Arguments for and against the death penalty

[Meclazine for Israel]

I am leaning towards pro-death penalty.

Not because it deters crime. Mainly:

1. Because the sickness in the people who deserve it cannot be removed.

2. They are very likely to re-offend at great risk to future victims.

3. Incarceration costs are extreme.

4. Australia's prison population continues to grow at a rate that is four times that of the general population.

Although it appears cruel to terminate one's life, there have been a lot of cases in Australia recently deserving of the death penalty.

[John Dule]

I am leaning towards pro-death penalty.

Not because it deters crime. Mainly:

1. Because the sickness in the people who deserve it cannot be removed.

Unless someone has a very serious chemical imbalance in their brain, they are almost always capable of redemption. And strangely, the people who we do execute are typically not the ones with such an imbalance, as those people can claim insanity or mental illness to escape death row.

2. They are very likely to re-offend at great risk to future victims.

Not if you put them in prison for life. Which brings me to the next point...

3. Incarceration costs are extreme.

As others have stated before, the court costs of the appellate process are ultimately most costly to the state/taxpayers than life imprisonment would be. The only way to change this would be to significantly limit the appellate process, which would almost certainly result in more wrongful executions.

4. Australia's prison population continues to grow at a rate that is four times that of the general population.

There was a time when 100% of your country's population was in prison, so I'm sure you'll be able to manage.

[John Dule]

Also, the idea that the solution to prison overcrowding is to just kill more prisoners is borderline Stalinistic.

[Non Swing Voter]

Against: an innocent person could be killed.  People playing God.  2 wrongs don't make a right.

For: GOP terrorists/Capitol insurrectionists/treasonous right wingers.

[LBJer]

Against: an innocent person could be killed.  People playing God.  2 wrongs don't make a right.

For: GOP terrorists/Capitol insurrectionists/treasonous right wingers.

I'm opposed to the death penalty (because I think the risk of an innocent person being executed is too great), but your post seems slanted to the point of being in bad faith.  In the "For" column, what about: "Some people do things so bad that they don't deserve to go on living"?  

[KaiserDave]

I have never seen an argument for the death penalty that cannot be refuted. I am opposed entirely.

[If my soul was made of stone]

If it doesn't make your skin crawl to think that the state has granted itself the power to take away your life if it deems you worthy of it, then you've sacrificed as much basic humanity as anyone who you'd feel deserves the death penalty. Even if wrongful convictions and needlessly painful means of execution were a non-issue, the right to have basic control over one's life is ultimate. The sort of mob justice instincts that make people cry for the blood of the condemned are a natural human impulse, but one that is easily curbed in the name of mercy, especially when one realizes that the satisfaction of seeing that blood spilled is short-lived and empty.

[LBJer]

The state doesn't determine such:  unanimous juries of our citizen peers do.  The question of someone's criminal guilt or innocence isn't decided by administrative fiat, it's applied consistently with majoritarian principles and standards of community conduct.    

The potential of some vanishingly few innocents being put to death is an appropriate price to pay for maintaining the retributive principle that protects and maintains the social contract.  

So you’d be okay with a racist Southern jury condemning a Black man to be condemned to death or lifetime slave labor for some minor offense? After all, that could conceivably count as “maintaining the retributive principle that protects and maintains the social contract,” and examples of this exact phenomenon existed and persist in the South to this day.

No, of course not.  Firstly, a racially segregated jury is hardly valid in that it isn't constituted "of one's peers."  Secondly, a retributive theory of justice demands punishments that are proportionate to the crime.   "An eye for an eye" means minor offenses receive the most minor punishments, while more severe crimes get harsher ones.   Theories of punishment based on criminal deterrence or rehabilitation cannot actually answer this question of how severe sentences should be.  In an ideal system, legislatures set bounds for what the prescribed criminal punishments ought to be and judges and juries dole out specific sentences considering any mitigating or aggravating circumstances.

Collectivism is morally bankrupt: Example 21,293,047,255

You gave a meme response so you'll get a meme retort:  I guess it was also "morally bankrupt" for the Allies to invade Nazi Germany knowing that a certain amount of innocent civilian death would happen?  Some ends justify collateral damage; maintaining the notion that the state proportionately acts to restore moral wrongs is pretty high on that list.

Your analogy is very weak.  Without minimizing the deaths of civilians killed by the Allies, the bad that would have resulted from Nazi Germany winning WWII would have been far greater.  Even if we accept the premise that some people deserve to be executed, it's far less clear that the goodness of doing so outweighs the badness of even a possibility of innocent people being put to death.  Your reasoning turns the maxim that it's better to let a dozen guilty people go free than have one innocent person in jail (let alone be executed) on its head.

[Del Tachi]

Your reasoning turns the maxim that it's better to let a dozen guilty people go free than have one innocent person in jail (let alone be executed) on its head.

This is not a maxim, lol

[LBJer]

Your reasoning turns the maxim that it's better to let a dozen guilty people go free than have one innocent person in jail (let alone be executed) on its head.

This is not a maxim, lol

Then I'll call it a "saying" instead.  My point still stands.

[Schiff for Senate]

If it doesn't make your skin crawl to think that the state has granted itself the power to take away your life if it deems you worthy of it, then you've sacrificed as much basic humanity as anyone who you'd feel deserves the death penalty. Even if wrongful convictions and needlessly painful means of execution were a non-issue, the right to have basic control over one's life is ultimate. The sort of mob justice instincts that make people cry for the blood of the condemned are a natural human impulse, but one that is easily curbed in the name of mercy, especially when one realizes that the satisfaction of seeing that blood spilled is short-lived and empty.

Very eloquently written. You make a strong case against the death penalty. This belongs in the 'Political Essays and Deliberation' board, in my opinion.

[TheReckoning]

I have never seen an argument for the death penalty that cannot be refuted. I am opposed entirely.

Not even if Hitler was captured alive and surrendering?

I’m asking this as someone who leans towards opposing the death penalty in all cases.

[KaiserDave]

I have never seen an argument for the death penalty that cannot be refuted. I am opposed entirely.

Not even if Hitler was captured alive and surrendering?

I’m asking this as someone who leans towards opposing the death penalty in all cases.

My mind changes slightly in regards to international war crimes tribunals, but this specific scenario is too absurd to consider. But that circumstance is the one time my mind is at all changed.

[TheReckoning]

I have never seen an argument for the death penalty that cannot be refuted. I am opposed entirely.

Not even if Hitler was captured alive and surrendering?

I’m asking this as someone who leans towards opposing the death penalty in all cases.

My mind changes slightly in regards to international war crimes tribunals, but this specific scenario is too absurd to consider. But that circumstance is the one time my mind is at all changed.

I suppose I would disagree with you here, I would not support execution even in that case, which is probably the case where it is most deserved. But thank you for being honest.

[Big Abraham]

Revolutions are not possible without bloodshed and the gallows.

[If my soul was made of stone]

Revolutions are not possible without bloodshed and the gallows.

I see this as an entirely different question from whether or not death is the business of the state as it currently exists.

[Big Abraham]

Revolutions are not possible without bloodshed and the gallows.

I see this as an entirely different question from whether or not death is the business of the state as it currently exists.

I see no reason to believe the death penalty is limited to only a question of the state as it currently exists.

[S019]

Revolutions are not possible without bloodshed and the gallows.

This is not convincing to those who do not support revolution

[Big Abraham]

Revolutions are not possible without bloodshed and the gallows.

This is not convincing to those who do not support revolution

Not supporting revolution is un-American.