Death Penalty

Discussion in 'Human Rights' started by edna kawabata, Apr 4, 2020.

  1. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    I am against the death penalty and here is why. I'll keep it short.

    Most who receive the death penalty probably deserve it and their lives are judged valueless by society. Their right to life has been denied for the actions they have taken according to the rules put forth by society. Can we agree on that?

    But the problem is errors occur. Innocents are convicted using the same rules that convicted the guilty. These lives are worth as much as yours or mine. Their lives are worth more than the sum of the guilty, therefore in the name of preventing an innocent person from mistakenly being put to death no one should be given the death sentence.
     
    Last edited: Apr 4, 2020
  2. btthegreat

    btthegreat Well-Known Member

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    I will keep this simple. The death penalty is always wrong, regardless of evidence, regardless of the crime because it is always wrong to constrain a man with handcuffs surround him with guards to hold him down, and with complete premeditation, and utter indifference to humanity, slowly, methodically kill him. It turns away from justice and towards retribution and it turns the state into a functionary for cruelty. There is no way to mitigate this act. You can release a man early but you cannot revive a man you have slain. It is also the only way for a govt to effectively interfere in a man's personal relationship with his God, with his absolute right to at the very least pray for mercy, forgiveness and atonement throughout his natural lifespan.

    This is not debatable. It is absolute. I am not alone in this view.

    "Out of the 195 countries, 56 countries still have a death penalty, 106 countries have abolished the death penalty by the end of 2018, 28 countries abolished a death penalty in practice, 8 countries abolished a death penalty for ordinary crimes only. In 2019, 142 countries have completely abolished the death penalty punishment.
     
    Last edited: Apr 4, 2020
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  3. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    Timothy McVeigh killed 168 innocent people and he didn't regret it. He was put down in the most efficient, humane way possible. It was justifiable cruel retribution that our society sanctions and his getting good with God is irrelevant. My point is those same laws convict the innocent who have infinitely more value than McVeigh.
     
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  4. btthegreat

    btthegreat Well-Known Member

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    I understand your point. For you its about there not being enough evidence to be sure. For me it does not matter if we have 20 confessions, DNA and videotape.

    Basically, you are empowering McVeigh to compromise the moral authority of a civilized nation, if he kills more cruelly or more often than the run of the mill murderer. There is no 'humane way' to sit and wait on death row, then get hauled out, held in chains and killed. It is by definition cruel and barbaric . I won't give him the power to reduce us all to co-conspirators to premeditated killing. It does not change him. It ultimately changes us. He's not worth it.
     
    Last edited: Apr 4, 2020
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  5. waltky

    waltky Well-Known Member

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    Granny says if dey been...

    ... scratchin' dey's butt...

    ... an' pickin' dey's nose...

    ... let God sort `em out!
     
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  6. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    Some would argue that the death penalty is within a society's moral authority. It sets the rules of behavior to keep order. For thousands of years public retribution for crimes has always been meant as a deterrent, but the death penalty is different. If mistaken, there is no one to say sorry about that to.
     
  7. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    That's cute.
     
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  8. Xenamnes

    Xenamnes Banned

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    The arguments against the death penalty could easily be applied to law enforcement as an organization as well. It is known that innocent individuals have been killed by law enforcement, due to mistaken identity, improper training, improper firearms use, or for simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

    Yet despite all of this, the united states simply will not move away from allowing law enforcement officers to both utilize deadly force as a first response, and holding that law enforcement officers cannot be punished for killing an innocent person due to qualified immunity.

    If deadly force by law enforcement officers cannot be stopped when there is no due process in place, why bother with the death penalty when there is due process in place?
     
  9. Diablo

    Diablo Well-Known Member

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    Very well put.
     
  10. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    Because of our lax gun laws, which you support, law enforcement will always need to have deadly force available to them but they are increasingly finding themselves prosecuted for the negligent use of deadly force.
     
  11. Xenamnes

    Xenamnes Banned

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    Even if such were an accurate assessment of the matter, it would still have no bearing on the matter.

    for better or worse, the damage caused by widespread, public, private ownership of unregistered firearms has been done for decades, and can never be undone. Even if the united states were to, overnight, follow the lead of the united kingdom, law enforcement would never be allowed to disregard their academy and field training. The training that they have received for dealing with armed suspects would have to be maintained indefinitely, because there is no way of knowing whether the suspect at the next traffic stop possesses a firearm or not.

    Even if the public were to be forcefully disarmed, law enforcement would still need to be trained to anticipate every encounter as being one with an armed and dangerous suspect. Sudden movements and holding dark objects would still need to be treated as if the individual is attempting to draw a firearm for the purpose of killing a law enforcement officer, and would in turn need to be met with deadly force.

    Even if the public were to be successfully disarmed, law enforcement would refuse to give up their own firearms in the course of their duties, as they would known a supposedly disarmed public is not truly disarmed, and is in no way not dangerous.
     
  12. VotreAltesse

    VotreAltesse Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I'm rather against death penalty for mainly two reasons :
    _ From my point of view, an innocent individual should never be executed by the justice. I prefer to keep 100 monsters in prison than taking the risk for one life.
    _ I don't think that the wish to kill is something good. There is ways to keep monsters away of society forever. According to my morality, wishing to kill people or make them suffer for any reason put a stain on our souls.

    BUT

    Laxism is worse to me. I'm french and death penalty have been abolished for a long time there, and today justice is quite laxist. It put short sentence on murderers or people that crippled for life other people. Many people got their life broken just because judges, the state has more compassion toward criminals rather innocent people.

    Life is extremly precious, laxism toward wicked people is unacceptable. Violent people released by judicial system that hurt again other people is unacceptable.

    So, I'm still against death penalty, however, it's for me the second biggest flaw of a judicial system, the first being neglectfull toward the life of innocent people.

    Furthermore, if death penalty would be in a situation the only way to put away dangerous people, for instance during a heavy government crisis, then I would consider it, after being sure there is no other situation.
     
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  13. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    Officers carry sidearms in many countries but seldom use them. They have criminals but what they don't have is our lax gun laws.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_firearm_use_by_country#Unarmed_police_forces
     
  14. Xenamnes

    Xenamnes Banned

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    The united states is not any other country. Therefore the united states cannot be properly compared to any other country. It is not a matter of comparing apples to oranges, but more accurately it is a matter of comparing apples to cinder blocks.

    Show one country, any country, that has had the same rate of unlicensed, unregistered firearms ownership as the united states, for as long as the united states.
     
    Last edited: Apr 5, 2020
  15. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    You mean like your comparing the death penalty to police use of deadly force?
     
  16. CKW

    CKW Well-Known Member

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    I think it's not right to put the lives of other prisoners and guards at risk by allowing allowing these people who have zero regard for human life to reside among them.
    When someone is waiting on death row...they are strictly separated from the community.

    Once given a life sentence they are out in general population and become king of the hill using intimidation and fear. People so reved up about saving heinous remorseless killers seem to not value innocent life they killed and will kill.
     
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  17. btthegreat

    btthegreat Well-Known Member

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    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/once-a-criminal-always-a-criminal/
    Mullane said her research has taught her that there are some convicted killers who "are back out in society and have so much to teach us about rehabilitation, redemption and about really screwing up in your life - massively - and then what it takes to come back, what it takes to be a person again and give back to society."

    "People can change," she said.

    Mullane said she was able to determine that 988 convicted murderers were released from prisons in California over a 20 year period. Out of those 988, she said 1 percent were arrested for new crimes, and 10 percent were arrested for violating parole. She found none of the 988 were rearrested for murder, and none went back to prison over the 20 year period she examined.

    "That's the lowest recidivism rate. That's unheard of," Mullane said. "In 20 years, the chance of you being returned on another murder was zero."
    "There's a huge disconnect in our sentencing laws," Mullane continued. "There's a higher recidivism rate among non-violent offenders."
    https://prisoninsight.com/recidivism-the-ultimate-guide/
     
  18. Dayton3

    Dayton3 Well-Known Member

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    the overwhelming majority I've seen of those who were "innocent" that were convicted might've been "innocent" of the specific capital crime they were convicted of but were frequently guilty of other crimes anyway.
     
  19. James California

    James California Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    ~ I used to be in favor of the death penalty in my younger days - if that is what people voted for. I never liked the idea but did believe in citizens choice. Now I see no point in it. It serves no purpose. I also am further discouraged by the DNA evidence that reveals innocent people are convicted. It is my opinion that too many Procecuters are interested in convictions - not justice.
     
    Last edited: Apr 9, 2020
  20. CKW

    CKW Well-Known Member

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    That study was not using murderers sentenced to death or life without parole.
    When you have a study using murderers who tortures and kills at whim....and who shows no remorse.....or murderers who orders hits on witnesses from the inside.....we are talking about a different kind of study.
     
  21. Xenamnes

    Xenamnes Banned

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    How are such truly different from one another? Both are government-sanctioned uses of deadly force that can result in an innocent person being killed. The only difference between them is the death penalty is applied after due process, while killings by law enforcement officers come before due process. Either way the individual is still just as dead.
     
  22. edna kawabata

    edna kawabata Well-Known Member

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    You said it yourself how they are different. Those that go through the judicial system are convicted on a rigorous review of evidence while law enforcement's use of deadly force to protect themselves and the public is subjective and difficult to control. We can say just stop using the death penalty to the judicial system but it is impossible to tell law enforcement to stop protecting themselves and the public.
     
  23. btthegreat

    btthegreat Well-Known Member

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    Well at least I supplied something beyond an empty assertion.
    Somehow other countries figure this out because they do it, many have done it for decades and continue to. If there is a problem with murder rates in prison proportionately greater than in countries without CP, there should be a statistical pattern. Maybe you have a nice study showing that murder rates within these 142 countries are higher than with CP Instead of saying it might be a serious risk how about you proving there is a serious risk to failing to tie people down and killing them?

    Lets not go anecdotal, and lets not make excuses, lets see your evidence besides this theory of yours that we are being cruel to the prison population, by not killing a sample of them for you.
     
    Last edited: Apr 9, 2020
  24. btthegreat

    btthegreat Well-Known Member

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    Do you understand what constitutes a legal use of lethal force for self defense and what does not. Maybe you need to do a little reading on the difference between a cop who shoots in the middle of an altercation in the middle of the night and the slaughter of another human being planned literally months in advance. You cannot plan to defend your self by killing someone in cold blood after tying them up and locking them in a room for months. Learn something about imminent threat because every other single justifiable use of lethal force requires proof of an imminent threat.

    Cops do not get to carefully plan the killing and execute people, and claim they felt threatened by a shadow of movement they saw behind the car at 1 in the morning.
     
    Last edited: Apr 9, 2020
  25. Xenamnes

    Xenamnes Banned

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    So ultimately what is the reason to oppose the death penalty?
     

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