Should Britain bring back the death penalty?

[Urbanblues]

No. The point of atheism is that you don't believe in any god/higher being/authority. That's all.

If there is no god then coming up with a moral code is up to us. We can't point to the bible, the 10 commandments or other religious teachings and use them to justify our opinions. Or, actually, in my opinion, we have to admit that our moral codes aren't and never really were, based in religious teachings.

Maybe I do have the right to take away an other human's life. This is what I need to think about in (re)considering my view on capital punishment.

Quimcunx, are you just being quimsical?

 

[quimcunx]

Quimcunx, are you just being quimsical?

What a polite way of saying cuntish.

I agree wholeheartedly with Bakunin's post.

I just watched a documentary and realised that my thinking behind my NO was a little fuzzy and I want to sort that out.

 

[Bakunin]

It's interesting to note that, while the death penalty is often popular among those who aren't faced with the grim reality of actually having to do the job, it isn't nearly as popular as folk might think among those who are charged with performing or assisting with executions at first hand.

Prison wardens, prison officers, prison chaplains and even a number of former executioners have come out against it before now in suprisingly large numbers.

 

[samk]

If we did, would we also up penalties throughout the scale, including for forum trolling?

 

[cesare]

No.

 

[Detroit City]

i support the death penalty for particularly nasty crimes

 

[Sootysoots]

how does one define nasty?

 

[Detroit City]

how does one define nasty?

killing a bunch of people? like oklahoma city or ted bundy or something like that

 

[cesare]

i support the death penalty for particularly nasty crimes

How about if you had to execute them yourself, personally?

 

[Bakunin]

killing a bunch of people? like oklahoma city or ted bundy or something like that

The small problem with killing Timothy McVeigh is that he then became a poster boy for various neo-Nazi and far right loons and thus a martyr for his chosen cause.

 

[Detroit City]

The small problem with killing Timothy McVeigh is that he then became a poster boy for various neo-Nazi and far right loons and thus a martyr for his chosen cause.

the same would have happened had he rotted in solitary confinement for life

death does not necessarily a martyr make

 

[derf]

Yes and extend it's use to people who import drugs and sex slaves along with others I may mention at a later date.

 

[samk]

Drug importing is easy to frame someone for

 

[Bakunin]

the same would have happened had he rotted in solitary confinement for life

death does not necessarily a martyr make

But the prospect of a vastly public suicide, with all the hullaballoo that accompanies executions in general and McVeigh's in particular, is a far superior way of making a martyr than simply dumping them in a solitary cell smaller than a parking space and simply leaving them to be largely forgotten except by a few far right loonspuds.

I'd also argue that solitary confinement for life is, in a way, far crueller than ending it all quickly for a life. Evidence of this would be the number of Death Row inmates in the United States who choose to forgo their mandatory appeals opt for death over life in jail, they're known in the US prison system as 'volunteers.'

 

[Detroit City]

But the prospect of a vastly public suicide, with all the hullaballoo that accompanies executions in general and McVeigh's in particular, is a far superior way of making a martyr than simply dumping them in a solitary cell smaller than a parking space and simply leaving them to be largely forgotten except by a few far right loonspuds.

what would you do with some looney who murdered 170 men, women and children for no reason???

I'd also argue that solitary confinement for life is, in a way, far crueller than ending it all quickly for a life.

maybe...but they are still alive and getting three hots and a cot each day

Evidence of this would be the number of Death Row inmates in the United States who choose to forgo their mandatory appeals opt for death over life in jail, they're known in the US prison system as 'volunteers.'

don't know where you're getting this from but most of them try to avoid the electric chair. few weeks ago some dude was trying to get out of his death penalty by saying he was too obese and the lethal drugs wouldn't affect him and it would be "cruel and unusual punishment' to kill him...he had raped and murdered three female college students 20 years ago

he died

 

[Bakunin]

what would you do with some looney who murdered 170 men, women and children for no reason???


maybe...but they are still alive and getting three hots and a cot each day



don't know where you're getting this from but most of them try to avoid the electric chair. few weeks ago some dude was trying to get out of his death penalty by saying he was too obese and the lethal drugs wouldn't affect him and it would be "cruel and unusual punishment' to kill him...he had raped and murdered three female college students 20 years ago

he died

I'd sooner see the likes of McVeigh and his ilk be kept under the strictest security confinement, on a sentence of life without parole, and used as subjects for study by the appropriate medical and psychiatric professionals to finally give shed light on what drives them to do such dreadful things than simply killed off and allowed to martyr themselves.

And, if you knew much about prison, and I'm assuming you've either never been yourself or don't know many if any folk that have done any really heavy time (I do know some, but feel free to correct me if you have as well) then you'd know that prison is far from the cakewalk the right make it out to be. The likes of Folsom, Parkhurst, Sing Sing and Dartmoor are no joke, especially on a long stretch.

Regarding the 'volunteers' I refer to, I suggest you read this artcile:

http://www.crimemagazine.com/deathrowvolunteers.htm

 

[nightbreed]

Nnnnnnnnoooooooooo!!

 

[Citizen66]

Only for people who agree with it. I'd love to see Derf get a bullet through his head for exploiting children.

 

[JHE]

No, don't bring it back.



There are some brutes, however, for whom 'life imprisonment' has to be exactly that - imprisonment for the rest of their lives.

 

[goneforlunch]

No. We can't bring it back anyway. The EU has outlawed the DP in its member states.

 

[TheDave]

It's a no for me, not out of any compassion for the criminal but I see death as an easy way out. That and i'd like to think we are civilised people who are beyond barbaric revenge and retribution.

 

[Shippou-Sensei]

Only for people who agree with it. I'd love to see Derf get a bullet through his head for exploiting children.

tempting

 

[ViolentPanda]

No.
Unless we develop technologies that can provide absolute proof of guilt, then a death penalty will always catch innocents in it's net. That is not acceptable.
It's also a sad fact that the death penalty in this country, when in force, tended to be handed down in a very class-biased manner.

 

[badco]

You can still get the death sentence for perjury?

 

[badco]

sorry,treason

 

[ViolentPanda]

sorry,treason

Nope, nor for arson in her majesty's naval shipyards.

In fact the last 2 sets of gallows, one at Chatham (iirc) and one at Wandsworth prison (which I visited before it was dismantled and the death room turned into cells) were destroyed in the 1990s.

 

[DotCommunist]

the opportunity for lethal miscarriage of justice is one argument against the death penalty. I also think there's a wider point, being that how can a state that holds murder as the ultimate crime indulge in it at the same time?

 

[_angel_]

No.
Unless we develop technologies that can provide absolute proof of guilt, then a death penalty will always catch innocents in it's net. That is not acceptable.
It's also a sad fact that the death penalty in this country, when in force, tended to be handed down in a very class-biased manner.

Unfortunately there are some people who do think we are already at the point of being able to prove things absolutely. I don't think we are, evidence is still assessed by human beings who make human mistakes.

 

[badco]

Nope, nor for arson in her majesty's naval shipyards.

In fact the last 2 sets of gallows, one at Chatham (iirc) and one at Wandsworth prison (which I visited before it was dismantled and the death room turned into cells) were destroyed in the 1990s.

The mandatory sentence for treason was death.....Right up until 1998

Why are most posters against the death penalty?

Don't agree with it myself like

 

[badco]

Unfortunately there are some people who do think we are already at the point of being able to prove things absolutely. I don't think we are, evidence is still assessed by human beings who make human mistakes.

Theres no way of having 100% proof unless a person was caught in the act or pleaded guilty

Even DNA evidence isn't absolute proof of guilt imo....Unless the individual cannot explain the evidence away