gall Posted May 21, 2015 Share Posted May 21, 2015 There are no monsters Yes, there are. Do you think the people to the left or to the right of people in the coliseum thought "man look at that monster" while they all stood there and watched innocents for the most part get eaten or stabbed and beaten to death. I am guessing they just laughed... perspective is a son of a bitch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gall Posted May 21, 2015 Share Posted May 21, 2015 bdp: Yes. A rapist, an abuser, a child molester, a person who deliberately hurts and manipulates other people for his/her own benefit--these are monsters. To say there aren't any ("just people who do monstrous things") is naïve. I think there are more politicians that are monsters than most other world class jackoffs. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thurisaz Posted May 22, 2015 Share Posted May 22, 2015 Not the way the government does execution, it's not a deterrent. It should be, though--I personally think hard labor, water, and stale bread for the rest of one's life would be more effective than the current system. In several ways, yes. Jail the greatest monsters for life, without parole. No risk of irreversible mistakes (if they turn out to be innocent later), you can make them work to pay for their expenses, and (depending on what they're in for) you don't create martyrs. That's what occurs to me spontaneously Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lilith666 Posted May 22, 2015 Author Share Posted May 22, 2015 Jailing an innocent person and forcing him/her to pay for something s/he didn't do would be an irreversible mistake, since they can't get those years back. But it's most certainly preferable to executing that person. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thurisaz Posted May 23, 2015 Share Posted May 23, 2015 Point taken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vigile Posted May 23, 2015 Share Posted May 23, 2015 Vigile, what I'm trying to say is that I don't support the death penalty for various reasons, but if the government is going to punish a person in this way, it should be an actual punishment. Not something watered-down because we are trying to "take the high road." Worrying about whether the convict is in pain doesn't count as distributing punishment. In my mind, retribution is not the role of society. How can it be? Society, as a group, isn't fundamentally or objectively better than those it seeks to punish; it just establishes rules for those things punishable and those things not (such as killing and maiming over 1M people in Iraq, etc...). I personally don't want society running around punishing people as once truly freed to run down that road, it will simply just invent nastier and nastier ways to accomplish this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vigile Posted May 23, 2015 Share Posted May 23, 2015 As I understand it, it's meant to teach the punished person a lesson to change her behavior in the future Or, to dissuade others from going down a similar path. Unfortunately, the correlation between death penalty and violent crime isn't inverted. IOW, there is no evidence that the death penalty reduces violent crime. Add to that, that it costs 3x on average more to sentence someone to death than it does to house them away from society for life, it just doesn't make logical sense. Those who support it, do so for reasons other than logic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vigile Posted May 23, 2015 Share Posted May 23, 2015 Not the way the government does execution, it's not a deterrent. It should be, though--I personally think hard labor, water, and stale bread for the rest of one's life would be more effective than the current system. It's been done before and it did not serve as a deterrent. In fact, crime is way down in the modern era compared to the days of French penal colonies and British exiles to Australia and the western noose. I'm personally happy we have laws against cruel and unusual punishment. We as a society can be just as cruel as those we seek to protect ourselves against but for rules barring us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bdp Posted May 25, 2015 Share Posted May 25, 2015 There are no monsters Yes, there are. Do you think the people to the left or to the right of people in the coliseum thought "man look at that monster" while they all stood there and watched innocents for the most part get eaten or stabbed and beaten to death. I am guessing they just laughed... perspective is a son of a bitch. What does the Coliseum have to do with this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bdp Posted May 25, 2015 Share Posted May 25, 2015 bdp: Yes. A rapist, an abuser, a child molester, a person who deliberately hurts and manipulates other people for his/her own benefit--these are monsters. To say there aren't any ("just people who do monstrous things") is naïve. I think there are more politicians that are monsters than most other world class jackoffs. That's asinine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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