I have no words.

[Yamori]

It's called a jury of your peers not a jury of government.

Is it our peers who put someone in handcuffs, drag them into a cell, and murder them with their own hands - and have the law written of allowing death as an option for punishment to begin with?

It *is* a matter of the government having unjust power over life and death - they're the ones pulling the switch.

[Vincenti]

Well if you dont want to see them dead, then you pay the 100K/year it takes to feed and house the bastards, personally I think that death is too good for this bastard, and killing him just MIGHT deter the next sicko from doing some bullshit like this. if not then keep killing them until the child-molestation gene has been completely removed from the population.

Dont want to do the time? then dont do the crime.

Perhaps if you had a daughter you would feel differently, but if someone ever harmed my girls in anyway they would die veeeeerrrrrry slowly and beg for death for a long time before I let them die. And then I would go to prison and be protected by liberal bleeding cunts like yourself from the death penalty.

Put yourself in the father of this child's place. this sicko just brutally murdered the most important thing in your life then molested her dead body, and planned to make a roast from her leg. If the first thought that comes to mind is not "I would rip that son of a bitch apart limb from limb" then there is something seriously wrong with YOU and you need to get in touch with your masculine side.

[vonkaar]

How much time did you waste writing this nonsense? If someone kills another person and they are found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt by a jury of their piers they should fry, hang, suffocate or whatever other ways they do it, now.

Hell, I think it should be televised! Put the executions on late night cable access. Better yet, give them their own channel; DTV (Death Television). Then all you pansies can just turn it off and pretend the world is nifty. FAG!

piers

That's a great gumdrop world you live in where crimes can be described as, "someone kills another person." At what level? Who gets killed by the government, for what crimes? Any chance of appeal? If I got drunk and accidentally killed a guy riding a bike to work, should I be killed by the state? What if I only took a Vicodin, was totally okay to drive but I spilled coffee on my legs and crashed into him... the Vicodin means I was driving under the influence... is that equally irresponsible? Kill em all? Bad ass. Let's just start killing ALL criminals... fuck the appeals too, right? God I'd love it if you agreed with me.

You nitwits are arguing about the most complex judicial system in the world... and supposedly the most fair. We have 3 choices... we can try to FIX the many errors in the system, which nobody HERE is talking about... we can start killing EVERYONE, which puts us in the same category as a Somali warlord (not that we aren't already in such illustrious company)... or we can abolish the death penalty and punish our criminals in a more civilized manner. This ensures that mistakes aren't made... it allows for TRUE due process... It's a much more humane and simple method to deal with the problems of our justice system. Criminals are still punished... off the street... the cost is DECREASED... life goes on.

[vonkaar]

Well if you dont want to see them dead, then you pay the 100K/year it takes to feed and house...

As we've discussed... it's common knowledge that death penalty inmates cost the state anywhere from 3 to 7 times as much money than LWOP inmates. "Keeping them alive" is cheaper AND more humane. Double your fun!

[Vincenti]

Im not saying it is cheaper I am saying I would prefer to see my tax dollars going to removing them from the evolutionary chain than trying to "rehabilitate" them.

That being said we have way too many laws, a 17 year old who has sex with his 16 year old girlfriend is NOT a rapist, someone who murders a 10 year old and has sex with her dead body is a waste of genetic material and should be removed from the food chain.

[vonkaar]

Who said anything about rehabilitation? We've all been saying life without parole this whole time.

These laws are great to bitch about now but they are here to protect us from being unjustly convicted for crimes we didn't commit. The laws are in place for OUR protection... Innocent until proven guilty, remember? Everyone is entitled to due process.

[Adivina]

Vonk, does someone who has tortured, raped, and murdered someone deserve to be treated in a humane manner? I am just curious how you feel about that. Honestly I think being treated humanely is a privelage and once you start being inhumane you should lose the right to be treated humanely in return. I guess I just think those that murder, rape, torture, don't deserve to be treated with humanity seeing as they have decided that they do not have to treat others with it.

This isn't a loaded question, you just made a mention to keeping prisoners alive being humane, and I figure you are one person I can get a straight honest answer from.

[DangerPaul]

A lifetime in general population in prison is hardly humne for rapists / sex offenders.

[vonkaar]

There was a time where killing Indians who dared to walk on 'your' land was considered 'just' and the county even paid a bounty for their heads. That was a barbaric time, I'd say. We are much more civilized these days. You talk about what is humane and what isn't... that question is completely subjective. My opinion is that a human is a human is a human. A person's actions don't strip their humanity from them, anymore than the color of their skin or the god they pray to. I watch old Nazi documentaries and I wonder at the guards of the concentration camps... how they could just sit idly by and watch those millions of Jews and ethnic minorities be murdered like that. Some might say, "just following orders," but that's bullshit. That's STILL A HUMAN. In the eyes of the Nazi party, they had committed a crime and had to be murdered. We look back on that... we look back on our own forefathers who murdered millions of native americans and we wonder the same way... how could they do that to another human?

See, we feel like we have 'progressed' beyond those barbaric days where we'd pay soldiers to murder entire tribes of women and children... over land. The ethics and moral code changes with each generation. Each year, several countries join in on the ban for capital punishment. The citizens of these countries believe that it is immoral for the government to murder a prisoner - and changes are made. The world is becoming more civilized! The US, meanwhile, hangs out with Lybia, Sudan, China and Iran as the most barbaric countries in the world for our execution practices. I'm not saying that the rest of the world should be our moral beacon, I just think the company we keep is awfully sad.

And here we are, arguing about the same thing. ACTIONS do not change the fact that these are MEN and WOMEN that the government is killing. Do I want them to be punished? Of course I do. Will we occasionally screw up and send innocent people to jail? Of course - that's UNAVOIDABLE in our current system of justice. The short answer that I'm sure you are looking for is: No, I'm against the death penalty in all forms, regardless of the crime committed.

[vonkaar]

A lifetime in general population in prison is hardly humne for rapists / sex offenders.

That's probably true but it's hardly something that's regulated by law...

"Life Sentence, gang-raped at 6 month intervals."

[Gaazy]

let him fight lions with a pocket knife on national TV~

[Arlos]

found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt by a jury of their piers

See, that's the problem. How many news reports have we seen already just this year about people who were convicted of murder, (beyond a reasonable doubt and by a jury of their peers, obviously) but 20 years later additional evidence proved beyond beyond ANY doubt that they could not possibly have done the crime, and that person is immediately set free. Hell, I recall a story about someone who was on death row for decades who was just set free when he finally got someone to believe him and arrange for DNA testing.

Our justice system is in no way perfect. Innocent people ARE convicted of crimes they never comitted. There are many reasons why, from biased juries to incompetent defense attournies, etc. etc. I am with Vonk on this: if you imprison someone for life, and later evidence proves he was falsely convicted, you can still release him. If you've executed them, they're dead, and there's nothing you can do.

The possibility of the government killing an innocent person is just too horrible to contemplate. Imagine if that was YOU: you've done nothing whatsoever wrong, were not associated with a crime in any way, yet because of some situation beyond your control, you've just been convicted of a murder, and been sentenced to die. Imagine your fear and frustration as your execution day approaches (and very very rapidly if people like you had your way.) Saying it's unlikely is no defense, it happening ONCE is too many times, period.

Until we have a perfect system of determining who is and is not guilty of a crime, we cannot have the death penalty because of the potential for the state murdering innocent people. Given that we're human, and thus imperfect, I doubt sinceerely we'll EVER have a perfect system for determining guilt and innocence, and as a result, we should not have the death penalty.

In no way does that opinion change my belief that the person that did this is a monster (though still human, for all of that, and thus still possessed of those "inalienable rights" Jefferson spoke of), and makes me despair of humanity, that it would be capable of producing someone who could do those things. I meant it when i said maybe it's better if Humanity goes away if that's something we're capable of as a species. But death for death, torture for torture... these things we abandoned centuries ago, and for good reasons. Satisfying they may be to the primitive instincts, but that doesn't make them something we should follow. Obeying non-civilized instincts is what causes these problems in the first place, it does nothing to fix them.

-Arlos

[Adivina]

Sigh I had a big reply written up but I did it in the quick reply box and then accidently hit post reply instead of submitt so I lost it. Basically though thanks for a well explained and well thought out answer Vonk, it was actually a good read.

[Minrott]

/agree Vonk

[vonkaar]

let him fight lions with a pocket knife on national TV~

What if he won?

Talk about your ultimate backfire.

[vonkaar]

Sigh I had a big reply written up but I did it in the quick reply box and then accidently hit post reply instead of submitt so I lost it. Basically though thanks for a well explained and well thought out answer Vonk, it was actually a good read.

[Narrock]

let him fight lions with a pocket knife on national TV~

What if he won?

Talk about your ultimate backfire.

Then they would nerf pocket knives.

[Harrison]

If he wins, send in a pissed off elephant and give him a black dildo.

Nothing pisses off an elephant more than a fake-african dildo-sword.

[DangerPaul]

If he wins, send in a pissed off elephant and give him a black dildo.

Nothing pisses off an elephant more than a fake-african dildo-sword.

maybe that works on you, but not elephants of the wild... ohsnap!

[Harrison]

So fake-african-dildo-swords anger me?

That's not much of an insult

I think there's been a real slump with the insults on me lately, I think you guys have lost your heart for it.

[DangerPaul]

I was calling you an elephant, fatty

[vonkaar]

I think there's been a real slump with the insults on me lately, I think you guys have lost your heart for it.

You lost weight and that took the fun out of things.

[Harrison]

lmao

So that's it?

[Jay]

I dunno man, you're actually kinda funny and somewhat likeable lately. My propensity for dishing out vicious insults to you is waning. Please remind me again why I think you're a douche and the insults will come back.

[vonkaar]

say something stupid so I can be mean again