You and I have been over this in detail on here before. I went in search of evidence from the huge number of countries that have abolished the dp, and the evidence I found wasn't quite what I was seeking, as I said at the time, as I was expecting and hoping to find some evidence that abolition had a positive effect in reducing capital crimes, a reflection of a less brutal and brutalised society. What I found, and I posted up the evidence, was that there really is no measurable effect either way. The old chestnut that the dp is a deterrent does need putting to bed, though. It really isn't, even if it might not be shown to be the brutalising cause of evil that I had rather hoped it might be.
thats the cheating god angle. Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord
Because of all the other reasons that we've discussed over the years. And of course it's still highly likely that capital punishment would have deterred at least some murders, and almost certain that it would deter many violent crimes where death was a possible outcome but not the intended one.
No it's not. kinell. No amount of evidence will make you change your view on this, eh?
You've never shown ANY evidence to the contrary!!!No it's not. kinell. No amount of evidence will make you change your view on this, eh?
Yes I have. I'm not digging it out again. You can search my posts if you don't remember. The evidence to the contrary comes from the dozens of countries that have abolished the dp and the lack of any measurable effect of that abolition on murder rates. The evidence for 'no or negligible effect' is strong.
Show us those studies then. Nobody has posted one that isn't full of holes on these boards in the 17 years that I've been here.
Clichéd bollocks. And those stats aren't the evidence you pretend them to be, as explained.
No. That was disputed. Either the countries had de-facto abolished the DP decades earlier anyway, thus rendering your stats meaningless for the purpose of judging deterrence, or you were comparing apples with oranges, iirc.
Spymaster is right about one thing in this, which is that there's a correlation/causation problem here. The states without the dp tend to be less unequal by many measures, have better standards of social care, etc, than those with it.
by no means. pa's often right. in contrast to your mealy-mouthed liberal tosh, which is in so many instances wrong.
yeh. lbj doesn't do evidence, pa.
Disputed by you. I took evidence from lots of places to avoid the apples/oranges problem. The best position regarding deterrence is the one that best explains the evidence - and that is that it has no measurable effect either way.
yeh. where do you stand on the deterrent sentences meted out to e.g. cop killers in this country?No it's not. kinell. No amount of evidence will make you change your view on this, eh?
Not the point. What is likely is that criminals will go out of their way NOT to kill people if the ultimate sanction exists. After the abolition of the death penalty in the UK there was an enormous spike in violent crime; GBH and the like. Some thinking suggests that this was in part due to criminals now being more prepared to use extreme violence knowing that if they killed someone they'd still live. Not the strongest argument, for sure, but difficult to rule out absolutely.
Another cliché that comes up in this, time and time again. Many criminals doubt they'll get caught and some expect to sooner or later. Either way this is useless regarding deterrence.
if you don't think you'll get caught, you won't think of the deterrent. why do so many people break the law regarding drugs, for example?
Do you accept that some people don't commit some crimes because of the fear of getting caught?
utter tosh
not to mention your drug-induced paranoia, pa
