this is when i support the death penalty

[Valmorian]

(sigh)

It's sad, Victor, how on your view the needs of the CRIMINAL become virtually identical with those of "society", so that he must be rehabiliatated, pampered, and returned to it; but the needs and rights of the victims for justice are dismissed offhand as a "primitive emotional reaction".

It's sad that you seem to automatically equate "Accused" with "Criminal". Not all those who are in jail are guilty. As Victor has stated, the system IS fallible.

Also, you haven't answered my question: on your view, why should the nazi war criminals have been punished at all?
After all, that didn't bring the victims back to life, and it lost "society" all those important, capable people, that could have helped so much in reconstructing Germany! Sure, they killed a few million lousy victims, but we shouldn't let our "emotional reaction" about THAT stop us from doing what is "rational", now should we?

For my part, I would have had them incarcerated, but not killed. Furthermore, the length of their incarceration would depend upon the involvement they had with the crime involved.

Now, if you think they should NOT have been punished, the discussion stops here--it means you and I are from totally different galaxies as far as our sense of justice is concerned.

I know you're from a different galaxy from ME as far as justice is concerned. I find your idea of justice frightening.

 

[Victor Danilchenko]

Skeptic

It's sad, Victor, how on your view the needs of the CRIMINAL become virtually identical with those of "society", so that he must be rehabiliatated, pampered, and returned to it; but the needs and rights of the victims for justice are dismissed offhand as a "primitive emotional reaction".

What fscking rights does the current system support? Does the government do anything besides the totally minimal to compensate the victim of theft? Does the society pay for, say, extremely expensive medical treatment for a victim of a correspondingly injurious beating? Does the government bring dead back to life, or compensate the dead vixctim's relatives for loss of income?

Our society does nothing to protect the victim from the consequences of the crime -- nothing besides exacting revenge upon the criminal.

Also, you haven't answered my question: on your view, why should the nazi war criminals have been punished at all?

Yes, they should have -- to deter war crimes; but they shouldn't have been killed. I wouldn't even advocate life imprisonment, provided we had psychologically reliable means to ascertain rehabilitation.

Sure, they killed a few million lousy victims, but we shouldn't let our "emotional reaction" about THAT stop us from doing what is "rational", now should we?

that's right, we shouldn't. Righteous outrage is a poor stand-in for rational thought. Just because you feel indignant, doesn't mean that you have a license to abandon reason and humanity.

Now, if you think they should NOT have been punished, the discussion stops here--it means you and I are from totally different galaxies as far as our sense of justice is concerned.

We are from different galaxies. You desire vengeance, I desire maximal good for society. You also seek an excuse to let your emotions take the reign, while I seek a way to always have rationality firmly checking the emotions' excesses. You treat the victims' plight an excuse to flaunt your righteous indignation, while I try to actually figure out what would be best for society.

 

[SoBitter]

So capital punishment is a way to remove members of society who have killed without justification or do not have a good enough excuse. Isn't life without parole basically the same as removing them from society? As has been pointed out, with many appeals, a death sentence becomes more costly than lifelong incarceration.
Other than to feel like justice has been served, why do we take part in capital punishment? One person's sense of justice can be much different than another's, justice is not universally defined. In Singapore it is considered justice to cane someone for theft or vandalism, in the USA we would consider it cruel and unusal. As our values as a society change and evolve we may come to consider capital punishment as cruel and unusual. Some members of our society already do, that is the difference. Our government has the power to decide how we punish criminals, and theoretically if enough of our population decides that we no longer want to take part in capital punishment then we won't anymore.
As a side note, why have anyone be exempt from the death penalty? If a person is mentally retarded and commited a murder, they could just as easily kill again as a person who has full mental capacity. We say that if someone was not aware that what they were doing was wrong then they should not be held to the same standards, but by Whomp's definitions they are detriments to society and have broken the rules, thereby making themselves unworthy to exist in said society. Isn't making these people immune from the death penalty also a cop out?

Malachi said : Improvement of the system could be done to make the death penalty less expensive w/o weakening the quality fo convisions I am sure. One of the problems is all the people fighting against it. Instead of trying to put in law to make it ineffecient and working against the process they could be working with the process and making it more effecient at getting proper convictions.

Of course I do really put most ofthat blame on prosecutors and a corrupt system in the first place, so whatever.


So could you give me some real examples as to how you think this would work? How can we make the death penalty less expensive and increase the quality of convictions? Who is fighting against making the system more accurate and producing convictions which are true (finding true guilt)?

 

[DialecticMaterialist]

Yes. And that wish conflicts our wish for the humane society that maximizes happiness.

Yes and I believe then that attaining justice best maximizes our happiness or at least our satisfaction.

All ethics and politics isa based ultimately on emotion -- on the desire to survive, if nothing else. the difference is that some imperatives we all agree on seeking (survival, progress, etc.)

Not everyone agrees with all the above technically. Ludites don't believe in progress, nihilists, radical nature worshippers, and doomsday cultists, care very little about human survival.

and some imepratives we don't. When a conflict between the former and the latter arises, which one should give, do you think?

Depends on many things(usually who's in charge). Some things we may feel more strongly about then others for example or how long the value lasts or whether values conflict in many complex ways(bread or butter choices for example are both long-term/universal value conficts). In the case of justice though, I see the need for justice as both one of the strongest and most universal of all human emotions.

Now I'm not saying might makes right. But that might is needed ti enforce right.

Evolutionary explanation may explain why this is how things are, but it says nothing about how things ought to be. Descriptive ethics is useful, but don't mistake it for prescriptive ethics.

Well I did make a distinction between explanations and justifications. However I will note according to your standards, with the greatest happiness principle being a given, you cannot dismiss evolutionary explanations as merely descriptive. That is because what makes us happy is determined by what kind of creatures we are: and what kind of creatures we are is determined by our evolutionary history.

A society of intelligent cows and a society of men may both adhere to a greatest happiness principle(which itself is merely established by emotion) , how such a principle is best served though will vary between the two societies according to each species unique biology(which is determined in part by evolutionary mechanisms/history).

Deterrenbce is a part of prevention; but death penalty has repeatedly been shown to be no deterrent to crimes for which death penalty is imposed.

I really doubt this. China for example has a very low crime rate due to its severe punishment.

We can treat incarceration as deterrence, and that's fine; but then we will arrive at incarceration methods and practices very different from what we now have under our vengeance system.

Why is that fine and not the other system? That's a mere value judgement on your part, based ultimately on what you have dismissed as "primitive emotion."

Criminals already aren't prudent -- else they wouldn't be criminals. There are very few crimes which a prudent person would undertake.

I really don't believe this at all. Your argument "criminals aren't prudent because otherwise they wouldn't be criminals" is circular. Theives and mafia men steal for profit and can get very, very smart. Many in the Russian mafia for example have Ph.d's and utilize complex chemistry to bypass tax laws on alchohol for example(disgusing vodka as window cleaner via a chemical, then adding another chemical to make it look like vodka again after shipping).

Also keep in mind behavior evolved in bands, not modern day societies. In a band being able to steal extra food when you were short on food, kill another man when you wanted his wife and such was very prudent, and at times meant the difference between life and death.

Who said anything about being a push-over? You are attacking a strawman.

That was just an example to illustrate why a vengeful person would be more succesful in a band society thena pushover. I wasn't really attacking anything with my example(Merely explaining).

If anything your taking my statement that much out of context was a strawman.

As I said, incarceration can be a part of systematic program of deterrence, which in turn would help prevent crime (but then the laws would be rather different from what they are right now). However, death penalty has no place in that scheme.

So you say, but you've still not offered anything more then mere value judgements i.e. (vengeance or justice have no value for me, so they shouldn't fpr you either). To which I disagree, I think vengeance and justice are of utmost value, especially for most henious and easily proven crimes.

 

[SoBitter]

I really doubt this. China for example has a very low crime rate due to its severe punishment.

Can you prove that it is due to their severe punishment? Maybe it is due to their differing values and other cultural differences like less violence. There are many reasons that a country might have a lower crime rate, why is it necessarily that they have strong punishments?

 

[DialecticMaterialist]

It's sad that you seem to automatically equate "Accused" with "Criminal". Not all those who are in jail are guilty. As Victor has stated, the system IS fallible.

True, but how fallible? I doubt it's fallible enough to let most of the criminals go. Especially when the policy is "inoccent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt."

And the chance for error shrinks as technology improves. Forensic and DNA evidence for example greatly reduce chance for error.

Ultimately, I don't think that sparring a few innocence is worth letting many, many murderes go free. In this sense though, I'm somewhat willing to compromise. If the evidence is sketchy/ify, then perhaps life in prison. If the evidence is clear cut, then death penalty.

I mean there are some cases where the fallibility of the system doesn't really apply, cases where we catch war criminals for example, people that admit to the crime or if there is VERY strong evidence(a dozen witnesses, bomb making equipment, a tape of the man torchering the victim): the unabomber, Charles Manson, Andrea Yates, Ted Bundy, the Oklahoma city bomber, Saddam Hussein, etc.

 

[DialecticMaterialist]

Can you prove that it is due to their severe punishment? Maybe it is due to their differing values and other cultural differences like less violence. There are many reasons that a country might have a lower crime rate, why is it necessarily that they have strong punishments?

Is that really a reasonable doubt? Consider how self-serving that argument is. Where the death penalty does not appear to reduce crime, that shows "no effect" even if there are a dozen variables there. Where the death penalty seems to be working, its due to other variables.

You cannot have it both ways less we did a controlled, very solid scientific test, and no such test is available today.

In any event, if I was to be executed for protesting or jaywalking vs given a mere ticket, I'd think twice about it.

Are you telling me the severity of the punishment is irrelevant to dettering the crime?

In that case should we just give rapists an 80 dollar ticket when they are caught....would you really find that acceptable? Would that deter them as much as the death penalty or (just to make an example) severe torture?

 

[Earthborn]

You cannot have it both ways less we did a controlled, very solid scientific test, and no such test is available today.

Which is exactly why you can't say "China has a very low crime rate due to its severe punishment". You don't know.

There are more factors you need to take into consideration:
- Perhaps less crimes are reported in China
(That wouldn't surprise me in the least, as people are not as likely to report crimes to an oppressive regime.)
- Perhaps China has a much greater proportion of the population that has no real policing at all
- Perhaps the Chinese gouvernment fixes the statistics to appear to have a lower crime rate.
(Which oppresive regime doesn't?)

In any event, if I was to be executed for protesting or jaywalking vs given a mere ticket, I'd think twice about it.

Are you telling me the severity of the punishment is irrelevant to dettering the crime?

Of course you can deter ordinary people with harsh punishment to not do things that are quite benign. The point however is whether you can deter very dangerous criminals from perfoming very dangerous crimes.

If you believe this is possible, you assume that dangerous criminals make some sort of rational judgement of the benefits and the risks of the crime they are going to commit, before they commit it. You assume they think before they act. Apperently you didn't notice that prisons are full of impulsive people.
http://talkjustice.com/files/ch05link.htm
http://www.healthleader.uthouston.edu/archive/mentalhealth/010322/
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/research/2002/11/criminal_genes/print.phtml

 

[Skeptic]

It's sad that you seem to automatically equate "Accused" with "Criminal".

No, I am equating "convited of a henious crime by a jury of his peers" with "guilty". Sure, the jury can be wrong. But so can any other human endevour.

Not all those who are in jail are guilty. As Victor has stated, the system IS fallible.

Yes, it is. So? It depends HOW falliable it is. No car, medicine, or recreation is 100% safe, for example; but we don't ban all antibiotics because a few people might have fatal allergic reactions to them.

You seem to be treating convicted criminals--EVERY convicted criminal--as some sort of potential saint, a potentially wrongly-accused innocent railroaded by the evil "system".

On the other hand, how do you treat the victims and their relatives? You despise them, treating them as "primitive" and "violent" for wanting the killer of their loved one, who caused them so much pain, executed. Can't they SEE that the murderer of their brother, son, or mother MIGHT theoretically have been wrongly convicted, or that he MIGHT still contribute to society? Have they no sense of the "greater good"?

This is standing things on their head: the murderer is glorified, and their victims defiled. And this is supposed to be the "advanced" and "humanist" position, the one that "cares about human life"?

News flash: the vast, vast majority of those on death row are people who richly deserve their fate, for cruelly and callously destroying the lives of their victims and (indirectly) of their relatives. For those who act in such a way, nothing but the ultimate punishment is appropriate.

For my part, I would have had them incarcerated, but not killed.

Hermann Goering was given by Hitler the overall responsibility for the "Final Solution of the Jewish Problem", which resulted in the death of six million jews. In addition, he had millions of russian prisoners of war and civilan starve to death. Let's say that's 10,000,000 lives or so he was resonsible for, at least partially.

Over (say) thirty years of incarceration, this amounts to ten seconds or so per death. "Bad boy! You killed six people today! I want you to stand in the corner for a WHOLE MINUTE!". Is this fitting punishment... or a laughable miscarriage of justice, a slap in the face to all the victims and their survivors?

Furthermore, the length of their incarceration would depend upon the involvement they had with the crime involved.

Yes, I really don't see why those of them who could only be proven responsible for a few thousand lousy deaths, insead of millions, should have been executed as well... had the allies no sense of proportion?

 

[DialecticMaterialist]

Which is exactly why you can't say "China has a very low crime rate due to its severe punishment". You don't know.

There are more factors you need to take into consideration:
- Perhaps less crimes are reported in China
(That wouldn't surprise me in the least, as people are not as likely to report crimes to an oppressive regime.)
- Perhaps China has a much greater proportion of the population that has no real policing at all
- Perhaps the Chinese gouvernment fixes the statistics to appear to have a lower crime rate.
(Which oppresive regime doesn't?)
quote:In any event, if I was to be executed for protesting or jaywalking vs given a mere ticket, I'd think twice about it.

Well its conjecture that makes sense. Notice one of your claims is at odds with background knowledge and the other two are spurrious as they suppose conspiracy.


In any event look at the context of my statement. It was made in reponse to alleged "studies" that show the death penalty to be useless as detterence.

Of course you can deter ordinary people with harsh punishment to not do things that are quite benign. The point however is whether you can deter very dangerous criminals from perfoming very dangerous crimes.

I don't see why they would be an exception. Criminals often times consider consequences just like everyone else, even sociopaths, which is why they try to hide their criminal activities.

If you believe this is possible, you assume that dangerous criminals make some sort of rational judgement of the benefits and the risks of the crime they are going to commit, before they commit it. You assume they think before they act. Apperently you didn't notice that prisons are full of impulsive people.

But who says impulsive people cannot be rational?

I see crime as more often caused by differing values, not errors in thinking or belief systems. Ted Bundy was very calculating and thoughtful but he still did his crimes. I doubt most people in prison are so impulsive as to not consider a consequence as severe as the death penalty. And if they are, then I must express a very strong dislike if not hatred for their character and demand execution for their actions.

 

[Valmorian]

It's sad that you seem to automatically equate "Accused" with "Criminal".

No, I am equating "convited of a henious crime by a jury of his peers" with "guilty". Sure, the jury can be wrong. But so can any other human endevour.

In this case, however, the error can result in the erroneous execution of an innocent. I would not take that responsibilty, so I cannot support the death penalty.

Yes, it is. So? It depends HOW falliable it is. No car, medicine, or recreation is 100% safe, for example; but we don't ban all antibiotics because a few people might have fatal allergic reactions to them.

This is true, but there are actual, tangible real world benefits to using antibiotics. Killing an accused murderer does absolutely nothing in regards to the victim.

You seem to be treating convicted criminals--EVERY convicted criminal--as some sort of potential saint, a potentially wrongly-accused innocent railroaded by the evil "system".

No, I treat them as human beings, and recognize that the system could be in error. I cannot with good conscience endorse the execution of an individual. Furthermore, the execution of said criminal does nothing but satisfy feelings of revenge, another thing that I do not endorse.

On the other hand, how do you treat the victims and their relatives? You despise them, treating them as "primitive" and "violent" for wanting the killer of their loved one, who caused them so much pain, executed.

Utter and complete nonsense. I understand why they want the killer executed, that doesn't mean I think it should be done. Suppose the relative of the loved one wants the killer tortured for days before execution, would that be ok too?

Can't they SEE that the murderer of their brother, son, or mother MIGHT theoretically have been wrongly convicted, or that he MIGHT still contribute to society? Have they no sense of the "greater good"?

They are not in a position to be very objective, are they? I'm sure I would probably want the murderer of my family members to be killed, but I'd recognize why that shouldn't happen.

This is standing things on their head: the murderer is glorified, and their victims defiled. And this is supposed to be the "advanced" and "humanist" position, the one that "cares about human life"?

Glorified? You're spouting nonsense. This has nothing to do with glorification.

News flash: the vast, vast majority of those on death row are people who richly deserve their fate, for cruelly and callously destroying the lives of their victims and (indirectly) of their relatives. For those who act in such a way, nothing but the ultimate punishment is appropriate.

Why? Because you say so? Because it satisfies you emotionally?

To me, even ONE innocent person put to death erroneously is too much. I'd rather see a THOUSAND murderers jailed for their entire lives than see one innocent person killed because of a false conviction.

Hermann Goering was given by Hitler the overall responsibility for the "Final Solution of the Jewish Problem", which resulted in the death of six million jews. In addition, he had millions of russian prisoners of war and civilan starve to death. Let's say that's 10,000,000 lives or so he was resonsible for, at least partially.

Over (say) thirty years of incarceration, this amounts to ten seconds or so per death. "Bad boy! You killed six people today! I want you to stand in the corner for a WHOLE MINUTE!". Is this fitting punishment... or a laughable miscarriage of justice, a slap in the face to all the victims and their survivors?

I cannot comprehend why this is a problem. He is not in a position to kill anymore, that is all that matters.

Retribution does nothing to reverse those deaths. His death would be meaningless.

Furthermore, the length of their incarceration would depend upon the involvement they had with the crime involved.

Yes, I really don't see why those of them who could only be proven responsible for a few thousand lousy deaths, insead of millions, should have been executed as well... had the allies no sense of proportion? [/B]

I don't suppose it might have occured to you that SOME of those involved might have:

1. Not been aware of the implications of the orders they were filling.
2. Fearful of their own lives.

-----------------------------------

I've known people who have lost loved ones to drunk drivers. Some of them have felt that the drunk driver deserved to die. They're no less traumatized than the person who lost a loved one due to a wilfull murderer, and yet I suspect you wouldn't want to implement a death penalty for Drunk Driving.... or would you?

 

[Victor Danilchenko]

Skeptic

Hermann Goering was given by Hitler the overall responsibility for the "Final Solution of the Jewish Problem", which resulted in the death of six million jews. In addition, he had millions of russian prisoners of war and civilan starve to death. Let's say that's 10,000,000 lives or so people he was resonsible for, at least partially.

Over (say) thirty years of incarceration, this amounts to ten seconds or so per death. "Bad boy! You killed six people today! I want you to stand in the corner for a WHOLE MINUTE!". Is this fitting punishment... or a laughable miscarriage of justice, a slap in the face to all the victims and their survivors?

but the magnitude of the pain he inflicted upon the world is so vast, his death would be as negligible compared to it, as his lifelong incarceration! Either way, the victims and victims' families get no recompense.

You can recompense someone for theft; you might be able to do it for rape; you cannot do it for murder. There is nothing in the world that will compensate for the loss of life. This is my whole point here -- not to do the arithmetic of pain and suffering and death, but to challenge the very assumptions upon which this arithmetic is supposedly done.

Yes, I really don't see why those of them who could only be proven responsible for a few thousand lousy deaths, insead of millions, should have been executed as well... had the allies no sense of proportion?

there is no sense of proportion to be had. Nothing the allies could have possibly done, would have compensated for the loss of life incurred by the Nazi regime. To even speak about fair punishment in this context is laughable -- there can be no fairness, the millions of victims are dead. In fact, in most crimes for which the DP proponents recommend death penalty, there ultimately can be no fair retribution -- the victim's suffering is irreversible and impossible to compensate for. Revenge is not even a poor second option next to genuine recompense, it's merely an emotional band-aid in response to cancer. It makes us feel better, but other than that, it doesn't actually accomplish anything WRT rectification of the wrongs inflicted.

 

[Skeptic]

Our society does nothing to protect the victim from the consequences of the crime -- nothing besides exacting revenge upon the criminal.

So why do you want to take that away from them as well? After all, the least the justice system could do is dispense justice by fitting the punishment to the crime, or, as you call it, "revenge". Surely, in that case, the thing to do is to change the system so that the victims, in addition for having the system effectively punish the murderer by execution, ALSO help them more monetarily and financialy.

Yes, it's revenge. So? Why on earth is taking revenge on vicious murderers WRONG? That's an important part of what "justice" is, after all! Revenge and hatered might not be nice, but they are NOT necessarily wrong. It is right to hate vicious murderers and to extract revenge on them by capital punishment.

that's right, we shouldn't. Righteous outrage is a poor stand-in for rational thought. Just because you feel indignant, doesn't mean that you have a license to abandon reason and humanity.

But you DO abandon humanity and reason if you don't punish nazi war criminals. You are sending the message that their horrific acts, their millions of victims, don't matter--because (horrors!) punishing them for it might deprive them of the ability to "express their full potential" to society's benefit. The opportunities of the monster to "help society" count for more than the blood of his victims. This is not being human; this is being inhuman.

On your view, there was no reason, for example, not to put Hermann Goering, or (if he survived the war) Heinrich Himmler, in charge of resettling jewish refugees after the war. Why not? they proved their ability to "resettle" millions of jews already! Surely, it's the "rational" thing to do...

We are from different galaxies. You desire vengeance, I desire maximal good for society.

Not exactly. I desire the maximal good for society--which IS served by extracting vengence on those who deserve it, like vicious murderers. You, on the other hand, SAY you desire the "maximum good for society"; but in reality, what you desire is "the maximum good for the criminal".

You also seek an excuse to let your emotions take the reign, while I seek a way to always have rationality firmly checking the emotions' excesses.

Why is it an "emotional excess" to extract revenge by the death penalty on nazi war criminals and the likes of Ted Bundy? Isn't it precisely PROPORTIONATE (or even less than proportionate) punishment for their deeds?

You treat the victims' plight an excuse to flaunt your righteous indignation

Nope. The victims, and what happened to them by the murderer, are the CAUSE of my righteous indignation, and demand a fitting punishment for the criminal.

Once more, what's wrong, exactly, with feeling righteous indigation against sadistic murderers? Or (to repeat) hate, or the desire for avenging their victims? When ELSE should one feel this, if not in these circumstances?

The difference between you and me is that you see ALL hate, indignation, and desire for revenge as essentially "evil". I don't. It was right to hate Hitler. It was right to hate Ted Bundy. It is right to hate vicious murderers.

I challange you to look closely, now, at the results of your claimed inability to feel hate and indignation. Do you really lack hatered and righteous indignation? No! you, too hate--or at least despise--SOMEBODY here. No, not the murderer: you despise the "primitive" victims, who let emotions "take over their rationality", by having the absurd idea that the murderer of their loved one deserves punishment.

It is THEM you can't stand, since they stand as a constant reminder that all your theories about the "good of society" will not make a vicious murderer less deserving of punishment, or his action less evil.

And why shouldn't you despise them? After all, you say to yourself in righteous indignation, if it wasn't for those ANNOYING people demanding punishment, SURELY the "humanistic and rational reform" of the penal system into one that turns every criminal into a new Aristotle would have been complete by now. Don't these primitive, insignificant people know that there's a little bit of good in everyone--including the guy who raped and murdered their mommy?

There is a saying in hebrew: "he who is kind to the cruel, ends up being cruel to the kind". Which is what happened to you.

 

[Earthborn]

Notice one of your claims is at odds with background knowledge

If you think so, I am sure you are able to show how exactly. You said yourself that there is less crime in China. I just said that it could mean 'reported' crime and maybe less crime is reported. If you cn show that people in China are just as likely to report a crime as in the US, then please do.

and the other two are spurrious as they suppose conspiracy.

Only one supposes conspiracy. The other just supposes the obvious: that China is a huge country and many people live hundreds of kilometers from the nearest police station and that influences whether someone who has been wronged reports a crime to the police to be registered.

The one that does suppose conspiracy only supposes a conspiracy that is very easy to pulll of: it is fairly easy for the Chinese federal gouvernment to change the figures about its crimerate before it reports them to some international organization. Or are you claiming that there is an independant agency keeping track of crimes in China.

And there is another factor I did not even mention: perhaps the Chinese bureaucracy is so inefficient that many of the crimes reported to local police stations never end up counted in federal crime statistics. Or you saying that this is impossible, or even unlikely?

In any event look at the context of my statement. It was made in reponse to alleged "studies" that show the death penalty to be useless as detterence.

You can't use your own flawed or made up studies to counter other's flawed or made up studies.

For example I could claim that the death penalty is not a good deterrent at all by comparing crimes stats from the US with crime stats from a European country (which is any many ways much more similar to the US as China is!) and show that despite the fact that there is no death penalty, there is a lower crime rate. But would I prove anything with it? Of course not: correlation does not equal causation!

I don't see why they would be an exception. Criminals often times consider consequences just like everyone else, even sociopaths, which is why they try to hide their criminal activities.

They usually hide the evidence for their criminal activities after the act, proving that they usually didn't think clear before they did it. Many of the criminals who end up in jail didn't even hide it very well, showing that thinking clear is not something that comes easy to them. The person about who this thread started didn't think at all about hiding his murder of a fellow prisoner and shows that he acted purely on impuls.

And if they are, then I must express a very strong dislike if not hatred for their character and demand execution for their actions.

So if someone murders out of 'rational' motives you want him dead, and if someone murders out of impulse you want him dead? Is there any reason at all you can think of that doesn't necessitate the death penalty?

 

[Victor Danilchenko]

Skeptic

So why do you want to take that away from them as well?

because doing so will make for a better society.

Surely, in that case, the thing to do is to change the system so that the victims, in addition for having the system effectively punish the murderer by execution, ALSO help them more monetarily and financialy.

DP, being usually dispensed for murder and somesuch major crimes, virtually never occurs in a situation where any sort of recompense is possible. To even talk about recompense in this context is ridiculous.

But you DO abandon humanity and reason if you don't punish nazi war criminals. You are sending the message that their horrific acts, their millions of victims, don't matter--because (horrors!) punishing them for it might deprive them of the ability to "express their full potential" to society's benefit.

No, we would send a message that the best thing we can do, is to move forward and to do whatever it takes to better the society in the future; that retribution doesn't have a place in the values of a civilized society.

The opportunities of the monster to "help society" count for more than the blood of his victims.

But this not a trade! The blood of his victims is already spilled, there is no comparison going on -- it's not like we spill the victims' blood again by not executing him!

Not exactly. I desire the maximal good for society--which IS served by extracting vengence on those who deserve it, like vicious murderers. You, on the other hand, SAY you desire the "maximum good for society"; but in reality, what you desire is "the maximum good for the criminal".

Ah yes, the good old 'you soft lefties love criminals" idiocy. How fresh.

Why is it an "emotional excess" to extract revenge by the death penalty on nazi war criminals and the likes of Ted Bundy? Isn't it precisely PROPORTIONATE (or even less than proportionate) punishment for their deeds?

No, it's infitely less than proportional, because there is nothing in the world that can compensate a victim of murder. Nothing can ever possibly make it right, no matter the punishment yu inflict on the criminal.

Once more, what's wrong, exactly, with feeling righteous indigation against sadistic murderers?

Nothing. What's wrong is to base public policy on such emotions.

When I read about heinous crimes, I feel righteously indignant also; I, too, want their blood. I just don't let those emotions override my reasoning facilities.

The difference between you and me is that you see ALL hate, indignation, and desire for revenge as essentially "evil".

No. I see giving in to those emotions -- letting them override your rational judgement -- as irrational and unethical.

I challange you to look closely, now, at the results of your claimed inability to feel hate and indignation.

I never made such a claim.

Do you really lack hatered and righteous indignation?

No, I don't. I do, however, keep my emotions in check. Unlike you, who has a long history of using reason to excuse your prejudices (remember the homophopboia thread).

And why shouldn't you despise them? After all, you say to yourself in righteous indignation, if it wasn't for those ANNOYING people demanding punishment, SURELY the "humanistic and rational reform" of the penal system into one that turns every criminal into a new Aristotle would have been complete by now. Don't these primitive, insignificant people know that there's a little bit of good in everyone--including the guy who raped and murdered their mommy?

Don't blow a gasket while expelling all that hot gas, dude.

 

[DialecticMaterialist]

Earthborn

If you think so, I am sure you are able to show how exactly. You said yourself that there is less crime in China. I just said that it could mean 'reported' crime and maybe less crime is reported. If you cn show that people in China are just as likely to report a crime as in the US, then please do.

My comment was in reference to your claim that China has more population that don't need to be policed, even though it has more people.

Only one supposes conspiracy. The other just supposes the obvious:

You said less crimes are reported because the regime is opressive and the statistics are fixed. Two claims.

The one that does suppose conspiracy only supposes a conspiracy that is very easy to pulll of: it is fairly easy for the Chinese federal gouvernment to change the figures about its crimerate before it reports them to some international organization. Or are you claiming that there is an independant agency keeping track of crimes in China.

Well then maybe we can suppose EVERY country fixes its crime rate stats , to make them seem lower and China still has the lowest crime....

And there is another factor I did not even mention: perhaps the Chinese bureaucracy is so inefficient that many of the crimes reported to local police stations never end up counted in federal crime statistics. Or you saying that this is impossible, or even unlikely?

Unlikely, communists may be bad at a lot of things but stopping crime is not one of them.

You can't use your own flawed or made up studies to counter other's flawed or made up studies.

I'm countering conjecture with conjecture. And why can't you used a flawed story? All stories are flawed.

So if someone murders out of 'rational' motives you want him dead,

Rationality refers to an epistemic method, tell me what a "rational" or "irrational" motive is exactly?

and if someone murders out of impulse you want him dead?

Yep. I know, I'm a wicked man. I want people who murder on impulse executed. A sick man like me is beyond help.

Is there any reason at all you can think of that doesn't necessitate the death penalty?

Oh come on. What kind of question is that?


Well lets see: theft, assault, jay walking. The only real crimes that I think warrant the death penalty are the most severe(murder, mayhem, extreme torture, mutiny).

 

[PygmyPlaidGiraffe]

Where would Christianity be if Jesus got eight to fifteen years, with time off for good behavior?

-- New York Senator James H. Donovan commenting on capital punishment.

 

[davefoc]

Is that a deep and meaningful quote or just one of the stupidest things that anybody has ever said.

 

[TomStockholm]

DM said

In that case should we just give rapists an 80 dollar ticket when they are caught....would you really find that acceptable? Would that deter them as much as the death penalty or (just to make an example) severe torture?


A lot of people in Sweden would say that that is basically what we do here. In Sweden punishment is far more lax than it is in the States. Life never means life, prisons are far more humune than they are elsewhere, like hotells a lot of people say. Without having the statistics to hand I am pretty sure that we have lower crime rates than you have in the US. I think it is pretty obvious that there are many other factors to take into account when looking at crime prevention rather than just punishment.

A question for you all. If hypothetically it was found that say sending violent criminals to the Bahamas on a luxury cruise was the best way of preventing reoffending would this be acceptable or not? Revenge would be zero but the cost to society would be negligable compared to incarceration or the death penalty. Do the ends serve the means? What is more important, society's need for revenge or a safer society?

And before you say anything, this IS something that was tried in Sweden a few years back! Only for juvenile offenders of petty crime if I remember rightly but even so...

 

[HarryKeogh]

and now we have this guy

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/08/25/geoghan/index.html

begin quote from article...Druce was carrying, hidden from view, a T-shirt and a pair of socks, Conte said. In his pocket was a book.

"He then stuffed a half of a book into the upper track of the cell door so that it could not be opened electronically, and in the lower track he placed a nail clipper and a toothbrush."

Druce cut pages from the book "just to fit the size of that track," Conte said.

Using the shirt, Druce tied Geoghan's hands behind his back, threw him to the floor, took the socks that he had stretched for the occasion to use as a ligature and began to strangle Geoghan, Conte said.

Using Geoghan's shoe, Druce twisted the socks like a tourniquet, then took a pillowcase and wrapped it around Geoghan's neck "to strengthen the strangulation," Conte said.

end quote

no matter how much of a dirtbag that priest was no one deserves to go like that. But since massachusetts doesnt have a death penalty what will be the consequences for his murderer? he's already in prison for life (for murdering a gay man). Will he be placed in solitary for the rest of his life (is that not cruel and unusual)? or will he just get a meaningless life sentence tacked onto his current life sentence?