Thought for the Day

[blackchubby38]

I believe in the death penalty for certain crimes. Not as a deterrent, but because I believe those crimes are so heinous that a death sentence is the appropriate punishment.

But my issue with the death penalty is how the method of execution keeps getting changed under the false guise of being more humane for person being executed. When instead its about making it easier for the people in the gallery to witness. That's why I think it would be better if the only people present during an execution would be the warden, a couple of guards, a priest, a rabbi, or imam (hey that could make a great joke), and the necessary medical officials.

[Stavros]

I believe in the death penalty for certain crimes. Not as a deterrent, but because I believe those crimes are so heinous that a death sentence is the appropriate punishment.
But my issue with the death penalty is how the method of execution keeps getting changed under the false guise of being more humane for person being executed. When instead its about making it easier for the people in the gallery to witness. That's why I think it would be better if the only people present during an execution would be the warden, a couple of guards, a priest, a rabbi, or imam (hey that could make a great joke), and the necessary medical officials.

We can agree that capital punishment is not a deterrent, but I cannot agree with the rest of your argument. The objections to Capital Punishment can be made on three levels -philosophical, religious and legal.

Philosophically, it is a logical contradiction to condemn murder, and then murder the person found guilty. If it is wrong for a man to hit another man over the head with a stick, hitting him back with a stick must also be wrong. If it is wrong for a man to rape a woman, or another man, it must also be wrong for the punishment to require the rapist to be raped. Murder is wrong, hitting people with a stick is wrong, rape is wrong. Replicating the crime does not resolve it.

In religious terms, with regard to Judaism, Christianity and Islam, repentence is fundamental to belief and practice. A murderer who has been executed cannot repent, and in some cases, such as a secular state, even a declaration of repentence is deemed irrelevant. And yet, in States such as the UK which is, officially a Christian State, in the 19th century the idea developed that criminals in prison ought to be rehabilitated into society, recognizing that they had 'gone astray' in their youth and as mature adults were prepared to live without resorting to crime. WIth regard to murder, Christians must forgive those who have wronged them, and a good example of this is the forgiveness expressed by a member of the Congregation of Charleston who openly said to Dylan Roof 'I forgive you'. That said, there was no Christian forgiveness in the UK when murderers were executed.

What strikes me about this, is how men and women occupying public office who make public their religious affiliation then set it aside to suddenly perform a secular 'duty' in the case of murder, while being more partisan when it comes to issues of sexuality, reproductive health, pornography and culture and related issues. thus, on religious grounds, there is a lack of consistency which enables the capital punishment that their religion ought to deny.

The legal, secular problem is probably where capital punishment is at its weakest. Time and again, and not just in the US, men and women have been executed for crimes they did not commit. In some cases they literally had no role in the murder, in others they are alleged to have been and may have been an accomplice, guilty by association. It is not just the philosophical contradiction that shapes this argument, because the State takes a legal and moral position that sets it above the citizen, granting itself the legitimate monopoly of vioence within the State. Thus a moral disgust with murder enables the State to execute, but cannot justify execution in order to protect society from further acts of murder, because the man or woman concerned is in custody -there is no need for a further act of violence.

It is irrelevant how anyone is murdered, the fact alone is all that matters. A lifetime in prison is the most sane option, and also a deserved punishment for the person concerned, if they are guilty.

The more intriguing questions, concern the reason or reasons why someone murders another, where it is not an angry reaction, a crime of passion, or a contract killing. If that person is executed, they are unable to explain why they killed. In the case of Timothy McVeigh, is it not possible that, years after the mass murder in Oklahoma City, he would have been willing to explain why he was involved, and reveal more details that were not known before?

Lastly, in the US where it still happens the judcial process is so flawed, both the guilty verdict and execution may be legally and moraly wrong (it used to happen in the UK before Capital Punishment was abolished in the 1960s).

A documentary whose title I forget, concerned the murder of a homeless man in Jacksonville, Florida in 2014 that led to the arrest of a 12-year old, Sharron Townsend, who admitted he shot the man. But no DNA evidence linked him to the victim, there was no gun, and the only possible motive was the claim by anothe homeless man that Townsend and an associate had targeted the victim before, the point being that this 12 year old was also homeless and living on the streets.
At the age of 12, Townsend ran away from a dysfunctional home after being beaten with an iron bar by his grandmother. In the first video of his interrogation, without a lawyer present, Townsend's mother offers him not a shred of love or pity or warmth, atacking him for 'throwing his life away', while the police officer also subjects him to verbal assault. At no time is he asked to explain where the gun came from, what happened, or why. When they leave and we see him put his head on the table in despair, we are seeing a 12 year old who has never know love, who has zero self-esteem, no moral compass.

We then find out this 12-year old was placed in an adult prison -an adult prison!- prior to being tried two years later and sentenced to 30 years in prison on what appears to me flimsy evidence. The lawyer who represented him at the trial might as well have been somewhere else for all the good he did. From the start, the boy's confession was considered absolute, and does not seem to ever have been challenged. Had Florida chosen to execute this boy, it would have been the capital conclusion to a disgraceful, legal mess in which justice was incidental to an act of revenge by people who took no interest in the circumstances of the crime.

So, no -it is wrong to murder in response to murder, the opportunity for forgiveness and repentence or remorse must be allowed, and the legal process that leads to a conviction and execution is too flawed to be trusted. And there are alternative forms of punishment that do not require execution.

[filghy2]

I believe in the death penalty for certain crimes. Not as a deterrent, but because I believe those crimes are so heinous that a death sentence is the appropriate punishment.

If it's not a question of deterrence then I assume your argument is that certain crimes mark a person as so irredeemable that they can only ever be a menace to society. In other words, the rationale is to remove the probability that the criminal will commit similar offences in future. I guess there's a certain utilitarian rationale to that, rather than expending resources on keeping them in jail for life, but it depends on a very high degree of certainty that they are guilty and will never reform.

[filghy2]

Philosophically, it is a logical contradiction to condemn murder, and then murder the person found guilty. If it is wrong for a man to hit another man over the head with a stick, hitting him back with a stick must also be wrong. If it is wrong for a man to rape a woman, or another man, it must also be wrong for the punishment to require the rapist to be raped. Murder is wrong, hitting people with a stick is wrong, rape is wrong. Replicating the crime does not resolve it.

I'm not sure this logic holds up. After all, the state routinely applies punishments that would be illegal if one individual did them to another. It confiscates the assets of people who illegally confiscate other peoples' assets. It also imprisons people who illegally deprive others of their liberty.

I'm not disputing that the US sets the bar too low on capital punishment, but I'm not sure its useful to apply moral absolutes to issues involving trade-offs. There's a trade-off between the certainty that the offender cannot commit further heinous crimes, and the possibility of greater deterrence, versus the chance that the person might be innocent or might not reoffend. Execution can be seen as a further step along the spectrum of severity of punishment beyond life imprisonment. The question is whether having such a further step is justifiable, given that it's irreversible. I see that as more a utilitarian issue of the benefits and costs to society than a moral one.

[blackchubby38]

If it's not a question of deterrence then I assume your argument is that certain crimes mark a person as so irredeemable that they can only ever be a menace to society. In other words, the rationale is to remove the probability that the criminal will commit similar offences in future. I guess there's a certain utilitarian rationale to that, rather than expending resources on keeping them in jail for life, but it depends on a very high degree of certainty that they are guilty and will never reform.

These are crimes that I have in mind:

Rape and/or murder of child under the age of 12.
Mass Murderers*
Serial Killers

*-This includes terrorists who acts result in the injuries and deaths of multiple people.

[broncofan]

We can agree that capital punishment is not a deterrent, but I cannot agree with the rest of your argument. The objections to Capital Punishment can be made on three levels -philosophical, religious and legal.

Philosophically, it is a logical contradiction to condemn murder, and then murder the person found guilty. If it is wrong for a man to hit another man over the head with a stick, hitting him back with a stick must also be wrong. If it is wrong for a man to rape a woman, or another man, it must also be wrong for the punishment to require the rapist to be raped. Murder is wrong, hitting people with a stick is wrong, rape is wrong. Replicating the crime does not resolve it.
.

Are there other reasons killing might be a punishment for killing when rape is not seriously proposed as a punishment for rape?

One reason may be that death is seen as the ultimate negative consequence, whether it is in fact or not, and also takes the responsibility off of the state to incarcerate someone who is exceptionally dangerous. Execution is also a 100% effective form of specific deterrence as an executed man cannot kill a guard, another prisoner, or a medic.

The fact that killing is the punishment for killing is not an attempt to teach an object lesson to the murderer by mimicking the crime. A murderer may kill someone in the most cruel of ways and the state will not copy that method. The consistency between the results only shows some proportionality between the punishment and the punished act.

I also am not convinced that when someone carries out an action as a response to a wrong that it has the same character as the wrong. It would be a technicality if I argue that when the legislature makes execution legal it is not murder but I can argue that at least some of the characteristics of murder at common law are stripped from the act. Not every intentional killing is murder and exceptions have been made for self-defense, defense of others, and lack of capacity to have a culpable mental state. In Dudley v. Stephens a court even wrestled with exempting killing and cannibalism under extreme duress.

We don't make judgments about culpability simply based on result. One example of this would be the distinction that the American legal system made between first and second degree murder. Both were intentional and neither could in any sense be justified but first degree murder requires proof of some deliberation and planning because legislatures thought that someone who committed the act coolly was more culpable than someone who may have acted out of anger.

Anyhow, I am against the death penalty because it is applied in clearly biased ways and in practice I can't imagine any value that outweighs the potential for innocent people to be executed and thereby never be able to exonerate themselves. I do think it plays into a vindictive mindset though I am not convinced the state that executes a person for a heinous crime has committed the same monstrosity.

[broncofan]

Are there other reasons killing might be a punishment for killing when rape is not seriously proposed as a punishment for rape?

Stupid joke but the perp who wanted to avoid punishment could simply consent.

[Stavros]

I also am not convinced that when someone carries out an action as a response to a wrong that it has the same character as the wrong. It would be a technicality if I argue that when the legislature makes execution legal it is not murder but I can argue that at least some of the characteristics of murder at common law are stripped from the act. Not every intentional killing is murder and exceptions have been made for self-defense, defense of others, and lack of capacity to have a culpable mental state. In Dudley v. Stephens a court even wrestled with exempting killing and cannibalism under extreme duress.

Ending a life is what it is, be it the murder or the execution of the murderer. Human societies have argued that killing a human being is morally wrong, which is why the philosophical argument is impeccable. What you are arguing about, is not some 'technicality', but the excuses societies make to justify what they have previously argued is wrong. Thus, you sub-divide all murders into categories so that you can then excuse some from execution but not others.

Philosophy has no role to play here, it is simply a form of discrimination, and it changes over time. Thus, women who have murdered abusive and violent husbands, are now more likely to be released from prison rather than executed, or detained with life sentences, an example of how a contextual understanding of the crime can lead to a less punitive sentence, though it cannot excuse the murder.

This parade of excuses parallels the contradictions in Religion, where God can comand Thou Shalt not Kill, in one part of the Bible, yet sanction stoning to death in another. The law on judicial murder or the laws of war, again, are just excuses that enable men and women to kill each other without having to bother with the pre-existing prohibition of the act (setting aside the fact that for many in uniform, killing is profoundly traumatic).

For centuries we have agonised over wars in which it is 'fair game' for Combatats to kill Combatats, but not civilians, even as the Combatants often never made the distinction, and even as I write this, men, women and children are being murdered in the Yemen, and legal cases being presented in Courts with regard to conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq where 'war crimes' are alleged to have been committed.

To me it is unfortunate that people shrug their shoulders because 'shit happens' in wars, regardless of the Military Code or the Laws of War, just as the diet of films and tv programme in which bad people get killed, has massaged the public into beiieving that what Dirty Harry does is what the cops ought to do, being moroally justified, and capital punishment in all but name. But they don't in fact identify what capital punishment is, namely a demonstration of failure, and an inability to understand the context in which crime takes place, and do something about that, be it mental health, alcohol or drug dependency, homelessness and so on.

Crucially, in the US, not only are most State executions carried out in the former Confederate States, they are proportionally more likely to be of Black prisoners. Taken as a whole, the judicial system in the US appears at times to be so incompetent in its judgement of the accused, the guilty sentence is without merit, and with a system so biased and unpredictable, the ultimate punishment might not be justified.

In a field so crowded with contradictions and incompetence, the best thing to do is stop it.

[Stavros]

These are crimes that I have in mind:

Rape and/or murder of child under the age of 12.
Mass Murderers*
Serial Killers

*-This includes terrorists who acts result in the injuries and deaths of multiple people.

Your list illustrates one of the problems -what is the difference between the rape and murder of a 12-year old and a 13-year old, or an 80-year old?

My country, like yours, has no respect for the lives of children, the bombs we make and the drones we fly kill them every day. Maybe the people in the UK and the US who make the bombs that spray the walls of a house with the brains of a two-year old should be forced to go to Syria, or Afghanistan, or the Yemen with a mop and bucket, and wash it all away.

[broncofan]

I see that as more a utilitarian issue of the benefits and costs to society than a moral one.

I have never studied philosophy though I know what utilitarianism is. I never assumed codes of morality should be absolute so that an action could never be justified if it is harmful even though it produces a better outcome than inaction. Such a system only tries to preserve the "clean hands" of the actor and seems obsessed with purity of conduct rather than long-term outcomes.

Under that system of morality killing someone in self-defense would be an immoral act. The act of intentionally killing someone produces a harm and the result of inaction cannot be used to mitigate it. The utilitarian justification is that if one doesn't act their own life be lost. But wouldn't that make us indifferent between the two outcomes in utilitarian terms when we shouldn't be? All told I like the utilitarian analysis better than one focused on absolute morality.

Maybe one can look at killing in self-defense as a positive utility outcome because the person defending himself is less likely to kill again because he acted only in exigent circumstances.