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For some context, the United States put 11 people to death in 2021, and has put 78 people to death since the start of 2018. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cap
by mabbo 5y ago
For some context, the United States put 11 people to death in 2021, and has put 78 people to death since the start of 2018.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_the_Un...
That isn't to say the US is better, worse, or just as bad. Just something to compare it to.
Edit much later: you know what, I was wrong to comment this on its own. There's a lot more nuance to this and it's not a fair comparison at all. Those that called me out on this are in the right.
- andrepd 5y agoIt also has 10x the population. And due process. There is no relevance to that comparison whatsoever.
- colechristensen 5y agoThe US has killed thousands of “militants” (and many people who were certainly innocent) with drone strikes in places where we’re not engaged in active conflict and without due process. It may or may not be wrong, case by case, certainly arguments to be made for both, but seems about the same motivation just further away than SA killing militants.
- missedthecue 5y agoThis isn't a political statement on the justice of any given drone strikes, but I feel like there is a difference between combatants and criminals.
- thfuran 5y agoWhen they're only combatants because we showed up at their house with guns, I'm not sure the difference is what you seem to be implying.
- missedthecue 5y agoThey were fighting and killing before we arrived.
- TameAntelope 5y agoExecution is completely different from war casualties.
- RobertMiller 5y agoWhen you start talking about targeted drone strikes outside of war zones, the difference seems thinner than a razor's edge.
- TameAntelope 5y ago"War zones" is doing a lot of work here for you.
- RobertMiller 5y agoIt's the same thing colechristensen brought up: > The US has killed thousands of “militants” (and many people who were certainly innocent) with drone strikes in places where we’re not engaged in active conflict and without due process. If you want to call those "war casualties", then those war casualties look a whole lot like executions. And if they weren't war casualties on account of not being in a war zone, then they are simply executions.
- TameAntelope 5y agoYou must be in captivity to be executed.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- sdoering 5y agoDue process might not be so clear cut [0]. But that might be tainted by my personal values. I personally value a legal system that refrains from the potential of killing an innocent person. [0]: https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/innocence/executed-but-possibly-innocent https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/innocence/execute...
- dane-pgp 5y agoFor extra context, here is a timeline of when countries have abolished capital punishment: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_by_country#Abolition_chronology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_by_country#... The list is growing at a rate of about 1 country per year, which, if continued, would mean that the 21st century would be the last in which countries formally kill their own citizens.
- vmception 5y ago> And due process It is mere coincidence that you respect one country's due process and don't respect another country's due process. Most places have non-arbitrary paths to punishment or any state actions, codified somewhere. And our media and pop culture just doesn't acknowledge that. The similarities are greater than the dissimilarities.
- FredPret 5y agoA king saying "off with his head" is technically a "legal process" but is not one with any modern moral justification.
- vmception 5y agoIt wouldn't have been as simple as the King or MBS saying that. There are some nuanced articles about the judiciary there, how they work and how they could improve.
- grey-area 5y agoNo. Saudi Arabia is a dictatorship run by tyrants who order members of their own family kidnapped abroad, journalists murdered then cut up their bodies to hide the crime, and imprison then extort leading businessmen to consolidate power and money in their hands. They have far more in common with Putin’s Russia than the US. The US is a long way from that, whatever its flaws (and there are many flaws, chief amongst them making alliances with brutal dictators like the Saudis).
- atdt 5y agoState-sanctioned murder is always dressed in a judge's robe, even in Saudi Arabia.
- moralestapia 5y ago>And due process. Whew ... there's dozens of convicts on the death row that are presumably innocent. Even if some of them get acquitted at some point, having spent 20 years of your life behind bars not knowing whether the state is going to murder you for something you didn't do is not that far from barbaric. So ... like another guy said, you're just accustomed to the set of rules of the environment where you belong, in the same way as a Saudi could think of executions as a regular thing (bc, well... they are).
- beachy 5y agoThere is relevance in that both countries execute their own citizens.
- lamontcg 5y ago> And due process. nearly all of us here on this forum would expect to get due process, but the due process for the people who wind up on death row is often a joke.
- Ekaros 5y agoDoes that include the drone strikes?
- bratwurst3000 5y ago
- klyrs 5y agoIf we're going to criticize other countries for human rights abuses, we should get our house in order.
- bratwurst3000 5y agoEhmmm yes there is criticism of the death penalt in the us .... So what has this to do with Saudi arabia??? And maybe the people critizing the death penalty in saudi arabia are NOT the same people who engage in keeping the death penalty in the us???
- bratwurst3000 5y agoImagine someone beating you to death and the only reactions of your souroundings would be „ hey someone else is also doing this“ thats no point and no help at all
- jonfw 5y agoThe goal of this post isn't to distribute actionable advice to those directly affected by the event. The odds that they're reading a US tech forum are slim. Most of us here are looking to better understand what's going on in the world when we read articles like this, and the additional context OP shared is helpful to do so
- bratwurst3000 5y agoMay I ask how it did help you to better understand the situation? I cant imagine people going „ I cant grasp whats going on in saudi arabia …. HOLD ON the usa is also killing people … now I understand „
- jonfw 5y ago
- TedShiller 5y agoAlso, the weather is 63 degrees Fahrenheit today
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