DD Social Thread (v1)

[bernie1227]

In my mind, there is Anders most definitely should receive the death sentence, if killing 77 innocents to keep Norway 'pure' isn't enough to get the death sentence, I don't know what is.

[james438]

From your perspective what common reasons do conservatives have for the death penalty? It is interesting reading the reasons why people do not like the death penalty.

EDIT: I spend a lot of time listening to reasons for the death penalty and conservative positions on the other issues that I forget how the other side sees these issues.

[jscheuer1]

In my mind, there is Anders most definitely should receive the death sentence, if killing 77 innocents to keep Norway 'pure' isn't enough to get the death sentence, I don't know what is.

Nothing from my point of view. It harms no one to keep him in jail until he dies.

If you feel that no matter what a person's possible potential for good, if they violate the rules they should be punished in the most extreme way possible . . . well, and this has no bearing on your personal beliefs in this matter, I just hope no one, not even you are ever held to that standard for their own transgressions.

[bernie1227]

Well if he's going to die in jail, he might as well die directly, with no chance of release. By law, he has to be released after 22 years. And in my opinion, no person who kills 77 people for their own misguided beliefs should be allowed to walk free.

I'm not planning on killing anyone John.

[jscheuer1]

From your perspective what common reasons do conservatives have for the death penalty? It is interesting reading the reasons why people do not like the death penalty.

They have the reasons that they have. Fear is often the root motivation for the desire to have someone put to death.

[keyboard]

They have the reasons that they have. Fear is often the root motivation for the desire to have someone put to death.

I disagree. I believe it's more about revenge...

[bernie1227]

eye for an eye, or in anders case, 77 eyes.

on a lighter and entirely unrelated note, I just downloaded opera ^o^

[keyboard]

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
how could you???

[keyboard]

^It was supposed to all be capslocked.... *curses*

[djr33]

Who knows? he might make a significant contribution of some sort.

I don't like this argument. I've heard it, and it's reasonable. I just don't personally like it. Everyone might contribute, including the people he killed. Perhaps he needs to be given a paintbrush to create wonderful paintings, or let out of jail to run for president. That's rational too. But few people would agree with it. There are already so many people on this planet (and lots of "what ifs" beyond that-- I find the argument against abstinence-- "what about all of the potential people"-- to be just about as rational as this one).
What reason is there to believe that a death row or life-in-prison prisoner is specifically going to be the only person who can contribute something? If they, let's say, cure cancer, why would they be the only ones to be able to do that?

And there just aren't many folks like Anders. I would guess that most people that are put to death allegedly killed just one person, and that there probably were extenuating circumstances not allowed in the sentencing phase.

That's fine. I agree that the reasons for the death penalty (in specific cases) need to be worked out in detail and that it must be only the extreme cases. But in itself that's not a reason to not consider it as an option. Why should it be removed as a possibility rather than considered a very very rare lasts resort for extreme cases?
For example, here's a hypothetical prisoner-- he has killed a handful of people without remorse and is guilty-- in fact, he killed someone else inside prison; no, let's say he killed three other people at different times, including a guard; then he found a way to escape and he killed more people. In fact, clearly he's simply too smart to be contained by the system-- he'll escape again. Is the death penalty then acceptable?
All of your objections are fair, and I would be perfectly happy with some sort of ethics board that oversees all of these decisions to make sure that everything is beyond "beyond a reasonable doubt" and so forth. But none of this convinces me even slightly that the concept is inappropriate or should be completely unavailable in the extreme cases.

... Life is precious. A human life can yield so much richness not just to the individual living it, but to civilization as a whole. Snuffing one out without ever knowing, and one never can, if that life might make a valuable contribution is at least as insane as the murder the person is accused of in the first place.

There is one huge flaw in your argument-- "life is precious"-- there certainly must be some prisoners who are sentenced to death who do not believe life is precious. Not all-- I'm sure some understand it or perhaps learn it in prison. But to the extent that there are prisoners who completely fall outside the scope of this perspective, I really don't see why it would make any sense.



There is another crucial point to be brought up about Texas, though. Although that website didn't have very clear statistics for every year, it's clear to me that what they're doing isn't working. They didn't succeed in scaring anyone away from committing crimes. They're just executing people at a constant rate. There's no argument then that their policy is at all relevant beyond each individual case-- there should be less crime in Texas than other states if that were the case, and it's not.