Are you 'for' or 'against' the death penalty?
BigBlindMax
Banned
Let me start this off with a little background.
A few months ago, a pair of shitbags I went to high-school with lured a mentally handicapped teenager (18-19) out to the woods. Once there, they stabbed her and used gasoline and a lighter to do the rest (possibly while she was still alive). The sick fuckers confessed once the cops caught up with them and now the state is seeking the death penalty.
I live in a rural, conservative area, so everyone is real gung-ho about sending them to Death Row except me. 
Pennsylvania hasn't executed anyone for almost two decades. There would be 20+ years of appeals and beaurocracy until either of them are put down. In my opinion, it's much easier just to give them life sentences without parole and be done with it. Killing them won't bring that poor girl back.
Enough rambling; what do you think? Are you for or against the death penalty? Why or why not?
Comments
I'm not against the idea of the death penalty. I think it's morally permissible for a society to remove particularly harmful individuals from that society by killing them. But the system in place in the US right now is extremely flawed. The amount of red tape standing between a Death Row inmate and the needle makes it far more costly than just sentencing them to life in prison.
While I can empathize with those who seek retributive justice for the victims of these horrific crimes, I don't think it's the role of the state to be doling out tit-for-tat punishments. The role of the state is to protect its citizens and their well-being. If that means killing people who have proven themselves to be a threat to the society, so be it. But if the community is just as safe and slightly more wealthy with them behind bars with no possibility of parole, then that should be what the state does.
So while I would support a more efficient death penalty system, I don't support the one that we have right now.
I've decided not to have a strong opinion either way. Death penalty stance will not affect my support or opposition of politicians.
I used to be for the concept, as long as it was only applied to the most extreme of cases. You can always come up with a crime so heinous that you decide the perpetrator really doesn't deserve to live, as the victims didn't get a choice.
On the other hand, it takes so long and costs so much to execute someone, it's actually cheaper just to let the person die in prison, no matter how long that takes. Life in prison is also a harsher punishment, as the misery extends for so many years. And if it turns out the person you thought was guilty actually was innocent all along (as DNA advances have shown for some convicted felons), you can let 'em out.
I'm not against it, but I don't see why it's necessary. Putting them in prison for life without parole and making sure they're monitored seems like it would do the job, plus maybe they end up changing and have to live with what they did for the rest of their lives, and they'd always be reminded of it. If they die, then you're basically ending all chances of any regret or guilt, so they're getting the easy way out.
Yeah. I'm hoping they get sent to general population and somebody guts em' with a shiv. It's not unlikely; murdering a mentally handicapped person ain't exactly the kind of offense that nets you a lot of respect in jail.
I still can't believe the ringleader was in my class...I mean, he was never a 'good kid' per se, but still.
EDIT: GOUSTTTT, you're welcome to travel to PA and dispense some vigilante justice.
Exactly! I'm not naive enough to think that a depraved murderer will ever 'learn their lesson', but capital punishments seems like a cop-out.
I agree with the death penalty on crimes that do large amounts of damage to society.
the only time i think the death penalty should be used is when they are 100% sure that the person did it, in this case they are so i think they should be killed for their disgusting crime.
100% for it. When someone commits a heinous crime, society has the right to deliver justice, in the name of the victims and for the benefit of society at large, and deal the ultimate punishment. We have an understood social contract, so when someone chooses to commit such a crime, they are doing so knowing that they will be executed for it, assuming the laws in the state allow it.
Why should a, say, sadistic mass murder be allowed to live a full life, and his/her (hypothetical) innocent young victims not be able to? Why should taxpayers pay to feed and house the killer for decades?
Anyone who commits a crime like that should be over and done with. They lost the right to live. Make execution cheaper. Heck, I'm even okay with doing away with parts of the (United States) Constitution's 8th Amendment. Anyone who steals the most precious thing from someone, their life, and makes them suffer terribly, should have the same thing done to them. That is justice. That is fair.
I also think the punishment should closely mirror the crime, in the worst cases. Recently I read about a mother who drowned her poor kids. Can you imagine what those poor children were thinking as they struggled against their mom and looked into her eyes as she was killing them? I say society should drown that evil woman and make her suffer and experience exactly what she put her children through. Prolong it and amplify the pain for her. Put a picture of her murdered children in front of her and she struggles to get oxygen. Have those poor innocent children's faces be the last thing that woman ever sees. Anything else would be too good for her.
vs.
Not sure the term "punishment" even fits the death penalty. Particularly what MtnPeak describes here is revenge, just that and only that. In civilized countries, revenge and justice are in direct opposition, actually.
Hm... depends on how I feel, if I'm pissed off I would probably just get a knife and fuckin' slice there knee caps off. If I have law enforcement mode activated I will fuckin' throw them in a cell and laugh at them.
Do any of them thousands of animals get justice for us eating them? Let me fuckin' guess... no.
You're confusing vengeance with justice. By subjecting the perpatrator to the same treatment as his/her victim, society is stooping to the same level. Killing criminals humanely and torturing them to death both have the same outcome; removing that person from existence. What does the latter option accomplish? Which option reflects better on society?
Killing a killer to say that killing is wrong isn't viable.
Prison doesn't work either, I wouldn't be surprised if most people who get out of prison fall back on old habits.
So honestly 'punishment' is just a complete mess, but to be fair I don't really have any solutions.
What's going on right now though is clearly not working.
For the death penalty. There are certain people in this world who need to be taken out to protect everyone else. I think it should be done with a pistol to the head, not some needle in the arm.
Execution by shooting might be messy, but it would be instant and (nearly) foolproof. Lethal injections are botched pretty often because they're performed by orderlies who don't know what they're doing.
Feed them to the gators, they won't be missed.
I am relatively neutral on the matter.
No argument here, criminal justice in America is pretty fucked. (1 in 100 Americans are incarcerated). That's what happens when looking people up turns into an industry. The War on Drugs didn't help either.
Aside from locking up people for drug possession, why not assume the legal system is doing its job?
If the killer eventually realizes what they've done, then they would have to live a full life knowing that they should be dead, but they can't run away from the consequences. The killer has to face them until that killer eventually dies. Killing someone, and in a way that they feel no pain, is like taking the easy way out. Again, I don't really care if people use it or not, but I just don't see it as neccecary.
I watched a documentary a while back that featured a potential method of execution called "nitrogen aphyxiation." That would be my preferred method of carrying out the death penalty (and also animal slaughter, but that's another matter). Simple, cost effective, and humane so if someone fucks up the execution, the prisoner just becomes dazed and delirious for a little while. Hell, it's even environmentally friendly.
Well my morals say to be against it, but then i see all those fucked up things those mothef**kers do and i don't really know.
Strongly in favor of. They really need to speed up the process and do away with the whole trying to find a more humane way to off these fuck heads. If someone is enough of an asshole to get the death penalty, who cares if they die peacefully? I say an axe to the face should do the job well enough. It would save a LOT of money too. Also, it doesn't really have anything to do with the death penalty... but I think we should bring back setting people adrift at sea. Say high-end white-collar criminals.
if someone gets more years to spend in jail than he will probably get to live anymore (= meaning he will most likely spend the rest of his life in prison) you might as well just kill him to save on precious tax money. The life of the person is pretty much over anyway at that point. Unless you consider a life spent in jail one worth living for.
If it was up to me we would go back to classic impalement. Nothing like seeing a guy on a stick to make your point across.
Whatever you say, CrazyVlad.
Call me what you want, but i know when people see people hanging from sticks, people will think twice about killing someone.
Sometimes in life, you have to play a role, even if the people you love, hate you for it.
Most people already think twice about killing someone. The ones who don't certainly aren't going to start if you lead by example.
The legal system in Merica is broken beyond words. Prosecutors fail on convicting criminals, because of their own incompetence, they make deals with criminals to give them shorter prison sentences just to get that "lesser conviction," so they can get reelected next year. We have a overcrowding epidemic because criminals see jail as a inconvenience instead of what it truly should be.
Look at Hollywood Celebrities, how many of them actually went to prison, or did actual jail time. I don't mean Lindsey Lohan Jail time. It is a complete joke. In this country we protect the guilty over the victims. It happens time and time again.
It should be a correctional facility and rehabilitation center. That's what they proclaim to be but aren't. The ultimate goal of prison should be to reduce criminal activity within a society. You don't do that by tossing people into violent, rape-y hellholes for a decade or two and then releasing them out into the open. You give counseling and evaluations to try and correct the attitudes and behaviors that got them there in the first place, while at the same time making them pay off their debt to society by putting them to work. Half labor camp, half asylum. That's my ideal solution.
That brings up another concept: Make the maximum sentence life in prison without parole, but allow a process where a prisoner could opt in to the death penalty instead, basically streamlining suicide. The prisoner who opts in could change his/her mind up until the last minute. No expensive appeals needed.
Because it's something "the prisoner wants," most people will probably oppose this.
That is the problem, these people shouldn't be released period. We coddle the criminals in america, and let the victims of crimes twist in the wind.
Who are "these people"? Most inmates aren't violent offenders. They're there on drug charges and other things like that. (And yet, we throw them in the same place as violent offenders. Which is dumb. But that's an argument for another time.) Even among the violent offenders, very few of them have done things severe enough to deny them release at some point.
Murder, rape, particularly brutal assaults, etc. These are the crimes worthy of indefinite prison sentence. Those charged with these crimes should be held until they are deemed psychologically fit to reenter society. For some, particularly those who commit very brutal, senseless crimes like the one above, this time may never come. But those who have demonstrated that they are no longer a threat to society should be able to very gradually reenter it after serving a minimum sentence.
Man fuck that. I know to some people it might sound harsh and all that, specially if your a religious person and a spiritual person but fuck that, I think I read those news somewhere, and I double checked them but I think I forgot about it because some other bullshit distracted me. those guys should be killed on sight. I really don't understand why people would have any sympathy for those fuckers. you kill a person ( an innocent person, there might be a different situation where it was an accident or it was self defense on some of those extreme cases) you don't deserve to live. yes them being killed are not bringing that person back but it sure as hell re-assures you that those fucker are not walking the streets or are there fucking living out of the tax payers money. I mean why the hell should they fucking get three or how ever fucking meal a day they get, while other people, people here and over the world don't get even if they are completely better people than those people. And why do they get a roof, a shower, a comfy bed ( I'm sure its not the best, but it sure beat sleeping conditions of some homeless people or really poor people) and they also get medical treatment. And I'm going out of topic here kinda a bit, some of these sick shit get treated better than some poor animals that get sent to soemof those god awful dog pounds. Fuck that, hell no it makes my skin crawl, and like you said she was probably still alive when they burn her. No I am not apologizing for that, its what they deserve. And to make myself clear, they need to really make sure that a person is guilty, find hard convicting evidence to really nail the fuckers. now I don't have a much of a problem for those prisoners that aren't murders, you know cold-blooded murderers, those other criminals, thiefs, fraud people, you those guys ok maybe they can be put in prison and be treated "well", if you view the jail life is good for what they've done( the living conditions if they're ok). But yeah, I do believe in a death sentence if again, they there's the right evidence and it is handled right in right legal system
Let's go back to hanging. Plenty of high places to hang someone from, and you can always build a gallows if you live out in the prairie or desert. It's worked for centuries before this generation. It should work for our criminals.
Never been a hanging fan myself. Would hate to see somebody writhe around for minutes or have their head pop off or the rope break because someone screwed up the math. That would really traumatize the witnesses.
What about people who are used to death (ie soldiers or professional executioners) being the only witnesses?
No... It shouldn't be the laws responsibility to end lives, it's their job to protect people. Putting people behind bars is good enough. I'm a pretty empathetic and merciful person, and nobody's punishment should be their death, no matter how much it improves society.