RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment

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RCdc -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:37:44 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Smith117 As for my being a bad guy for martyring myself, again I disagree. If I maintain my innocence from the beginning and I explain to them the consequences and such and put forth the best defense I can. Then I have done all that I can. Of course you did all you could, other than not die. Your premeditated decision to accept your death as part of the cause, only lays heavily on the victims you leave behind if and when the real perp is discovered. That makes you no different to the perp. quote: They will not be 'deterred' by their OWN death, no. But they will be stopped and prevented from commiting their crimes again on another victim. Not until they are caught. They will still commit the crimes before they are apprended. You speak about your own martyrdom as a deterrent, but with the mentally unstable, those serial killers and rapists, your death would be for a worthless cause and that is what you fail to see. the.dark.

Arctic -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:38:04 AM)
I always thought that.... Having mutiple cyber, emotional and physical affairs should be illegal. Having affiars with married men that have pregnant wives at home...should earn a big red stamp on the forehead like in the days of old. Trolling bondage sites, not being forthcoming with your marital status....at least punishable with a fine and community service... Arctic ...just feeling sorry for the future fools.

Smith117 -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:39:45 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: DaddyKeeper ONE person (your caps) how about 2, 3, 40? where do you draw the line at how many is enough? I'd go by ratios, personally. If 100 "real" murders are put down, potentially saving (for the sake of argument) 10 future victims of each. That's 1,000 people saved. If one or two of those were truly innocent. Then you've still saved 980 'future victims,' while only adding 2 'victims' to the dead list. That's a bit on the light-hearted, kidding side. But still. The point remains. We shouldn't let those 100 murders walk because we're afraid one or two might be innocent.

philosophy -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:44:21 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Smith117 quote: ORIGINAL: LadyEllen quote: ORIGINAL: Smith117 But people like the ones in the original post? Yes. People like the guy who killed the young girl in Utah after raping her? Yes. people like the guy who raped that young girl in Florida and then buried her alive clutching her teddy bear? YES. but if we are to execute only those whose crimes include aggravated circumstances such as these - which are clear signs of sociopathology and probable psychopathology - and not execute those who commit the same offence (being sociopathological or psychopathic is not an offence in itself), then we are executing people for being insane - for that is the distinguishing factor for which death is being proposed - not the actual offence. E I don't feel that someone who commits those acts should remain among living society. For whatever reason they did it. There is no guarantee that 'treatment' will prevent it from happening again. .....hypothetical situation......a guy is caught after committing some heinous act. Details are unimportant but it's very heinous. It then becomes apparent that, as a result of a long forgotten childhood accident, he has a piece of metal stuck in his head. It is removed, and with it goes the man's urges to commit heinous acts. Unlikely but plausible hypothetical situation. Now, most of us i think would see the man as cured. There was a cause for his actions, a cause we can see, weigh, throw at a wall.......once removed we can see the mechanism of his cure. Clearly the man must pay some price for his heinous act, but we can see how that punishment, in the name of justice, must be mitigated. Mental illness is a different kettle of Freud though....we can rarely, if ever, find the cause of mental illness and throw it at a wall. When we do succeed we can only measure our success in probabilities. If physical illness is Newtonian physics, then mental illness is Quantum Mechanics......a good physical physician can show their results in terms of primary data, a good mental physician shows their results as wave forms.... Now what does that mean to what i shall call, for the sake of argument, criminally insane? It means that we, as a society, have a choice. On the one hand you have the best possible scurity for the victims of such people.....in which case you lock 'em up and throw away the key.......on the other hand there is the percentage of people who are amenable to treatment, should they be incarcerated needlessly? What might they be able to put back into society? ...i see it as possible to hold honourable and arguable positions along the whole of that axis.....i don't think society, as a whole, has fully discussed this issue and come to a moral conclusion.

LadyEllen -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:46:14 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Aswad quote: ORIGINAL: LadyEllen we can acclimatise them all we like What you describe isn't acclimatising anyone. I'm talking about helping them hook up with a decent apartment and a reasonable job, for instance. Health, al-Aswad. The problem Aswad, is that our socio-economic system cannot provide a decent apartment and a job to those who abide by the law, let alone those who have broken it. As things are going, it cannot even provide a decent apartment and a job to those who gained the qualifications normally required for a job, and most jobs do not pay enough to be able to obtain an apartment. When we release people, we release them into social housing projects - and into the very social housing projects that other parolees are released to, because they are what is available because the more popular projects are full. Thus we get whole streets or blocks which are filled with those with prior convictions, who cannot get a job, have too much time on their hands, plenty of assistance and advice from their neighbours and who refuse to accept their poor conditions - and break the law again, to improve their conditions. Whilst there is an argument there to release people back with a hand up into a job and better accomodation in order to reduce their chances of further offences, we have to ask why a hand up should be given to those released, when no such hand up exists for those who did not break the law? The thing is though, many of those who break the law in the first place, do so because they find their conditions may only be bettered by crime - thus it is a socio economic problem from start to finish, and until we get our socio-economic models away from the current mindset ("fuck 'em all, winner takes all, devil take the hindmost" etc) we will continue to have this problem and this debate ad infinitum. E

Smith117 -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:47:00 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Darcyandthedark Of course you did all you could, other than not die. Your premeditated decision to accept your death as part of the cause, only lays heavily on the victims you leave behind if and when the real perp is discovered. That makes you no different to the perp. Well, even if I 'didn't die' I would still be sitting in jail while the real bad guy was out doin' his thing. Accepting my death after exhausting all my appeals is not the same thing as taking the fall on purpose. I specifically said I would exhaust every avenue available to me to prove that they had the wrong guy. I further stated that if that failed, I would tell them not to make me a martyr for the anti-death pentalty cause. That is not accepting my death. If my appeals fail, I'd be headed for the chair whether I accepted it or not, just like I'd be headed for the prison cell whether I thought I was innocent or not. The only difference in the scenarios is that in one, I'm a dead innocent man and in the other, I'm an innocent man who happens to still be alive. In both scenarios I have still maintained they had the wrong guy and exhausted every means I had to prove that. That makes me quite different than the perp. I can only do so much. When the third appeal comes back denied, I can kick and scream all I want or I can plainly state that I am innocent and that I hope they find the real guy so that he can be stopped. But by that token I hope that my case, when the truth does come out, does not deter a system I still believe in. quote: ORIGINAL: Darcyandthedark Not until they are caught. They will still commit the crimes before they are apprended. You speak about your own martyrdom as a deterrent, but with the mentally unstable, those serial killers and rapists, your death would be for a worthless cause and that is what you fail to see. Ones who are unstable or serial killers and rapists are not the ones for whom deterrent works. Those are the ones that must be stopped. And in my opinion, the best way to stop them is the same way I would stop them if they came after me and mine. If it's between them and me or them and someone I care about, I'll pop 'em twice for good measure, because there's nothin' like making sure.

MissMorrigan -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:51:02 AM)
Three instances, given that the Jamie Bulger murder was committed by two persons, not one. As for limited proof of successful rehabilitation of those offenders. Those were just three persons I highlighted and they have been under constant scrutiny since their release, of that I have no doubt given the media scrutiny and constant attempts to protect their identities/locations, etc... So it's reasonable to expect they have not reoffended. They committed crimes against other children, were rehabilitated and went on to become parents themselves. A complaint commonly thrown against Social Services is for their seeming over-zealous actions, so again it's fair to assume that they were not only involved once the rehabilitated offenders became parents themselves, but have continued being involved. That, by no means, ensures people from reoffending, of course, however, if those persons had I'm sure the public would have heard about it given their high profile. As for my son ((I do not have a daughter) dating a rehabilitated offender... He coaches, in his spare time, inner city kids at sports, has many repeat offenders as friends, a lot of whom I have had in my home. Put back in their own environment they've reverted back to 'type' and it's pretty clear to determine why. In my home/my neighbourhood they've always been respectful of not only me, my home also. Should my son go on to date a rehabilitated offender, I would like to think I'd take them on their merits as the person they are now, and not critique them for former behaviours/convictions. quote: ORIGINAL: DaddyKeeper A well known pair of instances, but of limited use as proof of rehabilitation. After all we, the public at large, have no idea at all if any of these three people have done anything more since, heck it is not inconcievable that they have all 3 been imprisoned again for other offences. Call me a sceptic and/or a cynic and you would be right. There is no way the authourities would admit that rehabilitation had failed should any of those appear in a court again as defendant, it would be easier to admit to hanging an innocent person than admitting people like Venables or Thompson had been freed to perform such an act again. Maybe your daughter or niece could one day be dating one of them, do you have that much faith in rehab? I barely have that much faith in humanity as a whole, let alone such individuals

Bella1965 -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:51:37 AM)
G'afternoon all: (Fast Reply) I've not read the entire thread so don't flame me if my opinions are already expressed, albeit in a more tactful manner. I thoroughly believe these two hellions should be held to the fullest extent of the law. Minority age should not absolve anyone from accountability of their actions and the consequences they reap. What these little despicable thugs did is inexcusable and reprehensible. This sort of behavior is a basic flaw in their personalities and cannot be rectified by rehabilitation. They should either be locked away for life or (my preferred option) they can fry for their crime. On the other hand, while not a follower of any faith, I do believe the Bible has one basic tenet I can groove with. "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." Give the little creeps to me for the same time frame, a waiver granting me immunity from prosecution, and I'd be happy to grant justice in the name of the afflicted party and her mother. If the young scumbags happened to perish during my ministrations, it would keep the American gene pool a bit cleaner for the future. Stay safe, play nice, & share your toys w/ others... [:D] Bella

Smith117 -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:54:58 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: philosophy .....hypothetical situation......a guy is caught after committing some heinous act. Details are unimportant but it's very heinous. It then becomes apparent that, as a result of a long forgotten childhood accident, he has a piece of metal stuck in his head. It is removed, and with it goes the man's urges to commit heinous acts. Unlikely but plausible hypothetical situation. Now, most of us i think would see the man as cured. There was a cause for his actions, a cause we can see, weigh, throw at a wall.......once removed we can see the mechanism of his cure. Clearly the man must pay some price for his heinous act, but we can see how that punishment, in the name of justice, must be mitigated. Mental illness is a different kettle of Freud though....we can rarely, if ever, find the cause of mental illness and throw it at a wall. When we do succeed we can only measure our success in probabilities. If physical illness is Newtonian physics, then mental illness is Quantum Mechanics......a good physical physician can show their results in terms of primary data, a good mental physician shows their results as wave forms.... Now what does that mean to what i shall call, for the sake of argument, criminally insane? It means that we, as a society, have a choice. On the one hand you have the best possible scurity for the victims of such people.....in which case you lock 'em up and throw away the key.......on the other hand there is the percentage of people who are amenable to treatment, should they be incarcerated needlessly? What might they be able to put back into society? ...i see it as possible to hold honourable and arguable positions along the whole of that axis.....i don't think society, as a whole, has fully discussed this issue and come to a moral conclusion. The problem with this hypothetical is something you've already pointed out. Where it so simple as to remove a piece of metal the answer would be easy. But all too often the person's "sanity" is dependant upon his medication or some other factor that we, barring a police state which everyone fears, can't monitor while he's out in society. If he's on his meds? Grand he's a nice guy. But when the pharmacy loses his refill prescription and he takes out a family of 4? Then what? If it was just a piece of metal, that danger would not exist. But with meds, they only work if they are taken. And we can't force people to take their meds out in the real world. Hell my mom takes more meds for various physiological things than I care to stipulate. And I've heard her complain that her refills were 'lost in the mail' on more than one occasion. These are meds the she desperately needs to regulate her own body processses to stay healthy and they just get 'lost.' It's not that simple if the medication is something that is the only thing preventing the person from being a 'cold-blooded killer.'

Jeffff -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:55:12 AM)
So, sad......... Jeff

MissMorrigan -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:57:44 AM)
Call me cynical, I was thinking along the lines of a pecuniary convenience vaguely disguised as retribution. quote: ORIGINAL: Aswad Killing a restrained human under controlled circumstances for satisfaction ... ... seems to describe two things mentioned on this thread, dunnit? Health, al-Aswad.

LadyEllen -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 9:59:38 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: MissMorrigan As for my son ((I do not have a daughter) dating a rehabilitated offender... He coaches, in his spare time, inner city kids at sports, has many repeat offenders as friends, a lot of whom I have had in my home. Put back in their own environment they've reverted back to 'type' and it's pretty clear to determine why. In my home/my neighbourhood they've always been respectful of not only me, my home also. Should my son go on to date a rehabilitated offender, I would like to think I'd take them on their merits as the person they are now, and not critique them for former behaviours/convictions. And that is the interesting thing, is it not? That much of the problem behaviour is a result of a problem environment (including peers and other people). I've had the same experience MsM - people who in their environment are monsters like the rest, are totally different people when removed from it. And the funny thing is too, that within the "monster" environment, one is actually pretty safe, as long as one has been accepted into that environment. This is very difficult for me to achieve, seeing as how I can complete sentences with perfect grammar and without using the f word as a verb, adjective, noun and adverb, but once in, youre in. And you'd be surprised at who is how, once youre in. E

philosophy -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 10:02:14 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Smith117 The problem with this hypothetical is something you've already pointed out. Where it so simple as to remove a piece of metal the answer would be easy. But all too often the person's "sanity" is dependant upon his medication or some other factor that we, barring a police state which everyone fears, can't monitor while he's out in society. If he's on his meds? Grand he's a nice guy. But when the pharmacy loses his refill prescription and he takes out a family of 4? Then what? If it was just a piece of metal, that danger would not exist. But with meds, they only work if they are taken. And we can't force people to take their meds out in the real world. ...(my italics).... ....you are correct so far. However consider this.......i've italicised two sections of your argument. i suggest to you that these two things are in subtle conflict. Effectively, by incarcerating the criminally insane, we are forcing people to take their meds. The very act of holding them makes that true. Now, a state is not a police state when all of its citizens are free of it, not just some of them. This is the real question.......it's not about whether or not we have a police state, its (when we decide to live in a society under law) how much of a police state we have. We can choose any value from zero to max along that axis, but all the possible positions have drawbacks.

Aswad -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 10:02:30 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Smith117 Small crimes like blue-collar tax fraud? No. Why on Earth not? That's one case where it's actually a definite deterrent. Those are premeditated crimes. quote: Drug users? No. The ones caught with an ounce of weed (that was legal up until like the 1930's)? No. Why not? Those things finance a bunch of crime (arguably due to poor government policy, but still). quote: But people like the ones in the original post? Yes. People like the guy who killed the young girl in Utah after raping her? Yes. people like the guy who raped that young girl in Florida and then buried her alive clutching her teddy bear? YES. In short, those you want to kill for your own reasons. Kind of like those guys, except you want the state to do it for you. Health, al-Aswad.

Aswad -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 10:06:01 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Smith117 There is no guarantee that 'treatment' will prevent it from happening again. Neither is there any guarantee that you won't commit a crime. But there's still a presumption of innocence in effect. Health, al-Aswad.

MissMorrigan -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 10:06:01 AM)
Bella, it really would serve you well to read the entire thread b/c you'll gain a better understanding of the points being discussed and hopefully, it will go some way in helping you formulate opinions based on informed arguments. As for the comment regarding the bible, an eye for an eye, etc... It's amazing how many people can revert to a work of fiction and interpret it to suit their agendas, you'll see many fanatics do that. The Westboro Baptists come to mind. It's odd how those that shout loudest for the death penalty, often say they'd happily 'do the job for 'society' if left alone in a room with them'. quote: ORIGINAL: Bella1965 G'afternoon all: (Fast Reply) I've not read the entire thread so don't flame me if my opinions are already expressed, albeit in a more tactful manner. I thoroughly believe these two hellions should be held to the fullest extent of the law. Minority age should not absolve anyone from accountability of their actions and the consequences they reap. What these little despicable thugs did is inexcusable and reprehensible. This sort of behavior is a basic flaw in their personalities and cannot be rectified by rehabilitation. They should either be locked away for life or (my preferred option) they can fry for their crime. On the other hand, while not a follower of any faith, I do believe the Bible has one basic tenet I can groove with. "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." Give the little creeps to me for the same time frame, a waiver granting me immunity from prosecution, and I'd be happy to grant justice in the name of the afflicted party and her mother. If the young scumbags happened to perish during my ministrations, it would keep the American gene pool a bit cleaner for the future.

MissMorrigan -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 10:12:20 AM)
Keep any personal issues strictly that.

Smith117 -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 10:14:41 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: philosophy [Effectively, by incarcerating the criminally insane, we are forcing people to take their meds. No, we're really not. You can place them in the facility and you can hand them their meds but you still can't make them swallow. You can't promise they won't tongue them and trash them because they make them 'feel funny.'

LadyEllen -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 10:16:52 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Smith117 quote: ORIGINAL: philosophy [Effectively, by incarcerating the criminally insane, we are forcing people to take their meds. No, we're really not. You can place them in the facility and you can hand them their meds but you still can't make them swallow. You can't promise they won't tongue them and trash them because they make them 'feel funny.' true enough - but there are delivery methods than oral. And we can test to ensure compliance. and in any case, theyre incarcerated, so there is no danger to the public. E

Smith117 -> RE: This kind of thing always makes me rethink capitol punishment (2/26/2008 10:18:45 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Aswad Why on Earth not? That's one case where it's actually a definite deterrent. Those are premeditated crimes. You got me there. That would certainly help out millions of people screwed over by companies like Enron and such. ;) quote: ORIGINAL: Aswad Why not? Those things finance a bunch of crime (arguably due to poor government policy, but still). Because substance laws are arbitrary. The drugs finanance lots of illegal things because they are illegal. When pot was legal prior to the 30's you didn't have people running pot illegally and starting gang wars over it illegally because it was legal already. Same with when they tried prohibition for alcohol. Make the alcohol legal and regulate it and the illegal bootlegger problem goes away. Do that with weed and you will see the drug dealers go broke because they are being undercut by 'the man.' quote: ORIGINAL: Aswad In short, those you want to kill for your own reasons. Kind of like those guys, except you want the state to do it for you. Only because the state says I can't do it myself. Trust me, I would LOVE 5 free minutes alone with some of those sick fucks. Unfortunately that's not the way the state wants things like that handled. So I have to play nice.

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