hopper on 4/7/2008 at 18:58
No, I didn't just say it's different. I pointed out why war and lethal actions by the police are fundamentally different from capital punishment. Lethal action against an aggressor, be it a common criminal or a hostile state, is justified imo a) in self-defense (examples: USA attacking Japan after Pearl Harbor, someone trying to kill you), or b) in defense of others (examples: bombing of the Bosnian Serb army, someone trying to kill your GBM). I also said that once you're able to control your adversary, there is no more need for lethal action. Lethal action includes execution.
Secondly, I thought it goes without saying that we were talking strictly about state-sanctioned killings, so a cop killing a shoplifter because the donut store was out of his favourite jelly brand is clearly out of bounds.
As for applying those principles to specific examples like the US civil war, that's a tricky business, because there are so many shades of grey. Some wars are more clear-cut than others. We'd never be able to agree, in each and every case, about who was the "real" aggressor, when an attack was primarily in self-defense, etc. But that's a different can of worms and doesn't mean that "kill only in defense, and stop it once you're in control" as a principle must be discarded.
Edit: And I'm a born and bred Norwegian, but I've lived virtually all my adult life in Germany. :)
SubJeff on 4/7/2008 at 19:55
I get you hopper. This is what I was saying about choice Starr (though it may have been on the PMs). In war you mostly have no choices because one its declared someone is going to attack something. You can rabbit on about who started it when why where 'til the end of time - but if it's started then that's what it is (chief).
But when you have someone strapped down on that lethal injection table you are not in danger, you can do what you want with them - be that free them or imprison them for X amount of time - and you have the choice to make; kill or not.
heretic on 4/7/2008 at 20:55
Quote Posted by Aerothorn
2. The other commonly discussed problem with the death penalty is that it gets involved in serious problems with the American court system. Namely, pretty much all of the people on death row are poor, and a hugely disproportionate number of them are minorities. If you're rich and white, you generally don't get the death penalty unless it's a really high-profile case.
All the same, the actual raw numbers ((
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=5&did=184#deathrowpop) in terms of race) may surprise you. Scroll to the bottom for a state by state comparison. (As given by the NAACP.)
WAREAGLE on 4/7/2008 at 20:56
Quote Posted by SD
Cost should not be an issue when you are determining what is just. So what if it's a little more expensive to keep someone alive than it is to kill them; if keeping them alive is the right thing to do, then the expense is an irrelevancy.
But how would it be determined that keeping someone locked up for life is the right thing to do? A 99 year sentence, for example, would mean you'd die in jail. Do you think that it would be worse to sit and do nothing in a little room for the rest of your life, or just get it over with? Personally, I don't know if I'd prefer the cell or execution. Being locked up till the end of your days would basically become psychological torture.
SubJeff on 4/7/2008 at 21:17
PERSONS EXECUTED FOR INTERRACIAL MURDERS IN THE U.S. SINCE 1976
Ha ha what. I saw Mississippi Burning. You can't fool me.
Thirith on 4/7/2008 at 21:48
Quote Posted by Gingerbread Man
See, now people are saying "where's the line?"
The rest of us are saying there isn't, and shouldn't be, a hard and fast line. No criteria, no checklists. These things cannot be rubberstamped any more than we'd want to consign all thieves to prison for ten years regardless. All this talk about aggravating circumstances conveniently forgets that there are plenty of cases with mitigating circumstances so compelling and understandable that sometimes it is considered not necessarily morally correct to have committed a crime, but at least not morally incorrect. If that makes sense.
There's never a good reason to presort complex phenomena, and anyone who asks for a clearly delineated point beyond which things change is either deluded or attempting to set up a wonderful strawman with which to harass any poor sucker stupid enough to fall into that particular trap.
The thing is, though, that there's a fundamental difference between condemning someone to x years in prison and condemning someone to death. The latter is an either/or proposition: either the criminal is put to death or he isn't. The stark clarity of this would require a similar amount of clarity in the sentencing, as far as I'm concerned. It's exactly because degree of guilt is such a fuzzy concept that I don't believe it translates in any feasible, just way into the binary proposition that is the death sentence. Crime is a complex phenomenon - the death penalty isn't.
SubJeff on 4/7/2008 at 22:06
So if some says they did it, they were seen doing it and it's on video them doing it how clear is that for you?
WAREAGLE on 5/7/2008 at 07:33
Quote Posted by Thirith
It's exactly because degree of guilt is such a fuzzy concept...
What are you saying here exactly, that you don't think proven guilt can be absolute?
The death sentence definitely needs to be handed down accordingly. Lets say, 3 credible witnesses to a murder gets a death sentence. Do you think that acceptable, or is guilt always in question for you?
Thirith on 5/7/2008 at 08:07
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
So if some says they did it, they were seen doing it and it's on video them doing it how clear is that for you?
That's why I said 'degree of guilt'. Bleeding heart that I am, I do think that a criminal's background, his life, his psychological health - all these things should have something of an influence on the sentence. Not to the point that someone is no longer guilty of a crime, obviously, but if someone who is subject to schizoid episodes commits the same crime as someone who isn't, would you give them the same punishment?
Scots Taffer on 5/7/2008 at 08:33
Quote Posted by Stitch
Why wouldn't I?
I'm curious then as to the real-world, demonstrable differences between an entire life spent in a cell versus state-sanctioned murder.
That is, if that was ever really an option ... which it isn't. The fact remains that life imprisonment without possibility of parole is so rare that essentially they can be "free" again at some stage.
