How does Oppo feel about the death penalty?

"Slant6" (slant-6) 03/20/2016 at 00:24 • Filed to: None

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I’m against it but I watched an episode of the new (2003) Dragnet and some of these people are really messed up, and what they do is really messed up. And I’m starting to reconsider my position, but at the same time I don’t want to stoop to their level.

TheHondaBro > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:29

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I’m all for it. If some madman blows up a stadium knowing that the maximum penalty is x years in prison with free food, shelter and whatnot, it doesn’t deter them from committing that crime. If the penalty is death, however, they’d think twice about it.

Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:29

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Against, but I also struggle to understand how someone can be truly evil.

Slant6 > TheHondaBro 03/20/2016 at 00:31

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In that case, what if we just low key had a death row but no death penalty?

Slant6 > Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch 03/20/2016 at 00:32

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It’s very hard to comprehend. I want to believe everyone can be reformed, but I’m no expert on anything.

Urambo Tauro > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:32

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In favor, but only for extreme cases. Other solutions must be considered first. It is supposed to be, after all, a last resort.

Luke's Dad Sold His 2000TL To Get a Sienna > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:32

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It’s one of those things that I feel should be considered on a case by case basis. I think that the ultimate punishment should be given to the ultimate crime, but the counter argument I’ve heard is that there have been people wrongfully executed before.

promoted by the color red > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:33

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I oppose it because of the possibility that the judge/juries/experts got it wrong. Too many cases of people spending decades on death row only to find out that some cop or bureaucrat lied or cut some corners.

shop-teacher > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:33

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I’m conflicted. There are some clearly evil people that I’d love to not keep alive and fed. The problem is that many people have been later found to be innocent while on death row. I feel obligated then to not have the death penalty, because the justice system is run by people, and people make mistakes and do things wrong sometimes.

TheHondaBro > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:34

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That would be a little more humane than the death penalty, but I’m still an advocate of euthanasia for any sort of extremely violent crime. The son of a bitch that shot up that school in Connecticut should have been killed.

Slant6 > TheHondaBro 03/20/2016 at 00:40

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But aren’t we better than him? Why should the government decide if he lives or dies?

We all have a right to life, and he may have taken that right from many people but it doesn’t mean we get to take away his. I think prison should be to remove dangerous individuals from society, not get vengeance.

Slant6 > shop-teacher 03/20/2016 at 00:41

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The convict is also a human that made a mistake.

Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen > shop-teacher 03/20/2016 at 00:41

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This.

The moment we have a perfect justice system, no problem. Till then, forget it - the moral risk isn't justified.

samssun > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:41

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Gustavo Palmas Reyes, 42 with a wife and family back in Mexico, came home to his Anaheim apartment in 2005 to find that his girlfriend had cooked dinner. Since he wasn’t hungry, he rewarded her effort by beating her to death, going drinking with his friends, then raping her 12 year old developmentally disabled daughter. I have zero reservations about the death penalty for any crime which involves a conscious decision to ruin a life.

Xyl0c41n3 > TheHondaBro 03/20/2016 at 00:41

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The death penalty doesn’t actually serve as a deterrent to capital crimes, though. And the ever-increasing number of defendants who have been exonorated thanks to new technology (mainly DNA and an evolving understanding of the faultiness of eye witness accounts), is definitely a powerful argument for why the death penalty is not a good idea, ESPECIALLY when some of those defendants have thusly been exonorated AFTER their executions. But if none of THAT sways you, then look at it another way: from a cost perspective alone, it is prohibitively expensive to conduct a state-sanctioned killing. Those defendants are entitled to numerous, numerous appeals, which are all incredibly costly, each and every one.

Then there’s the fact that at least two states now have resorted to less-than-legal, or outright ILLEGAL methods for obtaining the chemicals needed to conduct an execution as a result of European drug suppliers effectively refusing to sell them for those purposes. And of the executions that have been carried out since those drug supply chains were severed, the new Frankensteined cocktails that have been used have caused excruciating deaths. One inmate took so long to die that he was given over a dozen times the lethal amount and was in such horrible and VISIBLE agony as he was dying that the viewing was ended prematurely. A journalist who was in the viewing room during the execution later reported being sickened by the nature of the inmate’s death.

Flavien Vidal > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:41

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Death penalty don’t do anything to keep insane people from doing insane things... Utterly against, especially when considering how many innocents get killed every year by what is nothing else other than state sponsored murder.

Bman76 (no it doesn't need a WS6 hood) M. Arch > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:41

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I feel the same way. At some level I feel that we have to rise above the cyclical nature of anger, but I also know that I’m the exception not the rule.

Biggus Dickus (RevsBro) > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:42

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Use it less frequently. There are some fuck out there who certainly deserve it. However, get rid of the lethal injecton crap and bring back the firing squad. Quick, efficient, and cheap.

Slant6 > samssun 03/20/2016 at 00:43

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But you just made a conscious decision to end a life.

DrJohannVegas > TheHondaBro 03/20/2016 at 00:43

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There has been nearly 50 years worth of empirical research on this claim. At “best”, the results are too disparate (and the change in policy too infrequent) to make a strong case one way or the other (that capital punishment increases or decreases some types of crime). At the “worst”, the presence capital punishment seems to lead to outcomes in criminality which are no different than in its absence.

TL;DR: “If the penalty is death, however, they’d think twice about it.” - Probably not.

Edit: One example of the continued effort to find an effect: http://aler.oxfordjournals.org/content/11/2/3…

Flavien Vidal > TheHondaBro 03/20/2016 at 00:44

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?? Adam Lanza killed himself before the Police even got to him...

Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen > TheHondaBro 03/20/2016 at 00:46

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Except that for the religious nut jobs martyrdom beats prison, for the plain ordinary nut jobs they’re not thinking that far ahead, and for crims in general they’re not that hot on cause and effect or they wouldn’t be crims. I don’t think death penalty as deterrence works.

BugEyedBimmer - back in the Saddle Dakota Leather > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:46

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But is just setting them aside really providing closure to their victims’ families? I think at the time of the event, the needs of the victim, or the ones they leave behind take precedence. In that situation, would jail for life give you any solace or closure if it was your kid/parent/sibling/spouse/friend?

samssun > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:47

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Did I need to include the word “innocent”? Everyone has rights and freedoms until they choose to give them up violating others’ rights...unless you consider prison to be kidnapping.

Daily Drives a Dragon - One Last Lap > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:47

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Highly conflicted.

V12 Jake- Hittin' Switches > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:48

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I’m all for it. If you’re so fucked up that you can consciously shoot up a school full of 8 year olds I have absolutely no sympathy. I think the lethal injection system is a waste of time and money, and if we had a more efficient method (firing squad, guillotine, ect) there wouldn’t be such a long, expensive wait on death row. And I agree with The Honda Bro about the death penalty being a deterrent. I have no problem “stooping to the level” of a mass murderer or a child molester, if they can do something that horrendous then they can face the music and pay for thier actions too.

Flavien Vidal > TheHondaBro 03/20/2016 at 00:49

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And make them win by making them martyrs? You do understand that the goal of most terrorist is to get killed so that other fanatics adore him him and follow his path right? If the terrorist never gets killed on the other hand, it’s been proven that his aura diminishes among his follower,as, being still alive, he is considered to have sort of failed his mission.

And for the rest of them who are crazy enough to go and kill dozen of people randomly, most don’t give a single fuck about dying. Spending 50 or 60 years, isolated for all contact in jail on the other end, now, that’s hell! There insane mind keeps on running and running and they have no one to share their thoughts with... It’s often the worst that could happen to people like these and the prime reason why they killed many people: to be noticed. A lack of audience is terrible for these people.

shop-teacher > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:50

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The convict may be an evil sack of shit who knew exactly what they were doing, I suspect most of the ones in capital cases are, but we as lowly humans aren’t going to be able to hit 100% in determining the truly evil ones from the wrongfully convicted. Since death is 100% final, we have to be 100% accurate in dishing it out. Otherwise we’re evil too.

PorkchoPlissken > Xyl0c41n3 03/20/2016 at 00:50

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Not saying that I agree or disagree with the direction that you lean on this complex issue, but this will probably be the comment in this thread that has factual merit. For that, I applaud you.

Slant6 > BugEyedBimmer - back in the Saddle Dakota Leather 03/20/2016 at 00:51

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I’m sure I would think about it more if I was in this situation. But I do think I would find some solace in that I am better than they are, and I don’t kill. Also that they won’t be hurting anyone else.

Slant6 > shop-teacher 03/20/2016 at 00:53

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I could get behind the 100% clause. It would be a compromise, for me at least.

For Sweden > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 00:54

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Cash for clunkers was a travesty of justice

Xyl0c41n3 > PorkchoPlissken 03/20/2016 at 00:55

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Oh yay! Brownie points from my very own personal Romeo! I think I'm getting a case of the vapors. Please excuse me while I swoon.

Slant6 > samssun 03/20/2016 at 00:59

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That is an interesting point, the prison being kidnapping thing.

Although prison keeps this person from taking more lives all without taking their right to life. I feel like the right to life is a big one. Killing them doesn’t bring anyone back to life.

jj1013 > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 01:04

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It’s not about “bringing anyone back to life”, it’s simple: actions have consequences. The consequences you earn for murdering an innocent is that you forfeit your own life.

TheHondaBro > Flavien Vidal 03/20/2016 at 01:05

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Oh right, I forgot.

samssun > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 01:07

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It’s completely logical to me that when you choose to violate others’ rights, you forfeit your own claim to the same. The degree to which you do so determines how much you forfeit, so if you knowingly destroy one or more lives, you give up the right to your own.

It’s precisely because those actions can’t be undone that there should be no “rehabilitation”...heinous acts should mean complete removal from society, not expensive babysitting. For me that means death penalty, unless we can bring back remote penal colonies.

Slant6 > jj1013 03/20/2016 at 01:09

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But then wouldn’t we have to kill the executioner? And then kill the person that killed them? And then have someone kill that person?

PorkchoPlissken > Xyl0c41n3 03/20/2016 at 01:12

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You should also be expecting flowers on your doorstep

PorkchoPlissken > Daily Drives a Dragon - One Last Lap 03/20/2016 at 01:16

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This is the most logical opinion to have.

DancesWithRotors - Driving Insightfully > PorkchoPlissken 03/20/2016 at 01:17

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Dude, that gives /me/ the fucking creeps, and it wasn’t addressed to me. You’re coming across as a desperate, irritating, creepy potential axe murderer level of creep, here.

Not. Fucking. Cool.

PorkchoPlissken > DancesWithRotors - Driving Insightfully 03/20/2016 at 01:29

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Dude, you have no idea what you’re talking about. I think she knows it wasn’t anything like that. Apologies if it came across that way, but don’t stir up anything without having background or context. Again...not intended as creepy.

Xyl0c41n3 > PorkchoPlissken 03/20/2016 at 01:36

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Actually, he knows exactly what he’s talking about because I’ve found all of your comments — the invitations to drink with you in your underwear, the mock marriage proposals, and now this comment about sending flowers to my door — to be extremely creepy.

PorkchoPlissken > Xyl0c41n3 03/20/2016 at 01:41

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Well look, just so you know, all I was ever doing was attempting to lighten the mood of our conversations, nothing more, just figured that was understood. Please accept my apology, I was never creeping. Also accept my resignation from the internet because I’m apparently terrible at it.

M54B30 > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 01:48

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As a Catholic I’m supposed to oppose it, but I can’t. I feel some crimes and criminals are just so heinous that the victim’s family(ies) needs appropriate closure.

It’s tough. If I find myself bothered by the fact that someone is being put to death by the state, I find that reading their conviction and the severity of their deeds will have me asking to flip the switch by the time I’m done reading.

El Rivinado > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 02:04

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I was all for it, but overtime with my Libertarian views becoming clearer and the advent of differing viewpoints, I’ve come to be more or less neutral on the subject. My view now is like abortion, I understand why some are for it, I understand why some are against it, but in the end, it exists and its a state’s choice to go about how to handle it.

I believe that not everyone on Death Row is guilty of the crimes they commit, everyone makes mistakes we are in fact human. I also do not believe that the death penalty is not an effective deterrent for violent offenders not to do violent things, if that were the case, the prison system would have a 100 percent success rate. It’s very dubious about what makes it more “right” to kill someone than someone else, especially on the state level and not just a personal level, and the whole “Violence begats violence” thing opens up a whole can of worms about one of the more grey parts regarding morality and what’s okay and what’s not. So, in that sense, I understand why some people would be against the death penalty.

However, I’m not naïve enough to think that rehabilitation is going to work. The fact of the matter is, some people in this world are just sick and evil, and they like doing things like that for no other reason than they do what they want when they want, or worse, they just get off on it. The fact of the matter is, some people are just evil, and when you observe pure evil, you can’t combat it by trying to make it good. People like Manson, Dahmer, Gacey, Bundy, and others are proof positive of that philosophy that evil will manifest in ways that require no outside sources. No matter how much some people wish that you can cure every person who does a murderous misdeed by simply getting in a circle and talking about how Daddy never hugged them as a kid, the fact of the matter is that’s not always going to be the case. Some people can’t be saved, no matter how much you wish that we’re true, and its better to just do a scorched earth strategy, rather than try and waste money, effort, and time trying to rehabilitate someone into society who will never truly be fixed or save. In that case, the death penalty makes complete sense.

But the fact of the matter is, there’s no right or wrong way to go about dealing with the subject at hand. Its a grey topic that has no black and white, yes/no, right/wrong answer, ultimately it just comes down to what you believe and your reasons for doing so. If you believe the death penalty is wrong for the moral myopia the act pertains itself to, that’s understandable, but not everyone will feel that way. For what it’s worth, I was strongly for the death penalty, like I said, it was one of the few things I would not bend or change to. In some cases, what I said in the last paragraph is stuff I still ascribe too. But, at the same time, I also understand why some people have their convictions about using it as means of punishment to a crime. So, like I said, my view has lessened and become a bit more neutral. You’re not going to get a straight answer, its too complex a question, but hopefully my comment gives you some insight why some of us would be for it rather than against it.

slipperysallylikespenguins > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 02:14

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In support of the death penalty. As others have mentioned, actions have consequences. You intentionally take an innocent life, you should be killed (insane or not I do not care). I do believe that it should only be for 100% proven guilty. I don’t think there should be numerous appeals and decades long arguments. For instance the Aurora theater shooter is still alive, he was obviously guilty to all and should have been killed within a week. I think they should reinstate the gas chamber/ hanging/ firing squad, there is no reason to be spending millions on chemical cocktails to kill people.

On another note, prisons should be hell. Forced labor should be part of every prisoners day, especially the white collar criminals. They shouldn’t have tvs and internet. Repeated sex offenders/ pedophiles should be visually distinguished while in prison so everyone knows their crimes.

I do however believe that prisons should offer geds/job training to rehabilitate them into the workplace and end their criminal cycle. Drug enforcement laws also need to be relaxed, as they are proven to be uneffective and a huge cause of the overpopulation and spiraling costs of prisons.

This is just my opinion and will most certainly never happen.

iaintafraidofnoghost > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 05:31

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For it in terms of a response to really heinous acts, but against it due to insane legal costs. It is actually cheaper to keeper the piece of scum alive than to fry them.

pip bip - choose Corrour > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 06:16

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i’m for it!

i wish it was an option here in Australia.

Blind Willie Tyresmoke Namington IV > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 07:06

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I went to a psychiatric hospital some time ago to visit one of my relatives. He was labelled as “mad” and knowing him you could even say that it was fair. But then going out you see all these people in pyjamas smoking one cigarette after the other, having nothing to do. They had nothing on their face to say that they were mad and I bet that if we were standing there smoking in pyjama we would be looking just as mental.

All of this to say that many times it’s hard to judge what is going on inside someone’s head. I don’t trust doctors, newspapers or “ol’ stories”. They don’t know the truth. They know at best one half of it and make up the other.

Nobody is ever forever lost. Also, punishing has never stopped things from happening. It’s a case of do we want to understand what caused this problem or do we not?

Wrong Wheel Drive (41%) > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 08:51

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I am against "life in prison" sentences and for the death penalty. But only in that case! I don't support having both. In the current state, there should not be a death penalty since there is too much uncertainty. But if someone is convicted to life in prison, I think we should not waste time with that. It is essentially a death penalty with the execution method being death from old age. So I would rather just get it over with quicker and have all life sentences instead be immediate death.

Wrong Wheel Drive (41%) > Xyl0c41n3 03/20/2016 at 08:55

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That is an issue with the execution method, not execution in itself. Make it actually quick and painless and then it becomes a much better idea. Why not use a room filled with carbon monoxide? They will fall asleep and not wake up.

Renescent > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 11:10

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I think that, if you went from your guilty sentencing to out back of the courthouse for execution (sic) of said sentencing, it’d be a MUCH bigger deterrent ;-)

Elumerere > slipperysallylikespenguins 03/20/2016 at 11:44

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Wow, are you a vengeful person..

jimz > Slant6 03/20/2016 at 12:09

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1) I think it’s useless as a “deterrent”

2) I’m not 100% opposed to it, there are some people who are irreparably “Broken” who cannot be rehabilitated (not that our “corrections” system even tries)

3) in cases where I think it would be justified, I think the standard of proof would have to be more stringent than what’s required for a conviction (“evidence beyond a reasonable doubt.”) IMO it would have to be moved up to “evidence beyond a shadow of a doubt” at least.

DancesWithRotors - Driving Insightfully > PorkchoPlissken 03/21/2016 at 17:48

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jj1013 > Slant6 05/13/2016 at 19:45

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False. The executioner is not committing murder, as the murderer is not an innocent. Killing and murder are two different things. Killing is ending a life prematurely. Murder is killing someone who did not do anything to deserve it (i.e. not threatening the life of another human being).

Slant6 > jj1013 05/13/2016 at 21:29

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So the executioner is a killer. Still something that gets a prison sentence.

Really there’s no way to justify killing. At least for me. Maybe I’m just too forgiving and more sensitive than other people.

By your justification of killing if I kill someone that deserves to die I’m fine. The thing is how do we judge wether or not someone deserves to die? Don’t tell me the courts, they’ve been wrong countless times. It’s on the judgement of the killer. Which really is no different than muder.

jj1013 > Slant6 05/14/2016 at 14:41

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Read it again. All killing is not murder, murder is a specific type of killing. Murder is what justifies a prison sentence. Killing in self-defense or an accidental death do not rate prison sentences. You can’t tell when killing can be justified? Its simple: the person in question is threatening the lives of innocents. A murderer is someone who took someone’s life without his own life or anyone else’s being threatened. When an executioner executes a murderer, the murderer it’s not an innocent, hence the executioner does not rate punishment.

You’re not “more forgiving” or “more sensitive”, you’re just coddled and sheltered. Evil people exist and they have no qualms about ending a life in order to gain possessions or because of a difference of religion or ethnicity etc, your lack of willingness to accept that fact does not protect you from them. Being soft and wishy-wasn’t only ensures that they will run roughshod over you. Those of us who confront evil on a frequent basis as a profession do not have these kinds of misconceptions and understand the firmness with which these kinds of people must be dealt.