Capital Punishment are you for or against, with today's society?

firebobby

Definitely bring back capital punishment, but hanging was brutal. Lethal injection should be the method used.

Vraslli

Definitely for...if you kill someone how do you have a right to your own life? I don't think so...society has gotten too lax with punishments...I get sick to my stomach everytime I see a criminal get nolled by the court...are they learning anything? NO...someone needs to set an example.

uzedcarguy

I am totally FOR the death penalty. I had to guard an inmate who was eventually given the death penalty a little while back. He never showed ANY remorse. So what good would it do to have him live a long life on my tax dollars in hopes that he "might" someday start to feel bad about what he did?

Someone mentioned that it would not bring back the victim" ...Well...maybe not, but it sure as the devil would avoid any more victims by the same POC!

Some say the death penalty is not a deterrent to murder...uh...it is for the one with needle stuck in their arm.

One other angle no one has mentioned: Prison is NOT FOR REHAB. It is SUPPOSED TO BE FOR PUNISHMENT! Same goes for the death penalty. It's for PUNISHMENT...and a dang good one it is!

damond h

"Todays society" doesn't have anything to do with it...

The reason kids are the way they are is because of the idiots, who don't teach their kids right from wrong.

The argument, that lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment falls on deaf ears with me... I don't want to hear someone who killed someone else complain about cruel and unusual. Just like the guy a few years ago, who was going to be hanged for his crimes... he was a lard ***, so they said they couldn't hang him because his head would snap off his shoulders. If I were the govorner of that state I would have asked his family... One box or Two...

jim_n_ruth

You will never stop murder. But you can stop those individuals who get caught from murdering again. Rid the world of them. Who cares if it hurts? They didn't give a damn about the pain the victim endured one iota. They never considered the pain of those left behind. Screw the liberals on this one. Capital punishment is not intended to be fun. It's designed to kill.

patriotwww

Capital Punishment is brutal. If you are going to have a major operation don't they just put you to sleep? Then why all this controversy over how we do it and all the pain involved? Just put the person to sleep and they never wake up. Easy!

astonite40

How can i answer except say:
For
For
For

Blazing Pen Avenger.

Hard, hard, near-impossible question. Yes and no. Six of one, half dozen of the other. A 'Gordian knot.' O.K. Here goes: I believe that Public Opinion will soon 'rebel' and the Human Rights Act (a dreadful piece of legislation) shall be consigned to the 'dustbin' of this Country's long history. On many an occasion, certain crimes are indeed 'vile' and the 'cyclops' and 'boggits' committing such heinous acts, still....'alive.' However, to quote Ben Hecht: "We, as a school, of thought and science, detect a new race now forming; clean cut. This new race, shall be, the great race of the future." (Ask again in a couple of years.)

Halley K

in my opinion, voilent offenders need to be punished waaaay more than they are now. a person who would ever molest a child doesnt deserve a life, not even in prison. and people on death row shouldnt wait 20 freaking years to be put to death!!! if the evidence is there, why wait???

Kevin

I'm for it for hanish crimes.

meghenstein

it actually costs a LOT more money for capital punishment (for those of you who think otherwise). in order to put someone to death, think about how long the trials are before the person is even killed. so if you're really concerned about saving money, capital punishment is not the way to go.
i also wouldnt necessarily say that human rights "crap" doesnt work.
and i have no problem whether capital punishment exists or not. it's just got to be proven without a doubt that the crime actually happened.

I'm for it!! The more painful for the criminal the better!!! That'll deter them much more than the thought of having painkillers before being 'put to sleep'

TURANDOT

After Timothy McVeigh, I lost my support for the death penalty. I read his biography and it turned me the other way.

Let them rot in jail. That is their punishment. Death gives them an easy way out of their misery

uncwrocks

How does capital punishment deter? It doesn't because if it was successful in deterrence, you would have fewer murders and violent crimes. As far as mentioning wayward youth, it has no effect on them because it is unconstitutional to execute someone who is convicted of a crime that was committed as a juvenile (Roper v. Simmons, 2005). Punishment needs to be swift, severe, and certain in order to deter others from committing the same crimes.

kemlyn

for

pooled08

I'm all for the death penalty. Here's why:

-it serves due justice (the punishment fits the crime), and serving due justice is the NO.1 job of a court of law
-it shows that we are tough on crime
-it gets bang for the taxpayers buck
-criminals given the DP have a 0% recidivism rate
-It holds people responcible for the horrible content of their character. This fulfills what MLKJ always wanted: judge not by the color of your skin, but by the content of your character. The characterof these criminals warrants death
-It holds the criminal responcible for his actions
-appeals and **** aside, it's cheaper then prison
-it decreases the prison population, which saves even more taxpayers money
-Because the death penalty is the punishment given by a neutrel judge, there is no vengance in it. Therefore, there is no moral objection to be had with the death penalty.
-The death penalty defends human rights by establishing a mentality that "we will not tolerate any violation of any innocent person's human right's

BTW, I like how you said "human rights crap." I totally agree.

ALEX N

the consensus of opinion throughout the country appears to favour the return of the death penalty except among the useless idiots we elect to carry out our wishes , as soon as the elections are past they walk away and forget the fact that WE THE ELECTORATE are the bosses , he who pays the piper calls the tune , so mps you are up to now most deffinately NOT RIGHT HONOURABLE you are regarded as dishonourable by us , untill you waken up and carry out the wishes of the people who give you the inflated job with your inflated salary (and inflated pension) FAT CATS ? LISTEN TO THE PEOPLE

Panos

I am for it,even if mistakes can happen,usualy they dont.if criminals thought they might end up on the chair they might think twice before shooting or stabbing someone.

Mr. Morden

"human rights crap"?

That question is depressing on so many levels.

owenlax17

I still don't think we should justify killing someone to make the victim's family feel better. No matter what, we can't bring back the victim. Killing the murderer does nothing. I personally think it is better to make them realize their guilt, and have to live with that guilt for a lifetime, than to kill them and give them an easy way out .

bmulek2000

We don't use it enough! I think think that If the governement wants to save money, once found guilty, we find a strong rope and a tall tree... problem solved!

oldpepy

Against as it's just revenge!

elvis_liveonstage

This will get the wishy washy liberals out moaning.

Capital punishment is needed to bring society back in line, lets not waste years on death row. Sentence them take down and do it there.

news hound

we are nearly there to having no alternative but, to bring back capital punishment.
In the UK as we, are fully aware the dispensation of judgement sentences to convicted criminals is in it self, a criminal act. It has become so farcical, Life sentence is passed off as 8/12 years ,=This is for murder=?do not, blame the Police they, are as frustrated as the majority of the UK public our =laws= are =not fit for purpose= to quote another ex-minister

filipspagnoli

Capital punishment, what a euphemism! Of course, that's not an argument against it.

The main, and according to me only argument in favor is deterrence, scaring the hell out of potential criminals so that they refrain from enacting their crime.

However, deterrence basically means sacrificing the life of a murderer for instance in order to save future victims of other murderers. That seems to me an immoral use of someone life, however criminal that life may have been.

Article 3 of the Umiversal Declaration protects the right to life, and article 5 states that no one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Killing someone is obviously such a kind of punishment.

You may reject the Universal Declaration but don't forget you may need it later.

Of course, human rights can be limited in order to protect other human rights or the rights of others. For example, the right to free speech of some can be limited to protect the right of privacy of someone else. Some say that the same applies to capital punishment. The right to life of the criiminal must give way to the right to life of his/her victims. First of all, this cannot apply to his/her actual victims, because killing the criminal does not make it possible to safe the lives of the victims. That's too late. Capital punishment is not prevention, it is punishment. But of course it can mean prevention of the same thing happening again.

However, deterrence can only be estimated generally, not individually, because individual estimates are impossible after you kill the guy who would perhaps be liable to repeat his crimes. Hence you can never know, logically, that killing someone has avoided repitition of the crime. So you limit the right to life of one person without knowing that you have saved the lives of others. Limiting rights can only be done when you are sure that you protect other rights or the rights of others, and when these other rights are more important than the ones you limit. â€¨And anyway, even the general, non-individual estimates of deterrence are disputed and equivocal.

Reflect also on the possibility of a slippery slope: once you accept the death penalty for a certain kind of crime, what stops you going further? We can see in China today that this is a real danger: they execute people for relatively banal crimes such as corruption.

Here's a nice quote by Albert Camus on the subject: "Capital punishment is the most premeditated of murders, to which no criminalâ€™s deed, however calculated, can be compared. For there to be an equivalency, the death penalty would have to punish a criminal who had warned his victim of the date on which he would inflict a horrible death on him and who, from that moment onward, had confined him at his mercy for months. Such a monster is not to be encountered in private life."

Or this one: "I feel morally and intellectually obliged to simply conceded that the death penalty experiment has failed.... From this day forward, I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death." -Former US Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun.

I've added a link below to a longer article by Camus, a classic in the topic and a must-read for both opponents and proponents of the death penalty. I've also added a video by Elvis Costello.

Hawkeye85

When i was going through school it was the worse time i ever had and it ruined my education and i was angry that thugs, bullies and people who constantly miss behave got pathetic notes going home or punishments that had no effect on them.

Some parent thought their children where raised well enough to know how to behave but this is a miss conseption. Kids that mess about think they are top dog and no one can do anything to them no matter what they do. Worrying thing is that this attatude is spreading with the younger genaration and thugs are having cildren them self and raising the same way. You can no longer feel safe anywhere know because children are not dissaplined enough to know to respect people. All children male and female who miss behave i think will benifit from a form of capital punishment. When you look at animal behaviour the youngster gets disaplined by the the parent to make sure they are in check and know their place. This should be applied to todays children. National service should come back for male and females to reinforse respectable behaviour.

Sound like an old fart well i am not and i am pissed off with how things are turnning out.

DON'T DRINK!

I think if a person can be proved without a doubt that they are guilty of murder, or they admit to the crime, they should be handed over to the family of the murder victim. The family could then do to them what they wish. If the family dosen't want to take it into their own hands, then the authorities should put the murderer to death in the same manner that he killed his victim. Personally, if someone killed any of my family members, I'd want to make them suffer the same fate. People who are responsible for ending someone's life on purpose, have given up their own right to live. All you "feel-good" people who say "another murder dosen't bring back the victim" would surely change your minds if it was your loved one who was murdered. If not, you are not thinking clearly. If you think that murderers sit in prison, and cry over their crimes, and feel guilt, you are dillusional. They brag about it to other inmates to instill fear, and gain fame. They should be put to death, and buried twice as deep as their innocent victims, and be given a grave marker that reads: "Here lies a murderer. I was a coward in life, and this world became a better place after my death. Life is precious, and I am unworthy of taking part in it."

panpanpan

I'm against capital punishment, but for whole life sentencing and tougher, cheaper prisons. Prison should be a harsh environment, locked in the cell 24/7, the cheapest of food, enough to keep them alive but not more, no prisoner to prisoner contact, etc. This would reduce the amount of violence and drug taking in prison, increase security and cost the tax payers less. Prisons should be there to exclude and punish, not the rehabilitation nonsense that is such a complete failure.

Maybe, but I do not think so.

More prisons and a sentence that is a sentence.

I know someone got 3 years recently, but he serves only a third, ie 1 year.

Strange..

whip

i believe it should be left to the jury,judge and most of all the family.they need to be able to appeal to make sure. then they can execute the worst of our society.and you loose your rights when you commit a felony

Enter Your Message or Comment

User Name:
User Email:
Post a comment: