Capital Punishment?

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So what if some baby-raping, drug-dealing, bomb-throwing, mass-murderers get forcibly sent off to oblivion? What are they gonna do, come back and haunt me?

I'm in favor of the death penalty but I also don't think we use it correctly and that's why it's not much of a deterrant. If everyone who was convicted of first degree murder (the one who actually pulled the trigger etc, not accomplices) got the death penalty, if we kept the multiple appeal process but radically shortened the time between appeals to a few months, and executions were available for public viewing, I believe it would be much more of a deterrant than it is now.

I'm against the death penalty with one big exception, War Time. If the country itself is at stake and has been invaded then I think it's a game changer. Catching people who are traitors or saboteurs you need to at least attempt to have a trial but for threatening the stability of the Nation the stakes are so high I can see the necessity of field executions with a bullet to the brain.


Otherwise in civilian life I don't think it has any place. I also don't think Death or even Jail is a deterrent. Most people who commit crimes don't imagine themselves getting caught. In their mind they see themselves robbing a bank and evading police with their loot.

Rapists probably don't even think that far ahead past the rape act itself.

I think the best name for jail is Penitentiary because it really is a Pen or holding area for true social misfit criminals. I don't think it's much of a deterrent but we can at least box them in and quarantine them away from society. If we're damn lucky a few might rehabilitate.

I don't think we have the right or need to execute these fellow human beings just because they're misguided though. Also I think it's a terrible thing to ask another human being to act as their killer. They will have blood on their hands now even if the victim is guilty.

Why do they sterilize lethal injection needles? Or do they? Is it kind of like 'interstate highways' in Hawaii lol

But we use prisoners for cheap labor to make things such as license plates and to dig ditches. They're invaluable to our economy. Remove them, and where would corporations get that subset of cheap labor our prisons provide for them? Sure, we'd have one more spectator sport to gawk at, but don't we already have enough of those?

Because they use disposable needles just like in hospitals, doctors offices, and ambulances. They don't sell unsteralized IV catheters, I don't think. They come already sterile. They wipe the skin with alcohol because it's procedure. Also, if the guy is on the table waiting for the drugs to be pushed, with the IV already in, and the governor calls with a stay, he could sue if he got an infection. You can be 99.9% sure that the guy is gonna die, but there is always that tiny chance of a last minute stay.

It is very hard, if not impossible, to prove guilt beyond doubt. Even DNA evidence has been faked / planted in some cases, and people have been innocently accused of rape and child abuse.

I read about a Swiss case a while ago. Seven years after the trial, the stepdaughter of a convicted child abuser confessed that she lied about the alleged sexual abuse. Her stepfather was an alcoholic and she thought he wasn't good enough for her mother, so she decided to get rid of him and made up a very convincing story of repeated sexual abuse. But eventually she couldn't live with this guilt anymore.

No matter how small the chance that a convicted criminal might be innocent, the punishment should never be irreversible imho. It is bad enough when people are innocently locked up for years, or even for decades in some cases. If we allow an innocent person to be killed in the name of the people, we are all guilty of murder. I am strongly opposed to a justice system that kills people in my name.

Besides, who gets to sit on the electric chair for a deadly judicial error? The prosecutor? The judge? The guy who flipped the switch?

How do you think the guy who administered the lethal injection or flipped the switch must feel when one of the executed criminals turns out to be innocent later on? I think they really do come back to haunt him, albeit in a different way than you meant it.

If the guy who administers the lethal injection can not handle the possibility of executing an innocent victim, then that guy should not be the executioner.

Back in the day, a convicted murderer might have his sentence deferred if he was willing to take up the executioner's axe and never question the guilt of the person he was about to behead. I like that system.

So, murder is fine as long as the murderer is employed by the judicial system?

That's Capital Punishment for you!

Those who object to it should not involve themselves in it.

i think you will find that the justification for a "rightfull" killing is never who does it but the circumstances leading to it as well as the circumstances it happens under.

in that framework it would be a non rightfull killing if those circumstances does not warrant the person to be killed.
in that sense who holds the responsibility of the wrongfully killed person?

in any legal framework worth its salt there should be an increased punishment for anyone abusing any power bestowed to them, in denmark policemen abusing power stand to face a higher minimum sentence and a higher possible sentence for any action done under the guise of the state, sadly it isnt enforced rigorously enough to serve its purpose.

A "guy" who is willing to impose lethal violence upon another person without complete assurance of the rightness of his action has no business working in such an environment.

Being able to "handle" the possibility of executing an innocent victim is a hallmark of psychopathy. I, for one, do not think that a prison environment is the right working environment for a psychopath.

How do you know if they can never be rehabilitated? If you ruled the world then many people would already be dead.

To make capital punishment legal is an abuse of government power.
Capital punishment is hypocritical. It's okay for the government to commit murder but it is not okay for anyone else.

In some instances a person has been proven innocent after they were executed. Oh,but it's too late they are already dead because of a sick and failing political system. It's a form of torture and is morally wrong.

I believe people that support are one step away from becoming sociopaths. To support it so strongly is quite sick if you ask me.

But the citizens of countries that practice capital punishment are involved in it, no matter if they want to or not. "In the name of the people..."

Just to clarify my position, I also don't believe in rehabilitation. Sociopaths, pedophiles and rapists should be locked away for the rest of their life, imho. And if it was possible to prove guilt without any doubt, I might rethink my position on the death penalty. But since no judicial system is perfect, I think we can't risk executing potentially innocent people.

I also think that prison inmates deserve humane treatment. In my opinion, the purpose of the prison system is to protect the general population from dangerous criminals, not to punish or torture anybody. Ultimately, we all carry a burden of guilt for creating a society that turns some people into criminals. Behavior has both a genetic and an environmental component, even the behavior of sociopaths and rapists. They undoubtedly are responsible for their actions, but society has a joint guilt for creating or allowing environments that trigger their behavioral responses.