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Is Capital Punishment Justified?

Should Capital Punishment be supported?

  • It should be supported in both principle and practice.

    Votes: 31 45.6%
  • Yes in principle, but not in practice due to the ambiguity of social bias.

    Votes: 11 16.2%
  • It should be opposed both in principle and practice.

    Votes: 26 38.2%

  • Total voters
    68

AKLee

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Hello there people,

Just a thought here: in many developed regions we see the abolishment of capital punishment as a penalty for any crime. However, there still exists countries that do still exercise the death penalty system (approximately 90 countries) with 38 out of 50 states in the U.S. still endorsing the death penalty.

A major element of the argument will be the value of life: the side that supports capital punishment may argue that abolishing it results in the devaluation of respect for human life as the punishment is not proportionate and as such, does not reflect the significance of the crime. Also, the fact that the punishment is congruent to the crime proves that the system reflects the objective of the judiciary system: to deter.

The side that opposes capital punishment may argue that in the simplest of terms, execution is state-seanctioned killing - how different will taking the life of a killer be than taking the life of an innocent if the main objective is to preserve human life in general? Moreover, who is the judiciary system to have the right to take away one's right to life - the most fundamental of all rights? We all know how prejudice clouds judgement, especially in the fragile glass sheet that is today's society. Social bias makes secularity impossible, making the system unequal and as such, impossible to implement capital punishment in.

So what do you think? Should the use capital punishment be supported or opposed?

-Alex
 
Not only yes capital punishment is justified but hell yes it is justified. Those who commit certain heinous crimes are not deserving of life. Capital punishment serves as the ultimate punishment. It is unfair to the victims loved ones and other honest citizens to have to provide shelter,medical care, food, libraries, security,entertainment and other things to these scum who are behind bars.
"Sorry Jimmy's family and friends not only did this scumbag kill little Jimmy now you get to support this scumbag for the rest of his life." Its seems like adding insult to injury to the victims,the victim's loved ones and other honest law abiding citizens. In some cases the death penalty serves as a deterrent.

Most of the anti-death penalty nuts seem to show as much compassion for the victims and their loved ones as the scum on death row.
 
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Glad for the response. However, why don't you consider the possibility of the criminal reforming and as a result, ultimately benefit society? How different is taking away the criminal's life from taking away little Jimmy's life? Not every murderer is a chainsaw-wielding-serial-child-rapist, what if the crime was circumstantial? It is indeed unfortunate that Jimmy didn't have a choice before he was killed but who are you to take that choice away from the criminal?

(Just an opposing view, I did vote the same way you did, FYI.)

-Alex
 
IMO, the government should not be killing it's citizens for any reason. The only logical reason for capital punishment is as revenge. The Government is not in the revenge business.
 
Glad for the response. However, why don't you consider the possibility of the criminal reforming and as a result, ultimately benefit society?

The main priority of the justice system when it comes to criminals is punishment,not reform. I do not care if some scumbag can be reformed.


How different is taking away the criminal's life from taking away little Jimmy's life?
Little Jimmy is innocent the criminal is not.


Not every murderer is a chainsaw-wielding-serial-child-rapist, what if the crime was circumstantial?

If you speaking of circumstantial evidence being used to convict someone, I support life sentences in those cases.

It is indeed unfortunate that Jimmy didn't have a choice before he was killed but who are you to take that choice away from the criminal?

In order to not have vigilante mobs running around taking justice into their own hands we as society agree to adequately punish scum.



(Just an opposing view, I did vote the same way you did, FYI.)

-Alex

I did a thread regarding what people saw was more important, rehabilitation or punishment.

http://www.debatepolitics.com/polls/35104-if-possible-rehabilitate-criminals-one-pill.html
 
IMO, the government should not be killing it's citizens for any reason. The only logical reason for capital punishment is as revenge. The Government is not in the revenge business.

I sure that kind of reasoning can be applied to life sentences, fines, parole and other forms of punishment not just the death penalty. Some victims and their loved ones want scum to rot behind bars for their rest of their life.
 
I sure that kind of reasoning can be applied to life sentences, fines, parole and other forms of punishment not just the death penalty. Some victims and their loved ones want scum to rot behind bars for their rest of their life.


Removal of the a potential recidivist person from the general population is beneficail to the society as a whole. Going that extra step and removing that person from teh realm of the living is unneccesary and vengeance driven.

What the victim and their loved one's want is irrelevant to my logic.

Emotionally, I feel for them, but the post facto consideration of them is only done for emotional reasons, and justice should be emotionless.
 
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I don't have a problem with Capital Punishment. One way or the other, we remove a problem from our society. If the crime is heinous enough, I see no value in keeping them alive.
 
What the victim and their loved one's want is irrelevant to my logic.

Of course they are irrelevant to you anti-death penalty nuts, you guys have as much compassion for victims and their loved ones as the scum on death row do. Which is why the scum on death row are there and why you and others like you advocate that we should not execute these scum. You advocate that the victims loved ones and honest law abiding citizens should be forced to support these scum for the rest of their lives that we should pay for their room, food, medical care, security, entertainment, libraries, rat lawyers to help them weasel out of their punishment, sex change operation and drugs(in some states) and many other things.
 
Of course they are irrelevant to you anti-death penalty nuts, you guys have as much compassion for victims and their loved ones as the scum on death row do. Which is why the scum on death row are there and why you and others like you advocate that we should not execute these scum. You advocate that the victims loved ones and honest law abiding citizens should be forced to support these scum for the rest of their lives that we should pay for their room, food, medical care, security, entertainment, libraries, rat lawyers to help them weasel out of their punishment, sex change operation and drugs(in some states) and many other things.
Everybody who disagrees with you is a nut. They're not fellow citizens with a different opinion. They're just nuts. :roll:
 
Of course they are irrelevant to you anti-death penalty nuts, you guys have as much compassion for victims and their loved ones as the scum on death row do. Which is why the scum on death row are there and why you and others like you advocate that we should not execute these scum. You advocate that the victims loved ones and honest law abiding citizens should be forced to support these scum for the rest of their lives that we should pay for their room, food, medical care, security, entertainment, libraries, rat lawyers to help them weasel out of their punishment, sex change operation and drugs(in some states) and many other things.

Okay then, why not a life sentence as an alternative to all crimes that warrant capital punishment. The criminal is denied certain rights to a significant extent, it achieves the goals that is expected: the criminal is punished. Why must you go the extra step to remove something as powerful and fundamental as life? It is not so much the measure of the criminal's crime that is the point of contention here, rather, it is the authority of the court and the executioner to take this man's life. Do you see no hypocrisy in the system here?

Levels of social tolerance toward certain issues are changing every single day; in 1607, the persecution of people of Sub Saharan African descent as slaves were seen as something tolerable. The maltreatment of a black man then would not warrant as heavy a punishment as it would have now. Then, who are you to say that we got it right this time? What if in 400 years, the traficking of drugs were seen as something indecent, yet not unacceptable enough to warrant the death penalty? Why prosecute criminals on the basis of contemporary social boundaries, especially if it concerns something as basic, as constitutional, as constitutive, as fundamental as life?
 
Killing someone for killing someone makes you look like an asshole.
 
To quote Penn Jillette: "Personal pain and biblical tradition are not enough reason to kill a human being."
 
Killing someone for killing someone makes you look like an asshole.

Exactly my point (uhh...kinda). Deeper though its like killing someone who killed someone because you think that going to law school and wearing a black robe gives you the authoritah to do so. Which makes you look like an asshole. Though I still support capital punishment.
 
I support the death penalty being completely abolished world-wide, in all circumstances, and wish there was some way to exert international pressure on nations that still practice it - a reduced willingness to trade with them perhaps, more reluctance shown in allowing them to participate in internatial debates, with the UN being a good mechanism to do this through.

It's awful in practice - it's disproportianetely applied to black/Hispanic offenders, it's hideously expensive to carry out when you factor in all the appeals and the time spent housing inmates prior to them being killed, and most importantly, the danger of executing innocent people, what with a fair few for Death Row inmates being exonerated.

And it's barbaric and idiotic in practice - the state going into the murder business doesn't bring the victims of crime back, it doesn't appear to function as a deterent in any meaningful sense, and it reflects poorly on any nation that practices it. It priorities vegenance above all else, and bloodies our hands. How can we claim to have the moral authority to punish anyone while we kill our own for no good reason?
 
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Valid point, but who are we to pressure countries to abolish CP? We are assuming that total civil liberty is what everyone wants (which isn't always true) and that the whole world thinks that democracy and liberty has the moral highground over a more authoritarian mode of governance (which again, is not always true). In fact, it is hypocritical of a nation boasting to facilitate civil and individual liberty while blackmailing another nation into adapting a similar policy through economic sanctions.

I did read an article showing the statistical difference between black executions and white executions awhile back, lemme source for it. Again, this supports the idea of social bias influencing the decision to exercise the death penalty.

-Alex
 
Valid point, but who are we to pressure countries to abolish CP? We are assuming that total civil liberty is what everyone wants (which isn't always true) and that the whole world thinks that democracy and liberty has the moral highground over a more authoritarian mode of governance (which again, is not always true). In fact, it is hypocritical of a nation boasting to facilitate civil and individual liberty while blackmailing another nation into adapting a similar policy through economic sanctions.

Economic/ political sanctions against nations that violate human rights and renege on what they promised under international treaties are fairly common, and to be honest, I have zero problem with them. Hell, I think we need more of them. I was stunned when the UK government realised that British citizens were being held without trial at Guantanamo Bay and did nothing to encourage the US to try/free them bar ask politely. Making it plain that if they were not released/tried, British troops would be withdrawn from high-risk areas of Iraq would have sent the right message there, not bumbling, posturing and pouting like Blair did. Same with the US's disgusting behaviour regarding Matty Hull.

By the way, has the US actually got round to ratifying the UN Convention on The Rights of Children? From what I was told, the rationale against signing it was tangentically related to the US practice of capital punishment.

As for the above, it depends on whether you see such measures as primarily blackmail or primarily a nation reserving its right not to associate economically/politically with nations that carry out rephrensible practices. Of course, even the latter exerts pressure, that's the idea. But beyond basic diplomacy/trade relations, no nation is obligated to show warmth or favour to any other, and I wouldn't suggest violating those basic tenets of diplomacy. I was speaking more of putting more effort into developing diplomatic/economic ties with nations which show human rights the same respect as one's own country does, reducing dependence on nations that violate the human rights of their citizens.

AKLee said:
I did read an article showing the statistical difference between black executions and white executions awhile back, lemme source for it. Again, this supports the idea of social bias influencing the decision to exercise the death penalty.

-Alex

Mhm, that's a factor that would impede any possible fair emplentation of the death penalty, even if you agreed with it in principle.
 
I support the death penalty being completely abolished world-wide, in all circumstances, and wish there was some way to exert international pressure on nations that still practice it - a reduced willingness to trade with them perhaps, more reluctance shown in allowing them to participate in internatial debates, with the UN being a good mechanism to do this through.

It's awful in practice - it's disproportianetely applied to black/Hispanic offenders, it's hideously expensive to carry out when you factor in all the appeals and the time spent housing inmates prior to them being killed, and most importantly, the danger of executing innocent people, what with a fair few for Death Row inmates being exonerated.

And it's barbaric and idiotic in practice - the state going into the murder business doesn't bring the victims of crime back, it doesn't appear to function as a deterent in any meaningful sense, and it reflects poorly on any nation that practices it. It priorities vegenance above all else, and bloodies our hands. How can we claim to have the moral authority to punish anyone while we kill our own for no good reason?
Interesting
not only do you have blacks & hispanics in Scotland but they are also disproportionately prosecuted like in America
Amazing ;)
 
I support the principle, but having seen numerous reports that Life imprisonment is cheaper, I am opposed to it on economic factors only

not to mention life in prison is horrible, thats a bonus
 
Interesting
not only do you have blacks & hispanics in Scotland but they are also disproportionately prosecuted like in America
Amazing ;)

Mhm, because being Scottish means I couldn't possibly know anything about the political quandries surrounding the death penalty in the US, nor could I know anything about racial bias in the British law system that would inevitably transfer over to the application of the death penalty, if we had it. Mhm.
 
I support the principle, but having seen numerous reports that Life imprisonment is cheaper, I am opposed to it on economic factors only

not to mention life in prison is horrible, thats a bonus

Very true, the same article I mentioned earlier had something of that consistency. The numbers I have here in this book are subjective, it appears that in 2004, the average cost of capital cases, from arrest to execution was US$4 million while life imprisonment without parole costs US$500,000. The numbers are subjective, but the gist is the same.

Sources: Does the death penalty cost less than life in prison without parole?
 
Opting Out

"Opting Out"
IMO, the government should not be killing it's citizens for any reason. The only logical reason for capital punishment is as revenge. The Government is not in the revenge business.
Presume a right to life: one for the victim, and one for the perpetrator.
When the perpetrator removes the right to life for the victim, in double entendre, the right to life for the perpetrator is removed.
The argument is procedural, not revenge.

It is given that it is more expensive to implement the death penalty than to implement life in prison.
Yet, death penalty proponents are forsaken resolve.
Death penalty proponents would feel more at ease if life in prison meant until death, without parole.

It is sometimes said, "A miserable life is better than no life at all."
It is sometimes said, "The best revenge is living well."

If the perpetrator is able to conclude that "A miserable life is better than no life at all.", the perpetrator still retains "The best revenge of living well."

Yet, that is often the condition the non-death penalty proponents offer -- a prison system of earned priviledges.
Why else would death row inmates fight so hard to stay alive, if prison were not a sufferable lifestyle?
 
Re: Opting Out

always enjoy your posts
and i think i even understood this one :)
 
Re: Opting Out

"Opting Out"
Presume a right to life: one for the victim, and one for the perpetrator.
When the perpetrator removes the right to life for the victim, in double entendre, the right to life for the perpetrator is removed.
The argument is procedural, not revenge.

It is given that it is more expensive to implement the death penalty than to implement life in prison.
Yet, death penalty proponents are forsaken resolve.
Death penalty proponents would feel more at ease if life in prison meant until death, without parole.

It is sometimes said, "A miserable life is better than no life at all."
It is sometimes said, "The best revenge is living well."

If the perpetrator is able to conclude that "A miserable life is better than no life at all.", the perpetrator still retains "The best revenge of living well."

Yet, that is often the condition the non-death penalty proponents offer -- a prison system of earned priviledges.
Why else would death row inmates fight so hard to stay alive, if prison were not a sufferable lifestyle?


Very valid point - the concept that the criminal forfeits his civil liberty the moment he takes away another's. Then again, that is not entirely true; the rights of said criminal are at the hands of the judiciary system to dispose of or to reinstate, depending on the intended outcome. Think about this: how will a state portray itself if it immediately considers a murder as a forfeit of one's life? It gives an undesirable image, a society that shoots to kill without the slightest bit of slack to cut. Just an idea.
 
I tend to agree with the principle that executions are acceptable. Some people are more trouble than they are worth keeping alive. Wiping the life can wipe the problem. It depends on the particulars. However, I have problems with both camps about the death penalty. Death penalty proponents tend to annoy me when they start blabbering about "justice for the victim" blah blah blah. I do not support the principle because of the revenge. Death penalty antagonists tend to annoy me with semi-pacifism.
 
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