Are you for or against the death penalty?

[om3ga]

im for the death penalty. some people call it "revenge" killing, or state sanctioned murder, and im ok with it. this whole "no one has the right to kill" blah blah blah argument is meaningless. society has rules, and if you choose to be a schmuck and not follow them, then you deserve to die, point blank. and as far as some inoccent people being wrongfully executed, hey, you cant make an omlett without breaking a few eggs, unfortunatly some inoccents will get put to death, but we shouldnt through the baby out with the bath water. IMHO the chinese have it right, shoot the guilty party and charge his/her family the cost of the bullet.

Society has rules which we must follow, correct. But we shouldn't follow blindly. Democracy should be an organic process where we the people have the right to question (through our elected politicians), whether existing rules can be improved on.
We should never adopt a laid-back attitude towards innocents being placed on death row - suppose the evidence was tampered to fit allegations that the suspect was guilty?

 

[McRocket]

im for the death penalty. some people call it "revenge" killing, or state sanctioned murder, and im ok with it. this whole "no one has the right to kill" blah blah blah argument is meaningless. society has rules, and if you choose to be a schmuck and not follow them, then you deserve to die, point blank. and as far as some inoccent people being wrongfully executed, hey, you cant make an omlett without breaking a few eggs, unfortunatly some inoccents will get put to death, but we shouldnt through the baby out with the bath water. IMHO the chinese have it right, shoot the guilty party and charge his/her family the cost of the bullet.

Slavery. Segregation. Illegal for women to vote. Wife abuse. They are rules in many countries. Does that mean you are a schmuck if you don't follow them?

 

[makin247]

Slavery. Segregation. Illegal for women to vote. Wife abuse. ALL COMPLETELY DIFFERENT than putting a proven killer in the dirt where he/she belongs.

 

[D-rock]

Slavery. Segregation. Illegal for women to vote. Wife abuse. ALL COMPLETELY DIFFERENT than putting a proven killer in the dirt where he/she belongs.

While I personally think your point above might have merit, let me play the "devil's advocate" and ask why it is different. When it comes down to it everybody's views on what is right and wrong is just a matter of opinion. Unless you are God or some other cosmic divine being that determines the nature of the universe there is nothing separating slavery, segregation, and abusing your wife in terms of right and wrong from capital punishment other than opinion. The whole “people don't have a right to kill” idea seems as perfectly valid as saying that there should be no slavery to me. Don't get me wrong; I think you have every right to believe it is different. Just understand that just like you think all those other things are wrong, some people believe killing other people as punishment is wrong also.

As for not being able to make an omelet without breaking some eggs, I tend to believe that the ends don't justify the means. What will be next? Will we have all of our fingerprints and DNA of file because it will reduce crime? Will we all have a computer chip in our brains monitoring our thoughts someday? You can bet it will reduce crime,(unlike executions which probably don't) but like I said I don't think the ends justify the means. Just because something might be effective doesn’t mean it should be done.

I’m sure that if you are ever in a situation where you are wrongly accused and are going to be killed, you are just going to take solace in the fact that your taking one for the creation of the “omelet”. For me, saving the life of one innocent person is worth not killing all the other criminals you want dead. Protecting the innocent is more important than convicting the guilty. Hence the reason we are suppose to have a system that considers you innocent until proven guilty. If it was the other way around we could get all the bad guys that much easier, but we don’t and there is a reason for that. That reason if because protecting an innocent person from harm is more important.

 

[foxfilm]

Here-here, D-rock.

I'm 100% against state sponsored killing for a several reasons.

First, on a purely selfish note, I don't want to give up my rights to life to any authoritative structure. If you're pro death penalty, that's what you're doing. If your government can kill someone else, they can kill you, too.

Plus, I believe government needs to set the tone for a civil society that respects the inherent humanity in every person. I tend to believe people aren't born evil or violent, rather they're taught to be so by life experiences. Show me a murderer, and I'll show you an abusive childhood. Who's at fault?

Do I think violent people should be left to roam the streets? Nope. Life imprisonment, with the opportunity to build some kind of life, such that it is, under constant supervision represents a more enlightened and humane approach than state sancitioned murder. If the inmate chose to end their own life, however, rather than be doomed to a life of incarceration, I'd be in support of that. Their life, their decision to end it.

Sorry for the babble, but this issue gets me whipped into a frenzy. I live in Florida -- one of the states with the death penalty. Nationwide almost 1,000 have been put to death since 1976, with the leader by a mile being Texas, due in no small part to George Bush's decision to ok 143 in his 8 year tenure as gov. (http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=8&did=186)

OK, that's my last anti-Bush dig for the night.

 

[Jagger69]

My point was if there are established rules, like THOUGH SHALL NOT KILL, and established consequences [death penalty] if someone is stupid enough to break the rules then he should suffer the penalty.Why is this so hard to concieve? Why should the rest of society have to pay this persons way for years and years when he will never contribute anything. Shouldn't any money being spent on this trash be put to better use? Maybe other lives can be saved with the money spent paying for this scum of the world.

By the way,Thank God, no such tragedy has ever happened to anyone near and dear to me.

OK, if you are going to resort to quoting scripture....and you believe what the Ten Commandments say....THOU SHALT NOT KILL....is meant literally for ALL men....not those who presume themselves fit to judge others. The "established consequences" are laws made by man, not God. Ok, enough of the religion but you brought it up.

Your economic argument is flawed as well. It costs much more to keep a death-row inmate through all of the appeals than it does to throw him into a cell for life and forget about him. Don't take my word for it....look it up.

Death-penalty proponents still don't have a reply for those who have been wrongly convicted and executed. If it happened to you, You Might change your mind I think. Maybe you consider this to be acceptable. Personally, I don't want that blood on my hands.

I would respect your opinion more if you simply said you want vengeance and retribution for people who commit murders or other capital crimes. That's the only justification I can't argue with.

Anyway....I respect your right to express your opinion....peace....

 

[provalui]

i think i'm lucky to be european.....

"barbarism begins at home"
the smiths

Yes or no or unsure?

 

[memoryloss]

It's "an eye for an eye" with me.

I think if someone commits murder, they should face death also.

 

[stoopid337]

definetly for

 

[sexttyguy]

bah. I think its situational. There have been times when I felt that it was needed... but if you fuck up thats it, you cant take it back.

 

[9inch]

is snoop doggy dog old friend dead now ?? I hope not..

 

[julian999]

Against. You can't blame the family of murder victims for wanting the killer dead, but the death penalty is uncivilized and doesn't reduce crime.

 

[Slam]

I voted against based on a couple of things. I didn't read all the arguements posted, so if I'm repeating anything, my bad.

- Death penalty is not as cost-effective as people think it is. In the end, the costs can run up to a comparable figure to life imprisionment.

- Death penalty instantly comes packed with escalation. The details for the example I want to use are kind of foggy for me right now but some Africian country put in a death penalty for bank robbing (armed of course). Bank robberies dropped sharply. Good news. Bad news? They still happened and now that the robbers knew it was all or nothing, they were less hesitant of going in, killing everyone and taking the money. If the cops caught up to them, they were more likely to shoot at them. They know if they're caught that is over for them, theres no reason to not just eliminate eye witnesses and/or the police. Its not a good thing when thats the case, extreme punishments lead to desperate criminals.

- Where do you draw the line? Murder gets death penalty? What about attempted premediated murder? What about violent rape? Manslaughter? The list can go on about the terrible crimes in the world. But if you apply it just to murder then you are suggesting the punishment should be the crime? So a raper should be raped? The concept of wanting someone dead for their crimes is just a natural feeling people have when something happens, the true consquences become clear once the fact is examined.

- Court costs. Death penalty comes with an instant appeal in most cases. Granted most people would appeal a life imprisionment punishment too but its an option rather than a requirement.

I don't have a problem with people being killed, sorry if that sounds morbid. But some of the people may pretty much deserve to be killed but that doesn't mean that it is something that should be done. Especially not if the rest of society has to pay the costs that I mentioned above. Of course, the cost of money exists in jail systems regardless but the point, in my opinion, is still valid for those reasons mentioned above.

 

[calpoon]

whoever said that once someone goes to prison it makes it so they don't have any options but to commit more crimes to survive, thank you for bringing up that often overlooked fact.

why is it that a police officer can pretty much do anything that results in someones death and they will never be held accountable for it in court? if you don't think this is true, I can sight about 30 cases off the top of my head that demonstrate this. If someones does not threaten me and is proven to not have weapons and I simply feel like they are a bad guy and I shoot them, it's called second degree murder. If our politcal leaders think the same thing about a countrie's leader, we can drop bombs on and send in people to shoot citizens of that country, and it is not murder. what's the difference?

instead of giving an oppinion, im going to state some facts and you can draw your own conclusions.

In a case in CA, a man was on trial for having non-consensual sex with children between the ages of 14-18, (aka raping kids.) the manditory maximum sentance is 18 years in prison. he was offered a plea and he turned it down and pled not guilty. upon seeing this his victims were going to testify against him in court, he chose to accept the plea and wave the trial. he was sentanced to 1 year in prison. after serving six months he changed his plea to guilty, which offers a reduced sentance, and he was released.

this is what our justice system does. we have way more people arrested then we ever have time to try. trials cost a lot of money, and we allready spent it all so we give people pleas for reduced sentances so we don't have to spend all that money on court costs. this is great if you fucked up and made a mistake once, it really sucks if you are a danger to society.

80% of all people currently in prison are there for non-violent drug charges. no matter what you think the fact is that smoking pot never hurt anyone, at least not anymore then several other things that are legal.

nearly every single person that commits a sexual offense was sexually abused themselves. as hard as it is to understand, anything you do to these people as an offender you are also doing to a person that's a victim.

the point of all this is that it's not just a matter of executing murderers, the entire justice system needs to be reworked. we never need to build another prison, and if we stop arresting people for victimless crimes, we will never be able to fill up all the ones that we allready have. we could save a shit load of money and use it to actually eliminate real threats and help rehabiliate people that can be reintigrated into society, and reduce the number of policemen working on BS cases and maybe even be able to actually prevent crime for once, instead of just punishing people afterwards.

 

[Bloodshot Scott]

I'm 'for'. And yes, I did just bump this 5+ year old thread.

 

[busaguy79]

I'm for as well! If you are going to kill someone then you damn well better pay for your crime!!

 

[CunningStunts]

I'm for putting in express lanes to the gas chamber for convicted violent criminals.

Fuck them and the misery and fear they spread to honest, law abiding citizens.

It might not deter the next guy, but it sure as hell deters the fucker thats dead from hurting someone else.:2 cents:

 

[Deepcover]

I am against the death penalty. It's just wrong and should be considered illegal.

 

[ralph furley]

against. many ppl on death row have had their sentences overturned and been exonerated after coming very close to being put to death for something they didn't do

 

[Facetious]

Eye for an eye, but it must be beyond any reasonable doubt whatsoever.