Why we should enforce the death penalty

[Lady Sidhe]

"There is something of a difference between wishing the murderer dead and wishing the murderer to experience the maximum available pain and mortal terror and/or relishing the details of that pain and terror and/or finding it appropriate material for casual humour. Wishing the murderer dead may be a responsible and reasonable answer to the problem...delighting in their suffering is sadism, taking pleasure in the manner of their death is sadism."



Maybe. But after all the crime accounts I've read of the murderers "relishing the details of the pain and terror" of their victims (ie, serial murders who visit crime scenes to relive the murder, and/or who kill their victims over a period of time, murderers who torture before they kill), I'm really not that concerned with whether or not the punishment they recieve is "cruel and unusual." What they did to the victim was cruel and unusual, so why should they be spared the same? Why do they deserve better treatment than they gave the victim? I agree with TS in that punishment should be such that it is never forgotten, and serves as a deterrent. At the very least, we should strive for "like for like."

If they're a serial rapist, give 'em to a guy named Bubba who hasn't seen a woman in twenty years.

If they cut off a body part, do the same to them.

..and so on...

If wanting the penalty to fit the crime is sadism, then yes, I'm the biggest sadist you'll ever meet.

(Incidentally, "sadism" actually refers to one who receives sexual pleasure from intentionally inflicting (generally unnecessary) pain to another person. I wouldn't say that fits me.)


Sidhe

[DanaC]

(Incidentally, "sadism" actually refers to one who receives sexual pleasure from intentionally inflicting (generally unnecessary) pain to another person. I wouldn't say that fits me.)

Oh go on....admit it...you get moist.

[Lady Sidhe]

[Troubleshooter]

Catwoman:
Fry 'em. Fry them? I just cannot comprehend this brutal animality.

Here is where most people make a serious error in thinking, that if adjusted could possibly cause a major paradigm shift.

Only humans are this cruel, this often, and to this degree. "Inhumane" is a null-word as it is currently used. To use "animality" in the same context is equally incorrect.

Catwoman:
You are as guilty and sadistical as them

That may be a bit much.

She may be vindictive, sadistic, and unforgiving, but what woman isn't?

LadySycamore
If all this is based on one's morals, then it doesn't (or maybe even shouldn't) hold water in this conversation (seeing as though morality isn't a fixed concept). One man's yin is another man's yang, etc.

One essential part of this discussion is to come to terms with what morality and ethics can be agreed upon.

Catwoman:
Of course- no doubt I would feel just as much hatred, anger and desire for revenge as the next person, but emotions should not necessarily be translated into action. They are subjective and not a reflection of fact, or reality, and thus can only perpetuate the cycle of crime.

Emotion is a very real response to a stimulus. Regardless of of the subjectivity of that emotion, it is real. Fear, for instance is a salient responce to danger. Anger is a response to fear or danger.

Edit: fixed a coding error

[Troubleshooter]

Originally posted by sycamore

Agreed. Plus, as I see it, because you used your brain to think about committing the crime, your brain should be removed...not your hand, foot, etc.

I'm sensing sarcasm here...

Originally posted by sycamore

I think we have to take the victim and their family into account, at least to a small degree. After all, they're part of the society we're attempting to protect. And if you lock a person up and "throw away the key," society is still protected.

I agree that victims are a part of the formula, but for me, personally, it's not as much a part as for others because ultimately I believe that reason is more important than emotion.

Originally posted by sycamore

I don't think the cost would be such a big deal in the long run if we cleared some of the prison population out (e.g. nonviolent drug felons). In addition, if we put the prisoners to work, then the money is not being wasted.

Agreed, but the inmate work program is a whole new, giant can of worms entirely.

Originally posted by sycamore

How do you propose reconciling this with the 8th Amendment?

I think that the founding fathers had a different view of what would be considered cruel and unusual. They lived in a harder time and probably had much more first hand knowledge of the effects of punishment.

Not quite so warm and fuzzy, as it were.

Originally posted by sycamore

Absolutely not. You are sent to live in an 8' x 8' cell, where you may or may not have a TV, where you will have to spend anywhere from 12-23 hours a day. You face the possibility of being killed or raped or infected by other prisoners...and this will go on for the next 30-50 years.

I don't know about you, but that sounds like hell to me. A death sentence almost seems kinder.

I think that we should all table this aspect of the conversation until we can get some people that are actually in, or have been in, this position

Edit: typos (I hate doing this at work sometimes)

[Lady Sidhe]

" quote:The ACLU, since 1969, and its National Prison Project (ACLU-NPP), since 1979, has had the Orleans Parish Prison (OPP) in litigation over cruel, unusual and inhumane treatment of inmates in its care. This has amounted to "unquestioned and serious deprivations of basic human needs" and/or "the minimal civilized measures of life’s necessities," as defined by the US Supreme Court. In pursuing a minimal level of care at OPP, the ACLU has tried to prevent a tragedy such as the death of arrestee JoAnn Johnson, a brittle diabetic, on April 6, 1999.


The section I found most disturbing was this

quote:After interviewing over 100 women in OPP regarding medical care and conditions of confinement, the ACLU-NPP on December 8, 1998, filed a motion for emergency relief and enforcement of agreed entry on medical care provisions governing women’s OB/GYN and prenatal care ......... The ACLU found evidence of the following violations, which taken together "threaten the lives of women prisoners and their fetuses:"· Chronic and acute gynecological conditions such as ovarian cysts and vaginal discharge go untreated; Deputies tell pregnant women that they cannot go to the hospital to deliver their babies until 1)their water breaks; 2)they suffer heavy bleeding; or 3)the baby’s head emerges. "



Well, as far as having babies and such, I can't comment on that with any authority. However, I DO know that they tend to take the children away after birth, and either place them with a foster family or with someone in the prisoner's family. I know this because a friend of mine knows a girl who's a crack/meth addict, who spends most of her time in prison for drug use. This girl has had ten children, only two of which have lived, all born addicted, or dead in the womb from the drugs.

I do know that if you wanted a doctor, they didn't make you wait an inordinate amount of time.

The ACLU, from what I've seen, tends to melodramatize situations. I'm not saying that what you quoted is not true, just that it's not a constant, everyday, everyWHERE, ongoing thing. They make it sound as if EVERY prison in EVERY state ALWAYS does this. They don't.

One of the women I was in prison with was a murderer. The other was a crack whore. I didn't talk to the others. However, I don't think the murderer should've been in there. She killed an uncle who'd sexually abused her from a very young age up until the day she killed him. IMO that's self-defense. She'd reported him, and no one would believe her or help her, so she helped herself. However, she told me this: "I killed someone, and no matter what he did to me, I guess I deserve to be here because I did a killing." I've never forgotten that, because, like the people who put her there, she was casting herself in the wrong, when I really don't think she was.

Having been in a physically (not sexually) abusive relationship in the past, I know how hard it can be to "just leave." People act like it's the simplest thing in the world, and for many, many reasons, it's not. I won't go into it because that would be a whole different thread; but I will say that sometimes walking away isn't an option. When it comes down to your life or the abuser's, sometimes you just have to do what you have to do to escape.

She was a nice person. I felt sorry that she was there.


Sidhe

[elSicomoro]

Originally posted by Troubleshooter
I'm sensing sarcasm here...

No sarcasm meant. I first wrote about that concept two years ago.

[Lady Sidhe]

Slaying Suspect, 12, Ruled Juvenile

Carrollton, Ga.--A 12-year-old boy accused of strangling an 8-year-old neighbor cannot be charged as an adult in the girl's death and would face a maximum two years in prison if convicted, prosecutors said Wednesday.

District Attorney Pete Skandalakis said he had no choice but to try the boy as a juvenile. Under Georgia law, a defendant must be at least 13 to be tried as an adult, he said.

"I do not feel two years is sufficient as punishment in this case," Skandalakis said.

He said the victim's family was "heartbroken" that the boy could not receive a more severe penalty.

The boy, whose name is not being released by police, was ordered Wednesday to remain in a youth detention center. A Juvenile Court judge said that there was probable cause the boy committed a delinquent act.

The boy is accused of strangling Amy Yates on Monday evening when she disappeared while riding her bike to a friend's home. The boy also lived in the trailer park.

Yates' body was found hours later fully clothed in a nearby gully filled with tall weeds.




TWO YEARS for murder. Oh yeah. THAT'S justice. Somebody actually gonna tell me that a 12-year-old boy doesn't know that murder is wrong? There's this bridge for sale...


Sidhe

[ladysycamore]

LadySycamore
If all this is based on one's morals, then it doesn't (or maybe even shouldn't) hold water in this conversation (seeing as though morality isn't a fixed concept). One man's yin is another man's yang, etc.

Troubleshooter:

One essential part of this discussion is to come to terms with what morality and ethics can be agreed upon.

But that's the thing: in many instances, it can't be agreed upon. For instance, someone may say, "Killing is wrong...period..all kinds of killing". Someone else will say, "No, killing in self defense and the death penalty is not wrong". Another might say, "Self defense is ok, but abortion and the DP is wrong", and so forth. I would imagine that these opinions would be based (in some part) on each person's moral fiber (or ethics).

re: "Slaying Suspect, 12, Ruled Juvenile" posted by Lady Sidhe

I'd like to see someone go up to the victim's family and tell them that they are "wrong" for wanting a more tougher penalty.

[Troubleshooter]

Originally posted by ladysycamore
[i]But that's the thing: in many instances, it can't be agreed upon. For instance, someone may say, "Killing is wrong...period..all kinds of killing". Someone else will say, "No, killing in self defense and the death penalty is not wrong". Another might say, "Self defense is ok, but abortion and the DP is wrong", and so forth. I would imagine that these opinions would be based (in some part) on each person's moral fiber (or ethics).

There are differing levels of agreement. One level is personal, where you keep your ethics, another is the one that controls your ability to interact with others who have different ethics. There has to be some fudge factor there otherwise humanity would have eliminated itself a long time ago.

[OnyxCougar]

Originally posted by Troubleshooter


I think that the lack of deterrent effect is due to the disparity between the ideal of capital punishment and its lack of proper implementation.

I agree. I think that if there was a way to implement a system that was omniscient, and could immediately punish people in a predetermined way, then there would be less crimes.

IOW, if the penalty for murder is death, and you commit a murder, you die. Right then. No trial, no jury, no wait.

If you rape someone, your penis gets chopped off (if male) or tits
chopped off (if female).

Betcha murder rates and rapes would plummet. And fast, too.

Of course, that is never going to happen, and it's not feasible and never fool proof, but I said all that to agree that if we, as a SOCIETY, did what we said we were gonna do, there would be less crime.

As a parent, I'm told to be consistant (same punishment every time for the same infraction), and to back up every thing I threaten (don't say "I'm gonna break your legs if you don't sit down".).

So if that is what makes effective parenting, why isn't that also applied to our justice system.

Isn't that what the justice system is supposed to be? A set of punishments for breaking the rules?

[Lady Sidhe]

I have an idea....Me, Onyx, and Ladysyc can get together and go to the prisons and perform the executions, free of charge. That'll cut down on the cost of paying an executioner. Just buy us a nice dinner afterwards....

Sidhe

Originally posted by Troubleshooter


I think that we should all table this aspect of the conversation until we can get some people that are actually in, or have been in, this position

Edit: typos (I hate doing this at work sometimes)

Sure. I can tell you all about jail. Can't comment on the pen' - never been there. I did spend 3 weeks in jail for the crime of driving without insurance. I was guilty as charged and paid the debt I owed society.

The jail I was incarcerated in was over-crowded to the max. 180 women were housed in a unit meant to hold 100. Old timers were the ones who got to have one of the highly coveted cells which contained two bunk beds and a toilet. The rest of us slept on pallets on the floor or in bunks in the common area. Pillows were prized possesions. There weren't enough to go around and many women just had to use their arm as a pillow. We were allowed one thin blanket and that could only be used if we were laying on our pallet or in our bunk. We were not allowed sweators. We were cotton short sleeved prison uniforms with no underware and this was mid-winter. Everyone was always cold. There were two toilets and two showers for us all. There was no seperation of women there on mis-demeanor charges versus women there on felonies. I had the dubious pleasure of spending 2 hours in a holding cell with a woman accused of murdering her own child. After 5 minutes conversation with her, there was not a doubt in my mind that she was guilty. She had an empty blank stare out of two eyes that were portals to some black hole in hell. There were no classes or any sort of rehabilitation offered. If you sent a "kite" (formal written request) to the guards, you were allowed to attend a Christian religous meeting for one hour every other week. We were given nothing to do to pass the time other than 3 decks of cards and two games of scrabble. Women would hide the scrabble boards and fights would break out over them. The food was inedible. I lost 15 pounds in 3 weeks. Some months after my release it was discovered that the company contracted to provide meals for the prisoners had been ripping the county off to the tune of $100,000's per year by shorting on portions. Prisoners who had the money supplemented their meals with ramen noodles bought from the prison commissary. If you didn't have money, you went hungry. That simple. There was not enough tables to sit at when the meager food trays did arrive. Space at tables was jealously guarded. If someone who was not a member of the group attempted to sit at the groups' table, there would be retaliation. Many prisoners ate standing up with their trays balanced on bunks. The medical care for prisoners was a joke. A woman went into an epileptic seizure while I was there and nothing was done for her. Then she had a second and nothing was done. Then a third. No medical help. A woman who was obviously schizophrenic was thrown in with the general prison population. Nothing was done for her. The area where we were housed was quite literally like some huge open warehouse with tall ceilings and exposed pipes. The noise was incredible and went on non-stop from 4:00am when we were supposed to eat breakfast to midnight when there was the final "lock down." Lock downs were frequent. During a lock down women lucky enough to have cells were supposed to remain in them. The rest of us had to lay on our pallets on the floor without getting up for one, two, three hours - however long the guards felt like having the lock down in effect. Women who were housed in a cell got to have a glimpse of the sunlight thru the tiny window in each cell. The rest of us never saw the sun. It was 24 hours florescent lighting. Day and night ceased to have any reality. Prisoners who had been there long enough got the much coveted privilege of working - such as that was. A trustee got to sweep and mop the floors, clean the bathrooms, etc. It was something to do and the ones who couldn't envied the ones cleaning the guards' restrooms. There WAS a cable TV bolted over-head in one area. The guards controlled what station it was on and how long it was on for.

It is hard for me to imagine ANYONE who's life is that desperate that they would wish to live under those conditions. And this was punishment for being too poor to buy car insurance and getting pulled over because I dared to drive my car to try to find work in a town that has no public transportation.

[Catwoman]

Troubleshooter: Emotion is a very real response to a stimulus. Regardless of of the subjectivity of that emotion, it is real. Fear, for instance is a salient responce to danger. Anger is a response to fear or danger.

I agree. The fight or flight mechanism, stimulated by fear, is probably our most valuable survival instinct. And the 'reality' of any given emotion can only be ascribed by the individual, not dictated by an external party.

A couple of people have got a little bit confused, thinking I am attacking their emotions. I don't care what you feel. It is your subjective (real to you) emotion and this should never dictate action, be it YOUR action or the action of the state. Imagine if you went through life taking all your emotions to their logical conclusions. You would have slept with (and impregnated) every woman you found attractive, have married every guy you thought you loved, and murdered everyone who stimulated that most potent of emotions: fear. You would kill them because they are a threat to you or your family. Every killing is an act of self defense - you are eliminating a threat. Survival of the fittest. What goes through the mind of a murderer? The man who kills his wife and kids because she had an affair and the pain is too much to bear: the kids are a reminder. The woman who kills her lifelong abuser because there's no other escape. It's all self-preservation, taken to its psychopathic extreme.

I do not advocate ANY killing. NO ONE has the right to kill. There are no exceptions. We are the only species that kill each other en masse. We are the only species who are aware of our own inevitable death and we are the only species that knowingly commit suicide. No surprise then that many of us escape to insanity. If one can reject immediate emotional gratification in favour of rational, objective, effective action, then maybe we can begin to evolve from our inhumanity.

[DanaC]

Marichko that sounds like hell.

One of the women I was in prison with was a murderer. The other was a crack whore. I didn't talk to the others. However, I don't think the murderer should've been in there. She killed an uncle who'd sexually abused her from a very young age up until the day she killed him. IMO that's self-defense. She'd reported him, and no one would believe her or help her, so she helped herself. However, she told me this: "I killed someone, and no matter what he did to me, I guess I deserve to be here because I did a killing." I've never forgotten that, because, like the people who put her there, she was casting herself in the wrong, when I really don't think she was.

In your opinion she should not have been in there as it was self defense. Yet in legal terms it was not self defense and as such she was convicted of murder? Is it not possible that there are other such cases of abused and desperate people who have hit back at their abuser and yet are still considered murderers? Is it not also possible that these people may be sentenced to death if such a sanction is available in that state?