Primal

This is very true, however you can still attain some justice for the victim.

Primal

Well I don't really see any fundamental difference between "preserving social order" and preventing crime in regards to the criminal justice system.

This is true and I touched on this, basically it's still prevention though.

Yes, many ethical arguments come down to a value judgement of some sort. That is what I meant by it came down to a value judgement. As opposed to lets say a more cognitive fact based issue, like the speed of light or evolution vs creation issue.


Okay this is true, but you can also lose constitutional rights for commiting crimes, like your right to liberty if you commit a crime via going to jail.

See I don't know if this is true, for me personally and someone for whom life in prison may not seem so bad, the death penalty works as a syronger deterent. The deterent effects of the death penalty are questionable though, wich is why the death penalties effects as a deterent are not my primary reason for supporting the death penalty: mine is retribution.


I don't see how it is infinitely superior, as an innocent person can still get locked up for life.

Ah I see, an answer to my "on what basis do we punish" question. Punishment prevents. But there are cases where it's ability to prevent may be called into question (i.e. Nazi war criminals) but many still the person should be punished and crimes of passion. Likewise what's to then eliminate going to extremes and saying, that those who speed should be executed? It would eliminate speeding.

Also then, are you essentially agreeing with part of retribution theory, that an act wrong if initiated, can be right if it is committed as a response?



You see not to me, as first off the conditions for prisoners improve with the length of their stay in prison(mainly to avoid riots and such due to tremendous stress on prisoners) and the keeping of one's life as opposed to its loss seems far better, even if one lives as a prisoner(especially if the prison conditions aren't that bad.)


Well the same evasion of punishment can be had if a person has a life in prison though.


Fairly large as I have stated as he still gets to keep his life ultimately(they are hardly "rotting" in their cells). Basically the killer gets an additional 30 years of life that a victim did not.


As opposed to letting them "rot" for 30 years?


Like I said, not so for the most henous of crimes, where the victim was say tortured before he or she dies and hardly in a prison system, where prisoners get three meals a day and a color TV.


Well it does if the numbers are far greater for the murderers living, and their quality of life is not tremendously unpleasant, in which case both conditions are met.


No this is a very different thing. First one doesn't even know how effective this is. Second a person will get his rights violated without due process i.e. a trial which is meant to minimize error. Lastly, such an act can be very easily abused. Perhaps from a standpoint based in pure prevention, this works but not one based on retribution.

The key would be "in some cases" I think the case above with the cops breaking down doors is very different then a case where the accused gets a trial and apeals. A better analogy would be if cops could shoot whoever they suspected of murder.


I would say, not in cases where the crime is extremely severe and where the accused has been given a fair trial(meant to minimize error) as well as apeals(meant to further minimize error).


Yes but there are also checks meant to minimize abuse. And even though labs and evidence are run/collected by humans, the tools are improving. Already DNA evidence has allowed us to find certain people who were wrongly convicted. No system is perfect I admit, especially with humans running the show, but systems can be made better, especially with technology involved.


This may be true, but they may be also so small as to be ignored for all practical purposes. Just because a system if run bvy humans does not mean it can't be improved, vastly so in many cases,with technology.

All statistics on this issue are questionable. States and countries with ni death penalty usually have less crime in general. It should be noted though, one of the countries with the largest population density(China, which should then have one of the highest crime rates) has little to know crime, as do many ME countries, despite how poor their police forces are.

There is always a loss to justice and retribution though for every henious criminal,mass murderer, child murderer, person that murders and tortures several female girls, etc. That gets a fairly comfortable life in prison.

Like Leonard Lake and Chalres Ng of california, who's known number of murders is actually uknown. A conservative estimate is about 20 people.

To quote the site I got this from:

Now I strongly suspect these people could not be innocents convicted, mainly because they recorded themselves having sex/raping their victims. In a world with no death penalty, the two criminals if caught would simply getting what? A non too horrid 30 years in prison, even though they took what? 20 lives in a extremely cruel manner. Even when the evidence against them was quite solid.

Another case:

Can you really tell me these people deserve three square meals a day and a color TV is a fairly safe enviroment?

Even though there was video tape evidence?

Another horrid case with solid evidence:

This was all taken off an urban myth site: http://www.snopes2.com/horrors/madmen/snuff.htm

One not even concerned with listing heinous crimes. Now imagine how many more you could find if you really look, with solid, undeniable evidence of people who are basically, monsters, that would at worse get what? 30-50 years in a cell with books and a color TV.

Now that to me sounds like more then just a small injustice. Punishing a man by locking him in a room with many luxuries some free people don't even have, sounds like as grave an injustice as you get.









Look above, that kind of evidence, as well as finding dead bodies in the buried in the person's garage, DNA evidence, admittance etc. Evidence that is virtually undeiniable.


No but likewise if someone I cared for was kept as a sex slave, tortured and murdered: I would likewise care very much if the murderer was being fed and kept safer/more comfortable then I was.

But what about getting justice for the public in the cases of monsters like the Oklahoma city bomber, Nazi war criminals, John Wayne Gacy, Roy Norris,Paul Bernado etc? Do these butchers deserve color TVs, hot meals, books, free dental care, free medical care, etc?

Site on US Federal prison health care services(which are better then mine):

http://www.bop.gov/hsdpg/hsd.html#hps

Info on what prisoners eat(they eat better then me):

http://www.referenceworld.com/sage/P...0E19974260.htm

Valmorian

*Chuckle* Small consolation for the wrongly executed person, hm?

I cannot and will never be able to support the death penalty because of the point brought up above.

I also cannot comprehend why you would think retribution is served through the death of a person.

Jamie_L

Primal:

It appears we have a simple disagreement on values, which may be pointless to argue further. To me, however, your position boggles my mind. Which isn't to say I know any better than you, but here's my thoughts in a nutshell:

Do people who commit heinous crimes deserve to live out their lives in a safe environment? No. Does it bother me if they do? No, not really. Not if that guarantees that no innocent will ever be executed by the government for a crime they did not commit. This is what I mean by LWOP being "infinitely superior" to the DP at protecting innocents from execution. If there are no executions, no innocents will ever be executed.

Of course, innocents will still go to prison. But prison is not irrevokable. And, if prisons are safe (at the cost of giving heinous ciminals safe lives), these innocents need not be brutalized or subjected to unnecessary horrors.

Millions of murderers sitting in jail, harming no one, does not bother me one wit if it means my son will never be executed because some eye-witness is "100% certain" that he tortured and killed someone when he was, in fact, sleeping alone in his bed.

I just don't have a "need" to see people executed who may deserve it. I don't see the benefit it provides to the public at large. Protecting the lives of innocent people seems far more important.

To be honest, I can't really understand the opposite attitude: the feeling that it is so important to see criminals not just in a place where they can do no harm but dead, that it's okay to kill a few innocents now and then as well.

*shrug*

Jamie

Harumi

Jamie_L

:notworthy :notworthy :notworthy

Primal

Sorry for the lengthy delay and it does indeed appear as if we have a difference in values, in which case we may still argue but I doubt any of us, will change our minds.


See, one difference between me and you is that it would bother me a lot. Knowing that a man raped, totured and murdered people, then lived happily ever after to me is unacceptable.

But innocents can still be thrown in prison. And I agree though, the LWOP is much better at protecting innocents, but for me, if that means certain henious criminals will not face severe pain/punishment. I cannot allow that. I'd rather some innocents suffer then a hole bunch of the most vicious criminals get off lightly.

This is true, but for me this need to protect innocents is outweighed by the need to punish certain types of crimes to the full extent.

[quote\ Millions of murderers sitting in jail, harming no one, does not bother me one wit if it means my son will never be executed because some eye-witness is "100% certain" that he tortured and killed someone when he was, in fact, sleeping alone in his bed. [/quote]

Well see, that's one reason why I would advocate the death penalty perhaps only in cases where the evidence was solid. I don't think a single eye witness necessarily counts as solid evidence, especially if there is an alleby.

Yes but I guess that makes us very different types of animals.

Would you be okay with him living a comfortable life so long as he never harmed another human being? Lets says he's crippled and about to die soon anyways, do we let him go?

Or lets say some man was stuck with your wife on a desert island, he had no food so he murdered and ate your spouse. Hypothetically, and the man is brought back. This man will probably never do such a thing again, he was depserate. Would you be okay with him living a comfortable life?

It's hard to believe you have no sense of retribution.

Well perhaps you can't but I can perfectly. Perhaps it a difference in how we were conditioned or our genes. But imagine if the killer had taken someone you care about, the idea of having them live a comfortable life after all the pain they caused my loved one and myself would be unbearable.

The AntiChris

The problem I have with retribution theory is that it appears to portray the satifaction we derive from the suffering of wrongdoers as somehow intrinsically good - that our untuitive desire for retribution is an indication of the of moral worth of retribution in itself.

This seems to me to be simplistic as it makes no attempt whatsoever to understand why we have retributive feelings.

I think there are good evolutionary reasons for believing that our retributive desires have clear practical functions such as deterrence and incapacitance. In other words, punishment has a more fundamental justification than the superficial desire to see wrongdoers suffer.

It sems to me that those who see the suffering of wrongdoers as the foremost purpose of a criminal justice system are just missing the point.

Chris

Jamie_L

It's interesting that we have such differing views. I feel exactly the opposite. Mostly, I feel that execution provides no service to social order and safety that LWOP can't provide, but LWOP also provides the added safety of preventing wrongful executions.

And here's where my hidden conservative streak (I'm basically liberal) comes out: I don't trust the government with an "only with solid evidence" clause. Mistakes and misconduct are commonplace in human interaction, so "only with solid evidence" doesn't make me feel much better than our current system of capital punishment.

Punishment is important, in some sense. The public must feel like people can't just get away with things. However, I don't think fulfulling this need to the extreme serves society significantly better than filling it "good enough". I.E., a criminal still needs to serve time for his crime, even if he's not a threat. But going the extra mile of execution doesn't buy much, IMHO.

That's a scenario that might not even be punishable under our current legal system. Let me answer the more straight-forward question:

Would I want to kill a man who murdered my wife? Yes. I do have a sense of retribution. Would I want the government empowered to do so? No. The government and the legal system needs to have restraints on it.

Jamie

truelies

In my home city a year ago at Christmas a pair of vile young criminals by the name of Carr committed 5 brutal murders after robbing sexually molesting and torturing their victims for several hours. these individuals were given a fair trial. an adequate legal defensw funded by the tax payers of Kansas and were found Guilty by a Jury of 12 and sentenced to Die.

I am completely comfortable with the Fact that after a few years of fruitless appeals these two murders will in fact be executed. a person who can sink to the level of wanton cruelty displayed by these men has flatly forfeited the right/priveledge of living in a human society. Disposing of such individuals just as we would a dangerous animal is one mark of a Civilised Society.

TiConTiki

I must agree with you that this particular case made me angry beyond belief and the Carr brothers are far from ever going to be able to contribute anything outside of prison.

My biggest problem with the Death Penalty is that killing the criminal does not kill crime.

I would like to see legislation implemented whereby these death row inmates could have their sentences communicated to life inprisonment if they would donate their physical (living) bodies to medical research and allow themselves to have new drugs and other treatments tested on them in exchange for living.

It would need to be consenual and as painfree as possible.

These criininals have taken something away from society. Death does not repay it. But allowing them to use a portion of the remainder of their life to actually benefit society makes better sense.

IMHO anyway.