4 ms·

Hot take, but I feel like no humans should be killed as a punishment... But I'm also probably too European to understand the true value of death penalty.

s5300 5mo ago
[dead]
Sohcahtoa82 5mo ago
I'm only against the death penalty for the simple fact that courts have convicted innocent people. Sometimes, that conviction happens when the court actively blocks exonerating evidence. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/410/284/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/410/284/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/547/319/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/547/319/
- OkayPhysicist 5mo ago
  Anybody who is wrongfully executed was basically guaranteed to spend their entire life in prison. Death row inmates get dramatically more access to legal aid than anybody else rotting in a cell, so if they couldn't win their appeal, the guy doing life isn't, either. Generally, I'm against incarceration for that reason. I think the relatively muted violence of it is too easy to stomach for the public, which leads to people letting the system get sloppy. For public and infamous crimes, however, where the question is not "what act took place", but rather "did this act constitute a crime, and if so, what is the punishment?"-type cases, I'm perfectly fine with capital punishment being on the table. We trust public officials with significant authority, and abuse of that authority is utterly irredeemable. Frankly, for elected officials I'd support a "two-thirds vote and you hang" policy. If you want power, and seek out power, you have an immense responsibility to live up to your constituent's expectations.
  - embedding-shape 5mo ago
    > "did this act constitute a crime, and if so, what is the punishment?" I guess that last part is the perspective I'd change, for a more compassionate world. I'd much rather ask "did this act constitute a crime, and if so, what made the person commit that crime, and how can we help them not do that in the future again?".
    - OkayPhysicist 5mo ago
      For the kinds of "public and infamous" crimes I'm talking about, the answer is almost always greed, either for fortune, power, or fame. There's no need to ask "Why did Nestle decide to kill a bunch of African children by giving away just enough formula stop mothers from being able to breastfeed?" or "Why did tobacco companies stand in front of congress and lie through their teeth about how non-addictive nicotine is?" or "Why did Nixon decide to pursue the war on drugs in order to disproportionately target his political opponents and minorities?". The answer is that in order to end up in the C-suite or board of directors of a megacorp, or the White House, you have to be one of the most madly greedy, power-lusting parasites in the world. My compassion for my fellow man is why I suggest we wait for them to commit a crime before punishing such behavior.
      - embedding-shape 5mo ago
        > you have to be one of the most madly greedy, power-lusting parasites in the world. Yes, which is why we need to help these people. They clearly lost all their humanity and compassion, at one point we should care about the betterment of humanity as a whole, and put a limit to how these sort of people can act and do, the current situation is not tenable, and they should be classified as the sick people they are, rather than idolized.
  - cortesoft 5mo ago
    That isn’t true. There have been death row inmates exonerated, both before and after their execution. The ones that were executed would have been alive for the exoneration if we they had been given life in prison instead.
- eudamoniac 5mo ago
  So why aren't you against imprisonment for the simple fact that courts have imprisoned innocent people? We have to accept a certain amount of false positives in all things.
  - Sohcahtoa82 5mo ago
    The death penalty can't be undone, a prisoner can always be released. Sure, they'll never get that time back, but at least they can live.
CamperBob2 5mo ago
It's a uniquely-American perspective: "Our government can't do anything right. But hey, I still trust it to kill the right people."
- 1234letshaveatw 5mo ago
  so true, citizens of the dozens of other countries with the death penalty believe their governments to be infallible
  - happosai 5mo ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_by_country Vast majority of death penalties happen in countries where citizens don't have much of a say what their government does...
boredumb 5mo ago
If someone kills a family member and the court gives them 6 years and a parole officer, the remaining family will and has taken justice into their own hands and that has a much higher blast radius and margin of error than executing a guy convicted of the murder in a court of law and sat on death row making appeals for 10-15 years. If dylan roof was allowed to live his full natural life in jail, there would be race riots in the US by the end of the press conference.
- embedding-shape 5mo ago
  Cool, maybe rather than aiming to punish people, aim to rehabilitate them, and they don't need to spend their full natural life in jail. And if they're "unsalvageable" like many would claim, we (maybe not you, in the US, I dunno) have hospitals for those that are ill.
  - hirvi74 5mo ago
    We also have state operated forensic psychiatric facilities for criminals deemed "unsalvageable." Many are not the same facilities that civilians seeking mental health would attend. Though, some facilities house both on separate units. While prisons in the USA are often more punitive and dangerous than a forensic psychiatric facility, that does mean forensic psychiatric facilities are not their own form of Hell rife with their own problems. Essentially, autonomy, dignity, and human rights are stripped from individuals in both facilities -- you do not want to go to either.
  - boredumb 5mo ago
    Cool, but I'm not sure the victims and the public are always thrilled when they see murderers get off by reason of insanity, despite it being a life sentence and essentially a medically induced solitary mental confinement. People were furious about Yates and Bobbitt despite not even living within a 1000 mile radius because they felt it was a miscarriage of justice and are aware that rehabilitating people who drowned their own children is naive at best or yet another grift to siphon public money into their own pet projects and feign moral superiority.

s5300 5mo ago

[dead]

Sohcahtoa82 5mo ago

I'm only against the death penalty for the simple fact that courts have convicted innocent people. Sometimes, that conviction happens when the court actively blocks exonerating evidence. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/410/284/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/410/284/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/547/319/ https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/547/319/

OkayPhysicist 5mo ago
Anybody who is wrongfully executed was basically guaranteed to spend their entire life in prison. Death row inmates get dramatically more access to legal aid than anybody else rotting in a cell, so if they couldn't win their appeal, the guy doing life isn't, either. Generally, I'm against incarceration for that reason. I think the relatively muted violence of it is too easy to stomach for the public, which leads to people letting the system get sloppy. For public and infamous crimes, however, where the question is not "what act took place", but rather "did this act constitute a crime, and if so, what is the punishment?"-type cases, I'm perfectly fine with capital punishment being on the table. We trust public officials with significant authority, and abuse of that authority is utterly irredeemable. Frankly, for elected officials I'd support a "two-thirds vote and you hang" policy. If you want power, and seek out power, you have an immense responsibility to live up to your constituent's expectations.
- embedding-shape 5mo ago
  > "did this act constitute a crime, and if so, what is the punishment?" I guess that last part is the perspective I'd change, for a more compassionate world. I'd much rather ask "did this act constitute a crime, and if so, what made the person commit that crime, and how can we help them not do that in the future again?".
  - OkayPhysicist 5mo ago
    For the kinds of "public and infamous" crimes I'm talking about, the answer is almost always greed, either for fortune, power, or fame. There's no need to ask "Why did Nestle decide to kill a bunch of African children by giving away just enough formula stop mothers from being able to breastfeed?" or "Why did tobacco companies stand in front of congress and lie through their teeth about how non-addictive nicotine is?" or "Why did Nixon decide to pursue the war on drugs in order to disproportionately target his political opponents and minorities?". The answer is that in order to end up in the C-suite or board of directors of a megacorp, or the White House, you have to be one of the most madly greedy, power-lusting parasites in the world. My compassion for my fellow man is why I suggest we wait for them to commit a crime before punishing such behavior.
    - embedding-shape 5mo ago
      > you have to be one of the most madly greedy, power-lusting parasites in the world. Yes, which is why we need to help these people. They clearly lost all their humanity and compassion, at one point we should care about the betterment of humanity as a whole, and put a limit to how these sort of people can act and do, the current situation is not tenable, and they should be classified as the sick people they are, rather than idolized.
- cortesoft 5mo ago
  That isn’t true. There have been death row inmates exonerated, both before and after their execution. The ones that were executed would have been alive for the exoneration if we they had been given life in prison instead.
eudamoniac 5mo ago
So why aren't you against imprisonment for the simple fact that courts have imprisoned innocent people? We have to accept a certain amount of false positives in all things.
- Sohcahtoa82 5mo ago
  The death penalty can't be undone, a prisoner can always be released. Sure, they'll never get that time back, but at least they can live.

CamperBob2 5mo ago

It's a uniquely-American perspective: "Our government can't do anything right. But hey, I still trust it to kill the right people."

1234letshaveatw 5mo ago
so true, citizens of the dozens of other countries with the death penalty believe their governments to be infallible
- happosai 5mo ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_by_country Vast majority of death penalties happen in countries where citizens don't have much of a say what their government does...

boredumb 5mo ago

If someone kills a family member and the court gives them 6 years and a parole officer, the remaining family will and has taken justice into their own hands and that has a much higher blast radius and margin of error than executing a guy convicted of the murder in a court of law and sat on death row making appeals for 10-15 years. If dylan roof was allowed to live his full natural life in jail, there would be race riots in the US by the end of the press conference.

embedding-shape 5mo ago
Cool, maybe rather than aiming to punish people, aim to rehabilitate them, and they don't need to spend their full natural life in jail. And if they're "unsalvageable" like many would claim, we (maybe not you, in the US, I dunno) have hospitals for those that are ill.
- hirvi74 5mo ago
  We also have state operated forensic psychiatric facilities for criminals deemed "unsalvageable." Many are not the same facilities that civilians seeking mental health would attend. Though, some facilities house both on separate units. While prisons in the USA are often more punitive and dangerous than a forensic psychiatric facility, that does mean forensic psychiatric facilities are not their own form of Hell rife with their own problems. Essentially, autonomy, dignity, and human rights are stripped from individuals in both facilities -- you do not want to go to either.
- boredumb 5mo ago
  Cool, but I'm not sure the victims and the public are always thrilled when they see murderers get off by reason of insanity, despite it being a life sentence and essentially a medically induced solitary mental confinement. People were furious about Yates and Bobbitt despite not even living within a 1000 mile radius because they felt it was a miscarriage of justice and are aware that rehabilitating people who drowned their own children is naive at best or yet another grift to siphon public money into their own pet projects and feign moral superiority.