Most likely, this topic has been discussed so please excuse the repeat.
How do board members feel about the death penalty?
I'm against it because violence seems to perpetuate itself endlessly and does not solve anything whether it's done by criminals or the government.
I used to feel differently but I'm glad I finally see the light.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: aqua,

IMHO, It is used too often, but needed in rare instances.

This is a modified stance from the one I held only a few years back. Basically, there are some people the world is better off without.

On a side note, they didn't give Jeffrey Dahlmer the Death Penalty, but a sentence of any time at all, in the GP of a Maximum Security prison was the same thing.

i don't support the death penalty. i think locking people up for the rest of their lives means we're doing without them. if there are cases where, because of corruption, bad people (like former dictators) live cushy lives in gaol, then it's the corruption needs to be dealt with. and as far as tax payer funds being spent on feeding and housing crims, well i see it as a fair price to pay.

Wellll....besides the obvious, being able to murder while in prison where not all the population is in for life, there are other factors to consider. Most gangs have an active population in all prisons in order to recruit and man the front as it were.

I also don't appreciate feeding these prisoners.

What we ought to do is implant a code in the aorta of all convicted murders, then when Bush or whoever wants to bomb someone, we tell him the access code is "In the right aorta of prisoner 99544326."

Two birds, one stone.

boog, i was expressing my opinion. i doubt there's much you can come up with that i have not considered. this is where i stand.

not budging, and you'll note i'm not asking you to. i respect your right to your opinion, i choose not to share it.

I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything, merely doing the same as you.

sorry, boog.

i misinterpreted your "Wellll... besides the obvious" as patronising. my mistake.

quote:

Originally posted by m!sty:
i don't support the death penalty. i think locking people up for the rest of their lives means we're doing without them. if there are cases where, because of corruption, bad people (like former dictators) live cushy lives in gaol, then it's the corruption needs to be dealt with. and as far as tax payer funds being spent on feeding and housing crims, well i see it as a fair price to pay.

I agree, but my reasons are simpler, I guess. Even if it cost 10 times as much for prison, governments should not kill people as punishment. It's barbaric. It's prone to error. It's just fucking wrong. Yes, if one of my kids were murdered, I'd feel the same way.

It's called civilization.

I'd be happier about locking criminals up for life if they actually stayed locked up for life, instead of getting out in 15 or 20 after committing heinous acts.

oh me too, trog. it's not so much about the risk of an innocent person being killed (though the possibility makes the death sentence even more abhorrent to me) as my refusal to agree that anyone deserves to be killed.

quote:

I'd be happier about locking criminals up for life if they actually stayed locked up for life, instead of getting out in 15 or 20 after committing heinous acts.

perhaps the system needs to be overhauled to take this into account - but i don't see killing anyone as a solution to this problem. (not suggesting you say otherwise, btw, minx.)

Get rid of the racist, prison-as-a-profit-model War on Drugs, and you'll have room to keep deserving criminals in prison until they die.

What makes the death penalty so antithetical to civilization is the death ceremony. They've tried to make that final process as clinical and legally procedural as they can, in an effort to make it less ceremonial.

Can't do it. It's still a death ceremony and appears as such and always will.

It will always be the robed executioner escorting the condemned on that last walk of his life, to the ominous beat of the death drums. The scene itself cannot fit with modern society any more than ritual human sacrifice or some druid buggering a child.

Where the death penalty thrives, there is an unmistakable societal sickness. There is a malaise infecting the citizenry, which, while perhaps they cannot sense it from within, is obvious to outside observers. Texas.

That about does it.

My opposition is quite complex, ideologically, because in one hand I think the State should be able to kill when necessary, in its own defence. However to kill someone who is a prisoner, rather than a current menace, shows a lack of hope in the existence of redeeming qualities in Humanity, that once you go that way you can justify the killing of almost anyone who does not fit or conform.

It is to negate the possibility of change, both personally, technologically (for the clinically insane) or socially. It is either in pride in thinking you have the best system or fear that the system is so fragile that it can easily collapse.

A matter of Hope. And esthetically because it cannot be reversed.

Psychophant

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...shows a lack of hope in the existence of redeeming qualities in Humanity, that once you go that way you can justify the killing of almost anyone who does not fit or conform.

I think you've captured my leeriness.

Trog hit the nail on the head I think.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: aqua,

quote:

Originally posted by aqua:
Trog hit the nail on the head I think.

I dunno about the "some druid buggering a child" part.

My apologies to all the non-child-buggering druids out there.

quote:

What makes the death penalty so antithetical to civilization is the death ceremony.

I think that what makes death penalty wrong is that it is a penalty that cannot be reversed and there are no means of assuring it will be properly used and equally used for people in different social situations. If someone is monstrous (like a serial killer), then he must be put in a sanatorium (for life). Otherwise life sentencing is a good option.

I agree that the "death ceremony" is something that takes us back to the dark ages and, thus, is the antithesis of what we consider civilized behavior.

quote:

shows a lack of hope in the existence of redeeming qualities in Humanity

Well call me hopeless. Really, what are these "redeeming qualities" you speak of.

We're a fucking virus, strangling what gives us life.

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Really, what are these "redeeming qualities" you speak of.

Male or Female?