The death penalty to be brought back?

It seems I have lost this fight, I will win the war! Muahahahaha!

That Derek case was pretty interesting on a side note. Never heard of that before.

Neither had I till I had that PSE lesson. It is quite intresting, but quite sad at the same time.

And you can try to win the war. xD

Yea, i thought so to.

You best believe i will!

Will d (mr ramdom) said:

know-your-role said:

btw Will, was Derek a disabled young man who hung out with a dodgy crew? If so I learnt about him in Year 9 RE.

Not so much disabled, he just had some mental proplems resulting of some head injuries he had in his youth. I'm not sure if this resulted from one of these injuries, but he had the mental age of 11.

Well, this was the guy we learnt about in Religious Education a few years back, when I was in year 9 & I thought it was absolutely harsh when they put him on death row... I mean, seriously? He could have got help with his mental issues/problems. The death penalty wasn't the answer in this case. Then again, I would say that as I don't agree with killing another human being, whether they're good or bad.

I'm not sure wether they knew or not he had a mental age of 11 during the time of the trial or not. It could of been biased since a police man was injured and another killed.

well the death penalty ought to be used as rarely as it is now solely as a discouragement, but should be more painful, otherwise you are simply provoking crimes because the potential criminal thinks "well i don't really care if i do this or not because i'll die, but it will just be an injection and won't even be painful"

A man enters the battlefield and kills many, he returns as a hero. A civilian kills another civilian, he becomes a criminal. A criminal is put to death and everyone believes such is justice.

I hate that statement because it just shows how messed up this world is. No the death penalty shouldn't be brought back instead it should permanently be removed and made illegal. Why? Well plenty reasons.
1. What right do some person or multiple people have to judge another man's life and choose his time of death? I think no one can, no one is perfect and they have no right to judge another just because their crimes are greater. (nothing to do with religion here)
2. Murder is illegal, no exceptions should be made for law officials. Soldiers on the other hand can be justified (mostly because the situation is more complex).
3. This person could be innocent. And some times they find that after they put someone to death. They just took the wrong life.
4. It could have been a biased decision, which you can never really tell for sure. It could be obvious or not. Which means no matter how much they repent for what they did or there still isn't yet enough evidence to show they are guilty they are still put to death.
5. If they truly aren't sorry for what they did, they murdered and don't regret it one bit then death is still not acceptable. Then your just sinking down to their ranking because you would have killed them and not regret such.
6. (Not really supporting this one but I thought I may put it) There are worse things than death.

I got lazy had a few more reason but I am sure we will be fine with just 6.

xXlVlXx said:

well the death penalty ought to be used as rarely as it is now solely as a discouragement, but should be more painful, otherwise you are simply provoking crimes because the potential criminal thinks "well i don't really care if i do this or not because i'll die, but it will just be an injection and won't even be painful"

That's as bad as murdering in the first place.
Killing them is bad enough - guilty or not - but torturing them to death?
There's nothing in this world that justifies killing another human being - unless prehaps they were in extreme pain, but that's another matter - let alone torturing them.

There should of never have been a death penalty in the first place. We have no right to be someone's deathwatch.

I dont really agree with all of the Humanitarian stuff. If a person rapes, maimed, or kills someone they should be killed. Only after a few years to BE sure that they are guilty. I fully believe in eye for an eye. I also think all other prisoners should be put to work or put in the army. If they serve and survive, the go free.

xacto14 said:

If a person rapes, maimed, or kills someone they should be killed.

So you're saying that even if no life was taken in the crime committed, they should just die anyway? That's a bit more than "an eye for an eye" don't you think? I can see how that works with murder, even though I don't agree with it; but if no life was taken, there's honestly less reason to kill them.

Only after a few years to BE sure that they are guilty.

This might not always work out.
Some crimes you can just never accuse anyone because there's so little evidence. So a potentially innocent person could be killed here. Which is also part of the problem with the death penalty.

I also think all other prisoners should be put to work or put in the army. If they serve and survive, the go free.

You don't really want to be putting prisoners in the army.
If they disobey the law, odds are they'll disobey their Generals.
And you definitely don't want to be giving a possible psychopath a massive gun.

Will d (mr ramdom) said:

xacto14 said:

If a person rapes, maimed, or kills someone they should be killed.

So you're saying that even if no life was taken in the crime committed, they should just die anyway? That's a bit more than "an eye for an eye" don't you think? I can see how that works with murder, even though I don't agree with it; but if no life was taken, there's honestly less reason to kill them.

The thing with rape & such, is that it is such a life altering event, that quite often, one who is subjected to such a traumatic & absolutely disgusting event, never truly recovers from it. Often, being raped leads to depression and suicide, especially in younger girls (no "proof" merely observations through my own life).

Rape is an absolutely heinous crime, and personally, it is right up at the pointy end of criminal activity, along with murder, molestation and the like.

I have always been of the mind that convicted rapists shouldn't get the luxury of living their life out in prison for a few years and then rejoining society. Prisons these days are far too comfortable, often providing better living conditions than what a lot of criminals would get on the outside.

Personally, I'm all for the notion of rapists etc being put to death. I know there are a lot of people that say "oh that just makes you as bad as them blah blah" But face the facts;

If there is a well known rule/law - and you knowingly break it, do you not have to pay those consequences?

Fact is; yes.

If the law was that if commit such a crime in which you severely infringe on the rights of another human being (ie; rape/molestation/murder), you forfeit any and all rights to equal "humane" treatment under the law, and should either be sentences to death (rape/murder) or at minimum, 25yrs in prison, with nothing but the basic needs to live; Basic food staples, matress, blanket, pillow and shower.

These people do not treat others with respect, they do not deserve the respect of being treated as a human in return. Perhaps if things were so comfortable, and there was the realisation that you commit this crime, and get caught, you're either dead, or in for a life for absolute misery, it might act as a deterrent.

As for the "innocence" getting wrongfully convicted; A lot of people seem to like throwing that around as the trump card. You can't implement these kinds of systems because you might kill an innocent man. But no-one seems to know the likelihood of that actually happening.

Reality is; in todays age, with fingerprinting, DNA and the like, the chances of convicting the wrong person for a crime must be astronomically low.

I would rather take that chance on a wrongful conviction and play on the (guesstimate here) 99.5% chance of correct conviction & sentencing if that method above proved a successful deterent.

Sure, that may mean the odd innocent is killed/jailed - but if the deterrence was on such a reasonable scale, the lives saved through that deterrence would outweigh those very few wrongfully convicted.

I'm quite sure in the United States the death penalty is allowed only in certain states. I honestly do not have a black and white view on the matter, it seems that if a human being is truly capable of committing crimes that he/she deserves the death penalty then it seems that it would be deserving; at the same time the act of imprisoning a human being only to execute them seems inhuman. Regardless of the crimes committed, think about being on death row yourself. Being imprisoned and counting the days down until you are executed, the process is similar to putting an animal down (which theoretically is exactly what the death penalty is), but as a 'civilized' society it should not be used.

« Last edited by Ac3n on Jul 14th 2011 »

sphynxx said:

As for the "innocence" getting wrongfully convicted; A lot of people seem to like throwing that around as the trump card. You can't implement these kinds of systems because you might kill an innocent man. But no-one seems to know the likelihood of that actually happening.

Reality is; in todays age, with fingerprinting, DNA and the like, the chances of convicting the wrong person for a crime must be astronomically low.

I would rather take that chance on a wrongful conviction and play on the (guesstimate here) 99.5% chance of correct conviction & sentencing if that method above proved a successful deterent.

Sure, that may mean the odd innocent is killed/jailed - but if the deterrence was on such a reasonable scale, the lives saved through that deterrence would outweigh those very few wrongfully convicted.

Well, let's look at your numbers. 99.5% of convictions are correct according to your estimate, which means that 0.5% of convictions are wrongful (and a quick bit of research revealed that conservative estimates on wrongful convictions for serious crimes support that number). Okay, so we get it right most of the time. But that means that about 0.5% of the people sent to death row are in fact innocent. Since 1976, the US has executed 1259 people and there are currently 3093 people on death row. With the conservative estimate in mind, this means that since 1976 the US alone has executed seven innocent people and fifteen innocent people are currently awaiting execution.

Okay, so 22 innocent people have been or will be killed, but they're just collateral damage, right? I mean, the reduced crime rate brought about by the US using the death penalty has surely saved more lives than that, right?

Well, no. The US has a significantly higher intentional homicide rate than many countries which abolished the death penalty years ago, including Canada, the UK, Australia, Finland, France, Germany and New Zealand, to name just a few. Now, it is possible that if the US didn't use the death penalty then its homicide rate would be lower, but given that many countries which don't use it have lower homicide rates, the data don't seem to support this. At the very least, it suggests that other factors play a bigger part in reducing intentional homicide rates than the use of capital punishment does. Given that those other factors don't cost human lives, I'd say they were worth investigating before we go assuming that capital punishment always works, wouldn't you?

The death penalty needs to be used,except no death row if it's a sure deal kill 'em on the spot.

Ki Stryfe said:

The death penalty needs to be used,except no death row if it's a sure deal kill 'em on the spot.

Why that particular route rather than life imprisionment for example? You need to back up your opinion with evidence or a reason, it adds more weight to your arguement.

Well prison are in flaw due to the fact that they do nothing but there for free,thats not enough especially for murderers.

If not killed they should have to work all day,not just sit around. All those full prison with the prisoners doing nothing make me sick.

I for one,would take death over imprisonment.