Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
I'll decide the questions I ask, if that's ok with you.
Do you agree that some people can be guilty of a crime beyond all doubt whatsoever?
(This is where you go all quiet again, isn't it?)
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Should the death penalty be reintroduced in the UK?
- Thread starter planetgeli
- Start date
I'll decide the questions I ask, if that's ok with you.
Do you agree that some people can be guilty of a crime beyond all doubt whatsoever?
(This is where you go all quiet again, isn't it?)
PR1Berske
Alligator in chains by the park gates.
No.
Sorry to only get here on page 6, I hope I don't duplicate too many posts already made. I'm resolute and firmly against the death penalty and have had stand up rows in workplaces because of it
Capital punishment is revenge, not justice. It's a hideous act of bloodlust disguised as democracy. I can't shake knowing how other countries with the death penalty have very distant relationships with the rule of law and of justice, including in sharp focus the USA, the very centre of the death penalty complex.
From being called "too liberal" to "woke" I've stood my ground on this for as long as I remember. Big fat no
Sorry to only get here on page 6, I hope I don't duplicate too many posts already made. I'm resolute and firmly against the death penalty and have had stand up rows in workplaces because of it
Capital punishment is revenge, not justice. It's a hideous act of bloodlust disguised as democracy. I can't shake knowing how other countries with the death penalty have very distant relationships with the rule of law and of justice, including in sharp focus the USA, the very centre of the death penalty complex.
From being called "too liberal" to "woke" I've stood my ground on this for as long as I remember. Big fat no
PR1Berske
Alligator in chains by the park gates.
I've read and heard this view plenty of times and I do understand the point, though I look from a different perspective. Robert Thompson (sp?) knows who he is, and what he did. Even under a new name and all that, it can't ever leave him, and unless everything is under wraps (and Jon Venabals (sp?) proves things aren't always under wraps) he has never killed or abused againI can't shake the feeling that all the things the victims can longer do - eat/sleep/drink/exercise etc. the perpetrator still can
Killers are twisted and perverted. And they'll die under that shadow. They're rarely ever "free". I can't accept that killing them is justice for their crime: they die, never having to think about their crime again. That doesn't sound like fairness.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Here it is again; 'the death penalty is not punishment enough'
Aaronf
Bizarro Aaronf
This is interesting via looking at it from the opposite perspective. I guess it's dependant on the levels of remorse shown but even if there is none, a lifetime of thoughts and it could appear and that is one 'fairness' they potentially have do deal with.
Although, and I am being a bit devils advocate here, but revenge in the right circumstances is rational and useful.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
As prison psychiatrist Gwen Adshed points out, when someone who has done a truly terrible thing arrives at a moment where they feel remorse for their actions and understand the suffering they have caused, at that moment, they are in grave danger of suicide. It's her job to help people to reach that position, but it is not an easy position at all. I would advise anyone who thinks the idea of rehabilitation is a soft one to listen to Adshed's excellent Reith lectures on the subject. They're on BBC Sounds.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Dystopiary
All this aristocracy has really got to stop.
Who gets to be the executioner? It's not a mentally healthy job. In reality it would likely be someone employed by a company like G4S.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
No. It's a meaningless, useless question.
I'm not arguing with you any more on this. It's like arguing with editor about meat.
The answer is 'no' btw. Not in the way you want it to be 'yes'. We don't live in a certain world like that.
I'm not arguing with you any more on this. It's like arguing with editor about meat.
The answer is 'no' btw. Not in the way you want it to be 'yes'. We don't live in a certain world like that.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Again, you do this a lot.
You've realised that answering the question destroys your argument, so you refuse.
It's very dishonest.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Ok. So you disagree (for example) that Axel Ruducabana is guilty beyond all doubt whatsoever?
You disagree that Anders Breivik is similarly unequivocally guilty?
newme
Giant in Pastyland now
If there isn't beyond doubt why are people being found guilty at all?
If there are different levels of beyond doubt, then that defeats the entire purpose of being guilty. Relegates it to best guess?
Aaronf
Bizarro Aaronf
I agree that no-one ever really knows what is going on inside that person's head except themselves. Even then, their brain chemicals may have completely failed them and who knows what is going on? I think this is a debate that people will look at from their conscience or their behaviour. For example my brain chemicals have failed me several times but I'd be mortified if I ever had so much as an overdue library book, it's fascinating how no 2 people would be the same.
There are of course professionals like the person you mentioned who will be trained in certain areas and we need as many of those as possible.
Dr. Furface
One small step for me
I’m against the death penalty but I find this idea attractive, certainly for those with no hope of ever being released. In that circumstance I fail to see any point in keeping them alive, they’re just using up valuable state resources, often for decades, so what’s the point keeping them alive if they’d rather die anyway?
Of course it definitely shouldn’t happen if other citizens with terminal illnesses aren’t permitted the option of assisted dying, but it’s all hypothetical anyway as I know it’ll never happen.
The short answer is No.
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Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
These are questions perhaps better directed at littlebabyjesus .
He's been insisting that it's impossible to be absolutely certain of someone's guilt, and so to be able to avoid executing innocent individuals.
I've just given him two examples of people who are guilty with absolute certainty. There are many others.
newme
Giant in Pastyland now
Well not really, you are introducing the concept of absolutely certainty, thats a second level of guilty. Which questions all levels below that. If you aren't absolutely certain why are they guilty at all? Introduces a level of doubt.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
I don't think the concept of ultimate certainty for the ultimate sanction is particularly controversial is it?
newme
Giant in Pastyland now
I think the concept of being ultimately certain is not possible. At minimum it is open to interpretation and abuse especially by those with an agenda. Then it cannot be undone.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
In that case perhaps you can do a better job than LBJ.
Are you not absolutely certain of the guilt of Breivik and Ruducabana?
Do you think there's a chance that they might not have done it?
newme
Giant in Pastyland now
Absolutely no idea, I have only seen media reports on this which could be wildly inaccurate (I don't think they are but that isn't enough for me). Look at the reports on Elon Musk's Nazi salute, it's been portrayed widely as not that or things that did not even exist. Video can be faked, pictures can be faked, pretty much anything can be now, that wasn't and is still being denied.
Generally I am against killing people, if someone is found innocent after 40 years its horrendous but they aren't dead. If they are dead then thats the end of it. Many on death row have been let off in the US who were already condemned to death. That's not including all the ones that were not investigated as thoroughly as they died.
One mistake is too many.
Dystopiary
All this aristocracy has really got to stop.
Yep, the government'd outsource it to G4S, and make a lot of money from the means of execution.
Up next, reality TV maybe, funded by rich psychopaths (a word I don't use lightly), though the footage would soon be online without that.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
ice-is-forming
I was born naked, shameless & fucking outrageous..
It makes me curious about how it would change things - martyrdom for example ..
unintended consequences - people may start doing their time and have an evangelical moment, where having found 'god's forgiveness' wish to join him in heaven
or feel guilty and want to pay penance - People may start doing their time and very quickly use it as a way of dying on purpose. Or maybe they might do 10 years then put in a request to die.
Who knows really
I mean we're talking about offenders who have usually done something so awful that we couldn't even begin to understand their world , let alone why they may choose to die- if given the choice of capital punishment. These are people who have already been handed down life sentences because there is no uncertainty about their guilt, and they are judged as not able to be rehabilitated.
So surely no capital punishment is all about retribution at this stage.
Especially as most people have implied that it'd be better/ easier to die from a lethal injection than stay in jail for years - is there any evidence that this is what people think?
I'm just thinking out loud really
newme
Giant in Pastyland now
Well at least I will admit it, has no consequence to me, whereas I don't trust those who are in charge of it to be accurate, fair or impartial. I have no agenda other than killing people isn't good, my granddad was a lead bomber pilot who hit Germany over and over. He drank himself to alcohol induced dementia then nearly killed everyone burning the house down with a chip pan fire after flying commercial to Germany for years, so maybe that isn't quite as impartial if I consider that?
Thats a fairly mild (for me personally, ish) and not that related to my experience reason, given I met him a few times when under 7 and we apparently flew model planes about the place while he couldn't talk or get out of his wheelchair. My second grandfather was a white south african doctor who chose to work the blacks only hospitals before moving and never once mentioned anything about anyone's race in over 20 years.
Peoples background can massively effect their judgement, I don't trust someone else to judge anything I have done with 100% accuracy and I haven't done anything serious, why should I trust someone else to judge with 100% certainty what someone else did to the point they die as a result?
To me it sounds like vengeance and retribution rather than anything morally sound. Also lethal injections aren't even done in the US now as pharmaceutical companies don't want to be involved with it. Hardly the bastion of moral judgements themselves, especially in the US.It makes me curious about how it would change things - martyrdom for example ..
unintended consequences - people may start doing their time and have an evangelical moment, where having found 'god's forgiveness' wish to join him in heaven
People may start doing their time and very quickly use it as a way of dying on purpose. Or maybe they might do 10 years then put in a request to die.
Who knows really
These are people who have already been handed down life sentences because there is no uncertainty about their guilt, and they are judged as not able to be rehabilitated.
So surely no capital punishment is all about retribution at this stage.
Especially as most people have implied that it'd be better/ easier to die from a lethal injection than stay in jail for years - is there any evidence that this is what people think?
I'm just thinking out loud really
Aaronf
Bizarro Aaronf
I've been thinking more about the executioner role, I'm sure most wouldn't have the character or stomach for it but someone would, like the old phrase "it's a dirty job but someone has to do it". You could analyse it to the nth degree as well around what would it take to do such a role, it would be a legal professional position with high pay? Is that justified enough in thinking it's not the same as someone planning to murder another person just because they're evil or is there no difference in principle?
PTK
Paul Kegan
Or look at the Nazi salute of David Bowie circa 1976.
PR1Berske
Alligator in chains by the park gates.
From Rotten to TikTok, the internet has always had a market for the grotesque. Maybe you're already right with your prediction.
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