear because a misjudgement on my part could result in the death of innocents. In the unreal world, I would use a magic stun ray and then call 911.

 

[MontagK505]

<snip>

I never said the thought is the same as the act. I admit to having violent revenge fantasies when I hear horrible stories like this. I check my thoughts though and they fail to stand up to scrutiny.

I have revenge fantasies about slowly feeding these people feet-first into a tree-shredder. It's highly unlikely I would do if given the opportunity. I do not treat any thought as sub-human, it's simply a thought like sexual fantasies with beautiful women. Although for me the idea of having sex with a beautiful woman is much more pleasant.

 

[MontagK505]

If we were looking for an "eye for an eye" solution, they would round up the daughters of the perps, rape them and murder them. Which is pretty much why E4E doesn't seem like the right path to take.

That's only if you regard their daughters as property to destroy as restitution. The families of the victims may in fact regard their own daughters as property.

 

[MontagK505]

Killing other human beings is something that "punishment" cannot address. If your goal is to remove the possibility of them repeating these actions then they must be separated from the society to be protected. The most obvious choices for the primary perpetrators are confinement, banishment, or death.

With confinement you take the risk of some small but measurable risk that they will escape and repeat their crimes with even escalated brutality as revenge.

With banishment to a "Devils Island" you still run the risk they might return.

Death does guarantee they won't repeat their crimes. But there is no indication that it would deter other people from doing similar crimes.

There is in fact no final solution to evil.

 

[KumarS]

These sort of creatures need to be removed from society, permanently.

Following your own argument you and all other death penalty supporters (a.k.a cold blood murder supporters) should remove yourselves from society first!

 

[Trakar]

With confinement you take the risk of some small but measurable risk that they will escape and repeat their crimes with even escalated brutality as revenge.

Every breath we take carries risk; security isn't about eliminating risk, it is about minimizing damages and maximizing freedoms of choice and action.

With banishment to a "Devils Island" you still run the risk they might return.

Stupidity is not immunity from the consequences of one's choices, if they are so clueless as to return to an area where others casually justify killing, they are hardly in the position to easily solicit sympathy when they become the victims of their own beliefs. "judge not, lest ye be judged."

Death does guarantee they won't repeat their crimes. But there is no indication that it would deter other people from doing similar crimes.

There is in fact no final solution to evil.

Evil is not meant to be solved, merely recognized, avoided when possible and regretted when committed.

At the least, this is the path of my beliefs and considerations.

 

[Trakar]

Following your own argument you and all other death penalty supporters (a.k.a cold blood murder supporters) should remove yourselves from society first!

Extremism is rarely a good response to perceived extremism.

 

[trustbutverify]

Following your own argument you and all other death penalty supporters (a.k.a cold blood murder supporters) should remove yourselves from society first!

Where did he argue that people who haven't butchered another human being should remove themselves from society?

 

[Roger Ramjets]

The most obvious choices for the primary perpetrators are confinement, banishment, or death.

We've been using those methods for thousands of years, and yet it's not stopping these heinous crimes from occurring. Isn't it about time we tried something else?

There is in fact no final solution to evil.

There are solutions, but they may also be evil. Trying to prevent violent crimes by killing people is not an answer - it just perpetuates the cycle of violence.

It doesn't help that one person's 'good' is another person's 'evil'. Right now a lot of Americans are trying to stop the NSA from 'spying' on us, which they see as a greater evil than allowing crimes to go undetected. This is unfortunate because low detection rates are a prime enabler of criminal activity. Crimes continue to be committed simply because we aren't stopping them, and punishing the perpetrators afterwards is too late.

The other fact that we continue to ignore is that most criminals don't commit crimes because they are inherently 'evil', but simply that they have not learned to be law abiding. Instead of blaming them for their behavior we should be looking at ways to change it, or better yet prevent them from developing a criminal mindset in the first place. Early detection of people with such mental problems is a good start, but it is essential to follow that up with effective treatment.

A small number of people have severe brain anomalies which we cannot treat, so we have no choice but to lock them up. However that does not mean that they cannot lead productive and meaningful lives. It just means we have to provide with them a suitable environment - which is what prisons should be (not instruments of retribution).

There may not be a 'final solution' to evil, but by replacing medieval concepts of crime and punishment with modern technology and cognitive science we can reduce it dramatically. However we will never get there while we allow ourselves to be ruled by emotional reactions to incidents whose reporting is calculated to maximize our outrage.

 

[MontagK505]

We've been using those methods for thousands of years, and yet it's not stopping these heinous crimes from occurring. Isn't it about time we tried something else?

There are solutions, but they may also be evil. Trying to prevent violent crimes by killing people is not an answer - it just perpetuates the cycle of violence.

It doesn't help that one person's 'good' is another person's 'evil'. Right now a lot of Americans are trying to stop the NSA from 'spying' on us, which they see as a greater evil than allowing crimes to go undetected. This is unfortunate because low detection rates are a prime enabler of criminal activity. Crimes continue to be committed simply because we aren't stopping them, and punishing the perpetrators afterwards is too late.

The other fact that we continue to ignore is that most criminals don't commit crimes because they are inherently 'evil', but simply that they have not learned to be law abiding. Instead of blaming them for their behavior we should be looking at ways to change it, or better yet prevent them from developing a criminal mindset in the first place. Early detection of people with such mental problems is a good start, but it is essential to follow that up with effective treatment.

A small number of people have severe brain anomalies which we cannot treat, so we have no choice but to lock them up. However that does not mean that they cannot lead productive and meaningful lives. It just means we have to provide with them a suitable environment - which is what prisons should be (not instruments of retribution).

There may not be a 'final solution' to evil, but by replacing medieval concepts of crime and punishment with modern technology and cognitive science we can reduce it dramatically. However we will never get there while we allow ourselves to be ruled by emotional reactions to incidents whose reporting is calculated to maximize our outrage.

OM: Could you be more.......................specific?

Read Greg Bears SF novel "Queen of Angels" He describes a future of perfect mental health where a criminals brain can be re-wired to correct bad behavior. People can also volunteer to have "therapy" for self destructive impulses as well. I think you can see where this could lead. It's obviously a great brainwashing tool. It's not a horror novel by any means, but a lot of ugly stuff goes on behind the scenes. There is also a cute device called a "Hellcrown". You cam imagine what that does. Be careful what you wish for.

 

[NWO Sentryman]

We've been using those methods for thousands of years, and yet it's not stopping these heinous crimes from occurring. Isn't it about time we tried something else?

There are solutions, but they may also be evil. Trying to prevent violent crimes by killing people is not an answer - it just perpetuates the cycle of violence.

It doesn't help that one person's 'good' is another person's 'evil'. Right now a lot of Americans are trying to stop the NSA from 'spying' on us, which they see as a greater evil than allowing crimes to go undetected. This is unfortunate because low detection rates are a prime enabler of criminal activity. Crimes continue to be committed simply because we aren't stopping them, and punishing the perpetrators afterwards is too late.

The other fact that we continue to ignore is that most criminals don't commit crimes because they are inherently 'evil', but simply that they have not learned to be law abiding. Instead of blaming them for their behavior we should be looking at ways to change it, or better yet prevent them from developing a criminal mindset in the first place. Early detection of people with such mental problems is a good start, but it is essential to follow that up with effective treatment.

A small number of people have severe brain anomalies which we cannot treat, so we have no choice but to lock them up. However that does not mean that they cannot lead productive and meaningful lives. It just means we have to provide with them a suitable environment - which is what prisons should be (not instruments of retribution).

There may not be a 'final solution' to evil, but by replacing medieval concepts of crime and punishment with modern technology and cognitive science we can reduce it dramatically. However we will never get there while we allow ourselves to be ruled by emotional reactions to incidents whose reporting is calculated to maximize our outrage.

"Not learned to be law abiding" Seriously, criminals in most cases know outright that they are breaking the law (unless they are not guilty by reason of insanity or some other extenuating circumstance). And how the hell does executing the most heinous criminals "perpetuate the cycle of violence".

As for your NSA point, would you like the government creating a panopticon state which monitored confidential calls (say you are going through something like a nervous breakdown or a divorce, your situation would be made even worse if you thought the government was monitoring your every move). By that standard, do you advocate waterboarding people and the use of polygraphs (after all, nothing to hide, nothing to fear)

Lastly, humans are emotional beings, and if a friend or relative was beaten to a pulp and/or shot, you would be calling for the killers to get the noose just like anyone else. Anyway, you put far too much faith in SCIENCE! to solve societal problems (remember there were scientific journals in the 1920s arguing that black people were inherently dumber than white people)

 

[Trakar]

We've been using those methods for thousands of years, and yet it's not stopping these heinous crimes from occurring. Isn't it about time we tried something else?

This presumes that stopping the crimes is always better than eliminating the potential for the commission of such crimes. Elimination of poverty and social inequity, removal of family and cultural input that is counter to smooth social interaction, moderation of emotional responses through chemical and neurosurgical processes, constant monitoring of those "tagged" as prone to undesirable behavior, etc.,. I would not be prepared to surrender to such options or live in a society where such was casually considered, much less seriously proposed as a "solution" to crime.

 

[Caper]

We've been using those methods for thousands of years, and yet it's not stopping these heinous crimes from occurring. Isn't it about time we tried something else?

Well, in fairness... we may have lowered the rates. We don't know what the rates of these crimes would be if we hadn't eliminated these people from the earth over the years.

 

[Aepervius]

Well, in fairness... we may have lowered the rates. We don't know what the rates of these crimes would be if we hadn't eliminated these people from the earth over the years.

I am pretty sure that education and wealth made for the lowering of the crime and violence rate, not death penalty.

 

[Mike!]

If we were looking for an "eye for an eye" solution, they would round up the daughters of the perps, rape them and murder them. Which is pretty much why E4E doesn't seem like the right path to take.

No, that's not an 'eye for an eye' solution, because it inflicts punishment another set of innocents. It's the perpetrators who should be raped and hung. Of course, this presents a new problem, who does the raping? Since we all agree, rape is wrong, no one should have to rape another person, even if it is their job. So, what we need is a new punishment device. Some sort of automated raping machine, a "Rape-O-Matic", if you will. That way, no individual is burdened with the task, beyond strapping the guilty in and switching it on. With that, when sentencing comes down, the judge (or jury) , if they so decide, can dictate the number of hours in the "Rape-O-Matic", and further punishment, if necessary, including being hung.
Surely there's something to be learned from the Inquisitions.

 

[trustbutverify]

This presumes that stopping the crimes is always better than eliminating the potential for the commission of such crimes. Elimination of poverty and social inequity, removal of family and cultural input that is counter to smooth social interaction, moderation of emotional responses through chemical and neurosurgical processes, constant monitoring of those "tagged" as prone to undesirable behavior, etc.,. I would not be prepared to surrender to such options or live in a society where such was casually considered, much less seriously proposed as a "solution" to crime.

If you had to pick one factor most responsible for the rash of these particularly monstrous crimes, what would it be?