4 ms·

Life imprisonment is cruel? For the absolute worst possible crimes? I don’t think so. Life imprisonment is unusual? For the absolute worst possible crimes? Aga

Life imprisonment is cruel? For the absolute worst possible crimes? I don’t think so. Life imprisonment is unusual? For the absolute worst possible crimes? Again, no, not really. It certainly must suck, but what is unusual about society wishing to protect itself from it’s worst offenders? Life imprisonment has the huge benefit of being undoable if new evidence exonerates someone. I am certainly opposed to “BS life imprisonment”, like US drug three strike laws leading to that outcome. But for murder, rape, etc? No, I personally am entirely on board with life imprisonment, provided the justice system can demonstrate the person is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

86carr 7y ago
The definitions of cruel and unusual are independent of crime severity.
- burfog 7y ago
  I sure hope not. That would allow execution for first-time-offender jaywalking.
- tomatocracy 7y ago
  I don’t think that’s true in the USA - the idea that the application of the punishment rather than the punishment itself can make it cruel and unusual is the essence of the famous Furman v Georgia decision of the US Supreme Court in 1971 which led to a de facto moratorium on the death penalty until the late 1970s. What’s more eg in Coker v Georgia in 1977 the US Supreme Court ruled that rape of an adult woman was insufficient to qualify for the death penalty.
  - 86carr 7y ago
    Well like I said below I maybe hoping for something that doesn't exist. I assume enough legal action has taken place to figure this out but I wouldn't really know. However, I agree that the application of the punishment rather than the punishment itself can be cruel and usual (depending on how the punishment is defined). I fail to see how the second case example relates if the first is true. What is cruel or unusual seems unrelated to the crime severity because cruel and unusual is a separate concept like the first example seems to show or so I thought. Crime severity and severity of the punishment should be related though. This is why, in my opinion, solitary confinement can be called might be cruel and unusual. It's categorically different from prison. I hope any of that makes sense.
- gnode 7y ago
  Severity is part of what is meant by unusual. Life imprisonment for a minor crime would be considered unusual punishment.
  - 86carr 7y ago
    Maybe I'm hoping for a more thoughtful legal system than is actually in place. While your example would be unusual it's only unusual now. Meaning you're basing what what is usual on the length of the prison sentence can gradually increased over time as long as it never appears to be usual compare to the "current mean". Much of this is legislated which implies to me that unusual would fall outside of what has been legislated. Forcing someone to eat a box of baking soda would be unusual to me because it's in a totally different category of punishment. Like fining, community service, or death instead of prison.
08-15 7y ago
> Life imprisonment has the huge benefit of being undoable That's a blatant lie. If an innocent man ends up in jail at the age of 20 and it "is undone" when he's 40, his life is destroyed anyway: No career, no savings, no family, no prospects for ever amounting to anything. How do you undo that? Get off your moral high horse. Life imprisonment is more cruel than death.
- DanBC 7y ago
  A weird example to use. Are you really saying it's better to kill innocent people than lock them up for 20 years?
  - ddxxdd 7y ago
    That's a good question, and worth pondering outside the context of the state's monopoly on violence. Would the average person prefer Ted Bundy kill them immediately or lock them in his basement for 20 years? This entire comment chain seems to be conflating two common arguments: 1) If it's wrong to kill an innocent man, it's also wrong to imprison that same man; you can call one more unjust than the other, but (as the argument goes) you can't say that one is justified while the other is not. 2) Our society has gotten too used to locking people up in metal cages for several decades; there are many arguments in favor of moving back to flogging[1][2] [1] https://www.amazon.com/Defense-Flogging-Peter-Moskos/dp/0465032419 https://www.amazon.com/Defense-Flogging-Peter-Moskos/dp/0465... [2] https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/justice https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/justice
  - thrower123 7y ago
    Yes, definitely it would be far less cruel than subjecting them to the penal system for the best years of their life. Especially if it is a quick, painless method of execution. It's sort of too bad that there aren't many mostly empty wastes that we can exile people to any longer. Remove them from society, but give them the chance to make what life they can under the sky.
    - yankeehue 7y ago
jMyles 7y ago
In terms of human history, life imprisonment is very unusual. It's new enough to still be regarded as in an experimental phase, and everything we know about this experiment suggests that prison (especially life) is failing to have any of the positive effects that it is supposed to have.

86carr 7y ago

The definitions of cruel and unusual are independent of crime severity.

burfog 7y ago
I sure hope not. That would allow execution for first-time-offender jaywalking.
tomatocracy 7y ago
I don’t think that’s true in the USA - the idea that the application of the punishment rather than the punishment itself can make it cruel and unusual is the essence of the famous Furman v Georgia decision of the US Supreme Court in 1971 which led to a de facto moratorium on the death penalty until the late 1970s. What’s more eg in Coker v Georgia in 1977 the US Supreme Court ruled that rape of an adult woman was insufficient to qualify for the death penalty.
- 86carr 7y ago
  Well like I said below I maybe hoping for something that doesn't exist. I assume enough legal action has taken place to figure this out but I wouldn't really know. However, I agree that the application of the punishment rather than the punishment itself can be cruel and usual (depending on how the punishment is defined). I fail to see how the second case example relates if the first is true. What is cruel or unusual seems unrelated to the crime severity because cruel and unusual is a separate concept like the first example seems to show or so I thought. Crime severity and severity of the punishment should be related though. This is why, in my opinion, solitary confinement can be called might be cruel and unusual. It's categorically different from prison. I hope any of that makes sense.
gnode 7y ago
Severity is part of what is meant by unusual. Life imprisonment for a minor crime would be considered unusual punishment.
- 86carr 7y ago
  Maybe I'm hoping for a more thoughtful legal system than is actually in place. While your example would be unusual it's only unusual now. Meaning you're basing what what is usual on the length of the prison sentence can gradually increased over time as long as it never appears to be usual compare to the "current mean". Much of this is legislated which implies to me that unusual would fall outside of what has been legislated. Forcing someone to eat a box of baking soda would be unusual to me because it's in a totally different category of punishment. Like fining, community service, or death instead of prison.

08-15 7y ago

> Life imprisonment has the huge benefit of being undoable That's a blatant lie. If an innocent man ends up in jail at the age of 20 and it "is undone" when he's 40, his life is destroyed anyway: No career, no savings, no family, no prospects for ever amounting to anything. How do you undo that? Get off your moral high horse. Life imprisonment is more cruel than death.

DanBC 7y ago
A weird example to use. Are you really saying it's better to kill innocent people than lock them up for 20 years?
- ddxxdd 7y ago
  That's a good question, and worth pondering outside the context of the state's monopoly on violence. Would the average person prefer Ted Bundy kill them immediately or lock them in his basement for 20 years? This entire comment chain seems to be conflating two common arguments: 1) If it's wrong to kill an innocent man, it's also wrong to imprison that same man; you can call one more unjust than the other, but (as the argument goes) you can't say that one is justified while the other is not. 2) Our society has gotten too used to locking people up in metal cages for several decades; there are many arguments in favor of moving back to flogging[1][2] [1] https://www.amazon.com/Defense-Flogging-Peter-Moskos/dp/0465032419 https://www.amazon.com/Defense-Flogging-Peter-Moskos/dp/0465... [2] https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/justice https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/justice
- thrower123 7y ago
  Yes, definitely it would be far less cruel than subjecting them to the penal system for the best years of their life. Especially if it is a quick, painless method of execution. It's sort of too bad that there aren't many mostly empty wastes that we can exile people to any longer. Remove them from society, but give them the chance to make what life they can under the sky.
  - yankeehue 7y ago

jMyles 7y ago

In terms of human history, life imprisonment is very unusual. It's new enough to still be regarded as in an experimental phase, and everything we know about this experiment suggests that prison (especially life) is failing to have any of the positive effects that it is supposed to have.