8 ms·

Do ex-South Carolina death row staff support death penalty?

35 points by scswampfox 5y ago

ArtWomb 5y ago
This is Pulitzer quality reporting right here ;)
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
Loughla 5y ago
Personal opinion - the governor themself should be the one to push the drugs/button/trigger that kills the death row inmate. S/he should be the one to follow through on the state mandated and sanctioned death of one of its people. They are the head of the state after all, with the power to stay the execution.
- onychomys 5y ago
  At the very least, they should have to be in the room to give the executioner a final yes/no decision. Not really sure how we'd make all the states do something like that, but I think it'd really help.
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    The article indicates something along those lines is in place. > The governor is always listening through a phone when people condemned to die in South Carolina take their last breath. During 13 of the state’s recent executions, the Commander was on the line with the governor.
    - onychomys 5y ago
      Sitting on a phone hundreds of miles away talking to a guy in the room isn't really the same thing as being there yourself. Yes, you could stop the execution either way, but you're not seeing the consequences of your decision.
    - Loughla 5y ago
      That is actually the line where I stopped to make that comment. Sitting in your office hundreds of miles away is nowhere near the same as being in the room, looking the condemned in the eyes.
  - lisper 5y ago
    IMHO executions should be open to the public. The people ultimately responsible for these deaths are the people who voted for [politicians who support] the death penalty. They should be able to see what their votes have wrought.
    - kyleee 5y ago
      Would you be upset if people showed positive emotion at the execution (cheers, etc.; think murder victim's family) Executions have a long history of being a public event and fun/exciting/scratching a human morbid itch and satisfying cravings for justice (putting aside the innocence / false positive question for a moment) and I think a contemporary audience may exhibit some of the same historical reactions and behaviors
      - lisper 5y ago
        > Would you be upset if people showed positive emotion at the execution I would be disappointed. I would also be surprised. I think there's a reason executions aren't public any more, and I think it's because we have largely evolved beyond the point where most of us can take pleasure from watching another person die. I think this is the reason that the reality of industrial meat production is such a closely guarded secret. If people knew what happened behind those closed doors they'd eat a lot less meat.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  I'm not sure some of them could hide their glee.
- _jal 5y ago
  Be careful what you wish for. I expect executions would become campaign propaganda events.
  - revolvingocelot 5y ago
    And campaigns would select for those who had no compunction pressing the button.
    - AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
      The political process already strongly favors sociopaths, I doubt it would make a significant difference.
- rgrieselhuber 5y ago
  I have a similar opinion about skin in the game for war, any politician who votes for or pushes for combat action has to go themselves into the most dangerous part of the action to help carry it out.
  - Loughla 5y ago
    Yes. I 100% support the national vote for all aggressive 'war' actions, where a yes vote is also registration for selective service for that action. I understand that system becomes vulnerable to bad-faith actors who can use PR and other means to turn public opinion against US interference to then get away with whatever they want. But I also believe it is important.
    - rgrieselhuber 5y ago
      Sounds like we differ on the national vote point but in general, skin in the game should be a deciding factor in many scenarios.
- ashtonkem 5y ago
  I also think death penalty by lethal injection should be illegal. It is regularly botched, leaving the victim to suffocate or experience a fatal heart attack for minutes without pain killers while also paralyzed. Seems fairly cruel and unusual to paralyze someone and then suffocate them while leaving them conscious. There’s also something deeply unseemly about a method of execution that is quite painful but designed to make the executioners feel better about what they’re doing. If we’re going to execute people it should be via firing squad, which is honest about what is happening and much less painful for the condemned. If we’re not comfortable with that, well then maybe we shouldn’t be doing this at all then.
  - danpalmer 5y ago
    I agree with the point you're making, but there are far more humane methods than firing squad. Firing squad causes trauma issues for those doing the firing, and could easily be botched as well. Asphyxiation by another gas such as helium is generally considered to be "better" as far as I understand – it creates a feeling of euphoria for the subject. This is not an endorsement of any method of execution, I'm strongly against the entire idea.
    - themitigating 5y ago
      Not everyone has live rounds in a firing squad to reduce the trauma
      - spicybright 5y ago
        For clarification, they'll load some of the guns with blanks then give you a random gun with you knowing that. Still wouldn't ease my conscious if I was holding the gun, personally.
        ashtonkem 5y ago
        Right, but that's a feature and not a bug. You really don't want the state to be able to execute people without someone feeling morally culpable for it.
pietrovismara 5y ago
"Killing people will fuck you up, no matter if legal or not". Who would have guessed?
b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
[flagged]
- inglor_cz 5y ago
  I suspect this is a side effect of Christianity becoming the state religion of the Roman Empire in the 4th century. You cannot keep an empire of that size together without quite a lot of violence, especially when enemies like Attila the Hun come plundering your territory, so you find all kinds of religious justifications for war and killing even against the original intent. The alternative is defeat and slavery.
  - b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
    >I suspect this is a side effect of Christianity becoming the state religion of the Roman Empire in the 4th century. How many more millennial until humanity becomes free of our barbaric abrahamic past?
    - Jotra7 5y ago
      The religious snowflakes already got you flagged.
  - pkphilip 5y ago
    Where did you get the idea that it doesn't give authorities the power to use force? How is law enforcement etc supposed to work if there is no possibility of using any sort of force? From Romans 13 1. Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. 3. For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. 4. For he is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. 5. Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. 6. This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God's servants, who give their full time to governing. 7. Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.
endominus 5y ago
Interesting. Extremely traumatizing to the executioner, despite the (theoretically) bloodless death. I do wonder why prisoners being executed aren't completely anaesthetized first so that they don't/can't feel pain. Also, compare and contrast to the attitudes of an executioner in Saudi Arabia who generally uses a sword to behead people [0]: "[T]here are many people who faint when they witness an execution. I don't know why they come and watch if they don't have the stomach for it. Me? I sleep very well." "There are no drawbacks for my social life." "I successfully trained my son Musaed, 22, as an executioner and he was approved and chosen," he says proudly. "Sometimes [my family] help me clean my sword." [0]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jun/06/saudiarabia.features11 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jun/06/saudiarabia.fe...
- revolvingocelot 5y ago
  At the risk of sounding too ghoulish, I wonder if the right lens to view this through might be that of alienation from one's work. TFA's executioners are technicians, dressed up in the gloves and scrubs otherwise associated with people who save and preserve lives. Saudi executioners use a fucking sword, you know, like we always have! Of course, that cultural factor helps too. Not that dressing up in a black hood and hanging people would necessarily be less traumatic, but maybe we'd think differently if there was a cultural continuity of hangmen hanging people which we were all casually aware of as a consequence of growing up and learning about the world.
zahma 5y ago
Setting aside the morality of the death penalty, the methods used by prisons have been grotesquely mismanaged. I’m not surprised state-sanctioned homicide, as it was characterized in the article, has left an indelible mark on anyone willing to take on such a ghastly job. For the reason that nobody wants to do this job, the methods are subjected to further inefficiencies that turn executions into torture. The documentary, Mr. Death, by Errol Morris (who also directed Fog of War) comes to mind. Well worth a watch for anyone who doesn’t mind the gruesome topic, which I’m guessing is anyone reading this comment. It chronicles the rise of a private citizen and jailhouse worker who decided he could improve the electric chair —- despite having no background at all. Eventually he was advising on all sorts of execution methods.
arpyzo 5y ago
My opinion is simple. We should just never kill people except when there's an imminent threat. The death penalty doesn't deter crime, and life in prison is significant enough punishment. As far as I can tell, the death penalty mostly just serves to satiate the appetite of those who want revenge. Does it provide victims with enough solace to justify its downsides? I doubt it.
- FriedrichN 5y ago
  Absolutely. And let's not forget innocent people do get convicted and even if there is a 99% accuracy the state still kills innocent people. You can't get years behind bars back, but at least you're still alive if your conviction gets overturned.
- bluedino 5y ago
  >> life in prison is significant enough punishment. What is the point of keeping a human behind bars for 50, 60 years? Especially in a clear-cut case like a mass shooting. Those guys are still alive, behind bars, forever, unless they shoot themselves when they are done.
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    My local grocery store cards everyone for alcohol, even people obviously in their 90s. It turns out it's really hard to determine what counts as "clear-cut", and there are consequences for fucking it up.
    - sixothree 5y ago
      It's not like we _don't_ find out that people who were executed were not guilty in the first place.
- endominus 5y ago
  What would you say to people like myself who view "life in prison" as essentially the death penalty with 'entropy' chosen as the method of execution? Is the purpose of prison punishment or reform? If the latter, there is no reason for life in prison; what use is reformation to someone who's stuck in prison for their entire life? If the former, then life imprisonment is a terrible punishment from an economic standpoint. Incarcerating an inmate can cost anywhere from $80,000[0] to $200,000 per year. Death row inmates can double that amount. Looking at the situation from a completely cold-blooded perspective, life imprisonment is a worst-of-both-worlds compromise. It maximizes the suffering of the individual prisoner and wastes the maximum amount of the people's money. How many other people's lives could that money save if we weren't subject to identifiable victim bias? [0]: https://lao.ca.gov/policyareas/cj/6_cj_inmatecost https://lao.ca.gov/policyareas/cj/6_cj_inmatecost [1]: https://www.golocalprov.com/news/maximum-security-prisoners-cost-rhode-island-200k-each-per-year/ https://www.golocalprov.com/news/maximum-security-prisoners-...
bigbillheck 5y ago
Note that the original article's title was "They executed people for the state of South Carolina. For some, it nearly destroyed them." and not this, if you'll forgive my language, wishy-washy 'both-sides' thing.
- scswampfox 5y ago
  Yes I'm not sure what happened here. I submitted it from https://www.islandpacket.com/ https://www.islandpacket.com/ and with the original title.
lisper 5y ago
Weird, this story has 30 points submitted an hour ago but it's buried at #128.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  IIRC flags play a role. 30 points and 5 flags is different than 30 points and 0 flags.
andyjohnson0 5y ago
Again and again, the banality of evil. "when they asked the warden, Robert Ward, if they could take a break from execution work, he said they could lose their leadership roles if they didn’t do it, the men said. ... So they kept going. They both valued their managerial roles and needed them to support their families." They did it for the money and status. They chose to do other people's dirty work in a corrupt and utterly indefensible system. No one forced them to be killers. This is what people are like.
- NoGravitas 5y ago
  Someone strongly pressured them to be killers, and they lacked the moral courage to say "no". But maybe we'd be better off not creating systems where people need that moral courage?
mam4 5y ago
People have killed each other for millenias. Its very modern to think its that evil
- trutannus 5y ago
  Genocide was common for millennia as well. But today we don't ever think there's justification for that. Previous belief does not imply morality.
  - radu_floricica 5y ago
    Don't fall into the trap of accepting the premise. Killing was always considered evil. An evil that's occasionally necessary or justified, sure, but so is today.
  - b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
    [flagged]
    - trutannus 5y ago
      You can attempt to justify whatever you like. Does not mean you're correct.
- orwin 5y ago
  "Thou shall not kill" sounds very modern.
supperburg 5y ago
[flagged]
- b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
  "The death penalty is something where it saves a lot of money for the tax payer. please don’t link to those liberal articles that say otherwise, it’s propaganda — without endless appeals and other bullshit it is infinitely cheaper." "liberal bullshit" @dang
  - supperburg 5y ago
    I trust that you would still be fuming if it were conservative bullshit I had been talking about?
    - b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
      Not a big fan of free speech or debate? Let me guess, white, male, 25-35, living in a suburb. Make about $100k and feel you should be making $250k. Sexual fantasies about your sister and your dad you'd really like to act out. Call yourself a christian, but that's just because you want to molest little boys. Listen to a lot of Alex Jones an think you're a downtrodden class of human, what being white, upper middle-class, and a nzi who enjoys licking shitty asses?
throw0101a 5y ago
Worth checking out the movie Pierrepoint too: > The film is based on the life of Britain's most prolific hangman, Albert Pierrepoint (played by Timothy Spall), from the time he is first trained for the job and accepted onto the list of the country's official hangmen in 1932 until his resignation in 1956. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierrepoint_(film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierrepoint_(film) * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Pierrepoint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Pierrepoint

35 points by scswampfox 5y ago

ArtWomb 5y ago

This is Pulitzer quality reporting right here ;)

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

Loughla 5y ago

Personal opinion - the governor themself should be the one to push the drugs/button/trigger that kills the death row inmate. S/he should be the one to follow through on the state mandated and sanctioned death of one of its people. They are the head of the state after all, with the power to stay the execution.

onychomys 5y ago
At the very least, they should have to be in the room to give the executioner a final yes/no decision. Not really sure how we'd make all the states do something like that, but I think it'd really help.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  The article indicates something along those lines is in place. > The governor is always listening through a phone when people condemned to die in South Carolina take their last breath. During 13 of the state’s recent executions, the Commander was on the line with the governor.
  - onychomys 5y ago
    Sitting on a phone hundreds of miles away talking to a guy in the room isn't really the same thing as being there yourself. Yes, you could stop the execution either way, but you're not seeing the consequences of your decision.
  - Loughla 5y ago
    That is actually the line where I stopped to make that comment. Sitting in your office hundreds of miles away is nowhere near the same as being in the room, looking the condemned in the eyes.
- lisper 5y ago
  IMHO executions should be open to the public. The people ultimately responsible for these deaths are the people who voted for [politicians who support] the death penalty. They should be able to see what their votes have wrought.
  - kyleee 5y ago
    Would you be upset if people showed positive emotion at the execution (cheers, etc.; think murder victim's family) Executions have a long history of being a public event and fun/exciting/scratching a human morbid itch and satisfying cravings for justice (putting aside the innocence / false positive question for a moment) and I think a contemporary audience may exhibit some of the same historical reactions and behaviors
    - lisper 5y ago
      > Would you be upset if people showed positive emotion at the execution I would be disappointed. I would also be surprised. I think there's a reason executions aren't public any more, and I think it's because we have largely evolved beyond the point where most of us can take pleasure from watching another person die. I think this is the reason that the reality of industrial meat production is such a closely guarded secret. If people knew what happened behind those closed doors they'd eat a lot less meat.
ceejayoz 5y ago
I'm not sure some of them could hide their glee.
_jal 5y ago
Be careful what you wish for. I expect executions would become campaign propaganda events.
- revolvingocelot 5y ago
  And campaigns would select for those who had no compunction pressing the button.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
    The political process already strongly favors sociopaths, I doubt it would make a significant difference.
rgrieselhuber 5y ago
I have a similar opinion about skin in the game for war, any politician who votes for or pushes for combat action has to go themselves into the most dangerous part of the action to help carry it out.
- Loughla 5y ago
  Yes. I 100% support the national vote for all aggressive 'war' actions, where a yes vote is also registration for selective service for that action. I understand that system becomes vulnerable to bad-faith actors who can use PR and other means to turn public opinion against US interference to then get away with whatever they want. But I also believe it is important.
  - rgrieselhuber 5y ago
    Sounds like we differ on the national vote point but in general, skin in the game should be a deciding factor in many scenarios.
ashtonkem 5y ago
I also think death penalty by lethal injection should be illegal. It is regularly botched, leaving the victim to suffocate or experience a fatal heart attack for minutes without pain killers while also paralyzed. Seems fairly cruel and unusual to paralyze someone and then suffocate them while leaving them conscious. There’s also something deeply unseemly about a method of execution that is quite painful but designed to make the executioners feel better about what they’re doing. If we’re going to execute people it should be via firing squad, which is honest about what is happening and much less painful for the condemned. If we’re not comfortable with that, well then maybe we shouldn’t be doing this at all then.
- danpalmer 5y ago
  I agree with the point you're making, but there are far more humane methods than firing squad. Firing squad causes trauma issues for those doing the firing, and could easily be botched as well. Asphyxiation by another gas such as helium is generally considered to be "better" as far as I understand – it creates a feeling of euphoria for the subject. This is not an endorsement of any method of execution, I'm strongly against the entire idea.
  - themitigating 5y ago
    Not everyone has live rounds in a firing squad to reduce the trauma
    - spicybright 5y ago
      For clarification, they'll load some of the guns with blanks then give you a random gun with you knowing that. Still wouldn't ease my conscious if I was holding the gun, personally.
      - ashtonkem 5y ago
        Right, but that's a feature and not a bug. You really don't want the state to be able to execute people without someone feeling morally culpable for it.

pietrovismara 5y ago

"Killing people will fuck you up, no matter if legal or not". Who would have guessed?

b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago

[flagged]

inglor_cz 5y ago
I suspect this is a side effect of Christianity becoming the state religion of the Roman Empire in the 4th century. You cannot keep an empire of that size together without quite a lot of violence, especially when enemies like Attila the Hun come plundering your territory, so you find all kinds of religious justifications for war and killing even against the original intent. The alternative is defeat and slavery.
- b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
  >I suspect this is a side effect of Christianity becoming the state religion of the Roman Empire in the 4th century. How many more millennial until humanity becomes free of our barbaric abrahamic past?
  - Jotra7 5y ago
    The religious snowflakes already got you flagged.
- pkphilip 5y ago
  Where did you get the idea that it doesn't give authorities the power to use force? How is law enforcement etc supposed to work if there is no possibility of using any sort of force? From Romans 13 1. Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. 3. For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. 4. For he is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God's servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. 5. Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. 6. This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God's servants, who give their full time to governing. 7. Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.

endominus 5y ago

Interesting. Extremely traumatizing to the executioner, despite the (theoretically) bloodless death. I do wonder why prisoners being executed aren't completely anaesthetized first so that they don't/can't feel pain. Also, compare and contrast to the attitudes of an executioner in Saudi Arabia who generally uses a sword to behead people [0]: "[T]here are many people who faint when they witness an execution. I don't know why they come and watch if they don't have the stomach for it. Me? I sleep very well." "There are no drawbacks for my social life." "I successfully trained my son Musaed, 22, as an executioner and he was approved and chosen," he says proudly. "Sometimes [my family] help me clean my sword." [0]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jun/06/saudiarabia.features11 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jun/06/saudiarabia.fe...

revolvingocelot 5y ago
At the risk of sounding too ghoulish, I wonder if the right lens to view this through might be that of alienation from one's work. TFA's executioners are technicians, dressed up in the gloves and scrubs otherwise associated with people who save and preserve lives. Saudi executioners use a fucking sword, you know, like we always have! Of course, that cultural factor helps too. Not that dressing up in a black hood and hanging people would necessarily be less traumatic, but maybe we'd think differently if there was a cultural continuity of hangmen hanging people which we were all casually aware of as a consequence of growing up and learning about the world.

zahma 5y ago

Setting aside the morality of the death penalty, the methods used by prisons have been grotesquely mismanaged. I’m not surprised state-sanctioned homicide, as it was characterized in the article, has left an indelible mark on anyone willing to take on such a ghastly job. For the reason that nobody wants to do this job, the methods are subjected to further inefficiencies that turn executions into torture. The documentary, Mr. Death, by Errol Morris (who also directed Fog of War) comes to mind. Well worth a watch for anyone who doesn’t mind the gruesome topic, which I’m guessing is anyone reading this comment. It chronicles the rise of a private citizen and jailhouse worker who decided he could improve the electric chair —- despite having no background at all. Eventually he was advising on all sorts of execution methods.

arpyzo 5y ago

My opinion is simple. We should just never kill people except when there's an imminent threat. The death penalty doesn't deter crime, and life in prison is significant enough punishment. As far as I can tell, the death penalty mostly just serves to satiate the appetite of those who want revenge. Does it provide victims with enough solace to justify its downsides? I doubt it.

FriedrichN 5y ago
Absolutely. And let's not forget innocent people do get convicted and even if there is a 99% accuracy the state still kills innocent people. You can't get years behind bars back, but at least you're still alive if your conviction gets overturned.
bluedino 5y ago
>> life in prison is significant enough punishment. What is the point of keeping a human behind bars for 50, 60 years? Especially in a clear-cut case like a mass shooting. Those guys are still alive, behind bars, forever, unless they shoot themselves when they are done.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  My local grocery store cards everyone for alcohol, even people obviously in their 90s. It turns out it's really hard to determine what counts as "clear-cut", and there are consequences for fucking it up.
  - sixothree 5y ago
    It's not like we _don't_ find out that people who were executed were not guilty in the first place.
endominus 5y ago
What would you say to people like myself who view "life in prison" as essentially the death penalty with 'entropy' chosen as the method of execution? Is the purpose of prison punishment or reform? If the latter, there is no reason for life in prison; what use is reformation to someone who's stuck in prison for their entire life? If the former, then life imprisonment is a terrible punishment from an economic standpoint. Incarcerating an inmate can cost anywhere from $80,000[0] to $200,000 per year. Death row inmates can double that amount. Looking at the situation from a completely cold-blooded perspective, life imprisonment is a worst-of-both-worlds compromise. It maximizes the suffering of the individual prisoner and wastes the maximum amount of the people's money. How many other people's lives could that money save if we weren't subject to identifiable victim bias? [0]: https://lao.ca.gov/policyareas/cj/6_cj_inmatecost https://lao.ca.gov/policyareas/cj/6_cj_inmatecost [1]: https://www.golocalprov.com/news/maximum-security-prisoners-cost-rhode-island-200k-each-per-year/ https://www.golocalprov.com/news/maximum-security-prisoners-...

bigbillheck 5y ago

Note that the original article's title was "They executed people for the state of South Carolina. For some, it nearly destroyed them." and not this, if you'll forgive my language, wishy-washy 'both-sides' thing.

scswampfox 5y ago
Yes I'm not sure what happened here. I submitted it from https://www.islandpacket.com/ https://www.islandpacket.com/ and with the original title.

lisper 5y ago

Weird, this story has 30 points submitted an hour ago but it's buried at #128.

ceejayoz 5y ago
IIRC flags play a role. 30 points and 5 flags is different than 30 points and 0 flags.

andyjohnson0 5y ago

Again and again, the banality of evil. "when they asked the warden, Robert Ward, if they could take a break from execution work, he said they could lose their leadership roles if they didn’t do it, the men said. ... So they kept going. They both valued their managerial roles and needed them to support their families." They did it for the money and status. They chose to do other people's dirty work in a corrupt and utterly indefensible system. No one forced them to be killers. This is what people are like.

NoGravitas 5y ago
Someone strongly pressured them to be killers, and they lacked the moral courage to say "no". But maybe we'd be better off not creating systems where people need that moral courage?

mam4 5y ago

People have killed each other for millenias. Its very modern to think its that evil

trutannus 5y ago
Genocide was common for millennia as well. But today we don't ever think there's justification for that. Previous belief does not imply morality.
- radu_floricica 5y ago
  Don't fall into the trap of accepting the premise. Killing was always considered evil. An evil that's occasionally necessary or justified, sure, but so is today.
- b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
  [flagged]
  - trutannus 5y ago
    You can attempt to justify whatever you like. Does not mean you're correct.
orwin 5y ago
"Thou shall not kill" sounds very modern.

supperburg 5y ago

[flagged]

b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
"The death penalty is something where it saves a lot of money for the tax payer. please don’t link to those liberal articles that say otherwise, it’s propaganda — without endless appeals and other bullshit it is infinitely cheaper." "liberal bullshit" @dang
- supperburg 5y ago
  I trust that you would still be fuming if it were conservative bullshit I had been talking about?
  - b0bd0bbsb0b 5y ago
    Not a big fan of free speech or debate? Let me guess, white, male, 25-35, living in a suburb. Make about $100k and feel you should be making $250k. Sexual fantasies about your sister and your dad you'd really like to act out. Call yourself a christian, but that's just because you want to molest little boys. Listen to a lot of Alex Jones an think you're a downtrodden class of human, what being white, upper middle-class, and a nzi who enjoys licking shitty asses?

throw0101a 5y ago

Worth checking out the movie Pierrepoint too: > The film is based on the life of Britain's most prolific hangman, Albert Pierrepoint (played by Timothy Spall), from the time he is first trained for the job and accepted onto the list of the country's official hangmen in 1932 until his resignation in 1956. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierrepoint_(film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierrepoint_(film) * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Pierrepoint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Pierrepoint