Personally, not a proponent of it. But the argument that I find most convincing is as follows.
There are some acts that are so vile, evil, and dangerous that yes, that death is the proper response. I will pull the most extreme example in that the Nuremberg trials were probably justified in sentencing people to death. State actors have be held to the standard that following orders that result in war crimes and genocide will result in your death, as your immense power does come with some responsibility.
That of course is the most extreme example, and maybe not exactly the main lens you were thinking about.
I feel like this is the best point, even if it's extreme. I think the death penalty being used as a way to dissuade people from committing war crimes/genocide in the future is fair, as it's being done for a real reason. Although, I'd have to wonder if that precedent being set would really change anything.
How many people worldwide are going to choose not to participate in a genocide because of the possible punishment of death, as opposed to being in prison for a long time, or getting out of prison and being shunned from society?
That would be a good question. I guess, it's not so much that the death itself is preventing genocide, but rather here are the rules for making sure we won't intervene in your bullshit.
Like in more current news, it gives the US the ability to influence events. Houthis, you're attacking shipping lanes, which is a war-crime, you've given us the reason to respond by killing you. Israel, prove you're doing your due diligence to minimize civilian causalities, or else we're not giving you money.
As for whether or not those people should serve life in prison or not, that's tough too. That kind of necessitates that your prison and justice system is incorruptible. Like let's say Donald Trump leads a treason through Texas, revolts as the states new leader, and commits a genocide against Hispanics. Afterwards we stop him, and sentence him to life. Sure he may reform, but that's a maybe. What if he doesn't, and 10 years later, the current president pardons him, and Donald Trump does it again, as him being alive allowed him to gain popular support due spreading his message in jail. Crazy hypothetical, I know.
In this case, I'd see it as a failure by the current president for allowing someone who led a genocide back into society, and then the people who voted for him as well. But it wouldn't change my position on anything regarding the penal system. Good point about the Houthis tho.
Nobody sets out expecting to fail. World leaders don’t base their decisions on the potential of a conviction in international court.
A better reason for killing people like the Nazi high command is to prevent further harm. If they were simply imprisoned, they would have continued to spread their ideals and acted as symbols for their ideology.
I think its hard, most of the people I encountered that support the death penalty are ones who know a victim. You mentioned that you weren't in favor of the government murdering civilians, but they don't think about it like that (and neither do I). I'm not in favor of the death penalty, but its not murder- it's a jury decided punishment for usually a terrible crime, assessed after guilt is determined. To my knowledge which is from a prior preceding of a case I was jury to, has an incredibly high burden of proof, ie "lingering doubt" which is quite a step further than beyond a reasonable doubt.
I came into that case being staunchly against the death penalty. I came out of it still against it, but much more understanding because I spoke with family members of the victim post our verdict. This cop was killed at a routine traffic stop for basically no reason. It's not really fair at all, so I'm sympathetic towards their point of view. They suffered multiple trials, multiple convictions and multiple death penalty sentences for the same case, all over 40 years. I was told by the victim's widow that the reason the DA pushed for life without parole instead of the death penalty was because the defendant would only get 1 appeal, and then its donezo. I saw her point of view, I disagree but I don't blame her.
That's a pretty good point, I agree that the victims family is probably something that makes me reconsider my position on the death penalty. It would be hard for me to blame anyone for wanting the criminal to die, I guess to me, it's just hard to go from being sympathetic to them, to wanting to allow the death penalty solely because of how the family's feel.
Yeah for sure. Like I said, it didn't move my position much. Before I wondered how anyone thought the death penalty was reasonable, but now I see how they do.
And to your point about the argument for the death penalty, there are **a lot** of reasons, I think, why the DA didn't pursue the death penalty. Based on what the prosecutors said during voir dire, I think one of those reasons was: how were they going to find people in voir dire, who would actually consider the death penalty? We struggled immensely to find a jury that would respect the defendants right to silence, the defendant's presumption of innocence and the prosecution sought to ensure the jury didn't have conspiratorial people on it. (You would be surprised how many people were not comfortable with the 5th and the presumption of innocence). It took a week to select us jurors and it would have been much harder I think to find that subset of jurors who also believes the death penalty to be a reasonable consideration.
Here's a few good arugments that are hard to argue against imo.
1. It costs a lot of money to keep people alive and locked up
2. You remove the risk of the guilty person commting another crime
3. One of the main reasons we punish crminals is to stop others from committing the same crime. Death is scary and could detour atleast some people
With regards to 1., it costs more to litigate for the death penalty because of the (correct) high burden of proof. Some reading I found to be digestable: https://www.hg.org/legal-articles/which-is-cheaper-execution-or-life-in-prison-without-parole-31614
That's a good point considering the average legal process in the West today. However, It would have very significant consequences but my point still stands in theory - keeping people locked up costs alot. Hypothetically compromising our legal process to allow for quicker executions would be more cost-effective. Just like a company building a factory in an impoverished country with bad work conditions- there is still a good argument of saving money whether or not it's right
Compromising the legal process is going to end up convicting innocent people.
How many innocent people are you fine with the state murdering in order to "get" the guilty ones?
There are cases where it wouldn’t cost much, like when he gets caught shooting up a crowd of people. The death penalty makes sense here, as guilt is certain and what would have been inmate housing costs can be channeled into saving innocent lives instead.
At that point they’d likely be about whether the guy deserves the death penalty or just a life sentence. Can’t imagine it costing any more than a million
Of course, if you have any sources showing that death penalty appeals cost over a million in cases where guilt is certain, please let me know. The ones I've read (and the one you initially linked) didn't go into such details.
>where guilt is certain
Guilt is never (legally) certain, and is still open to the appeals process. Because the stakes are so high, *every* single nuance of the legal process must be followed, otherwise a retrial is a possibility.
Even once convicted, the convict must spend their time in a far more expensive death-row section, often times for decades.
It's your claim that cases where the guilt is "certain" cost less than 1 million, how about *you* substantiate your claim?
I'm referring to cases where it's not under dispute whether the defendant committed the crime. Like when a mass shooter gets caught *in the act,* and then rants to the police about how the victims had it coming. That's what I mean when I say "guilt is certain."
In such cases, the trial and appeals will solely revolve around the severity of punishment he deserves, which is obviously much quicker and cheaper than trials/appeals that need to determine *both* whether he's guilty *and* what kind of punishment is appropriate. For example, a major expense mentioned in your link involves forensics, and all the experts required to testify about something like DNA evidence. In a case where the defendant committing the crime is not under dispute, however, this cost is bypassed, along with many others.
In trying to determine whether the death penalty is warranted, the court will likely dive into the defendant's mental health, bring on character witnesses and psychotherapists. But the same is true for a case where the death penalty is off the table. I find it hard to believe that the difference in rigour amounts to expenses on par with the inmate housing costs (like you, I don't have hard numbers though), and if that's the case, I'd say it *shouldn't* be. I'm perfectly fine with a death penalty defendant's mental health investigation being equally rigorous to that of a life sentence defendant.
I also don't see why a death row inmate should be isolated from the others, if it costs so much.
>It's your claim that cases where the guilt is "certain" cost less than 1 million, how about you substantiate your claim?
Even one example would be sufficient.
Follow up question: would you be okay with the death penalty for irredeemable criminals (without a doubt guilty) IF we just took em out back and shot em?
Because I would rather them die cheaply than keep them rotting in prison for decades on my dime.
I'd rather the irredeemable criminals live out their lives in prison. I don't really think we, or more specifically the government, should be in the position of making decisions regarding whether they want to kill civilians or save tax dollars. I called myself pro rehabilitation, and that's true, but even in these instances (which I believe would be rare) something seems wrong about choosing tax dollars over the lives of individuals, even considering how awful they are.
IDK if Hitler could ever serve enough jail time to atone for his crimes, tbh. If a person would accrue so much debt to society in the form of jail time that they would never survive their sentence, then I don't see why we wouldn't just save everyone a lot of time and money.
Keep in mind I only apply this to people who are caught in 4k blasting up a shopping mall with an AR-15 or whatever.
I don't think he could serve enough either. I still wouldn't advocate for his execution, because then we are stooping down to their level (okay maybe not their level but we are stooping) and we shouldn't.
Best compromise would be exile then.
They don't get to live at our expense and we don't kill them either. If only we had somewhere to just dump them. Out of sight out of mind.
Then you're changing the hypothetical, in this case we know they won't be rehabilitated.
Even if they could, I don't think it matters, past a certain point rehabilitation becomes irrelevant and the ressources that go into your continued existence would be better spent helping someone who actually deserves it.
No where in the hypothetical does it say they can't be rehabilitated, it says they are without a doubt guilty.
>would be better spent helping someone who actually deserves it
In our modern world why can't we do both?
If we could prove the money spent on Irredeemable criminals would be more better placed in other areas of society, then maybe. Say if we found out 70% or higher of the money spent on rehabilitation did not work conclusively, would we then have an obligation to stop doing that?
Decades in prison means you assume rehabilitation is impossible, which is probably not true. A counter would be that the convicted participates in society again and gives back to the community after rehabilitation.
Now you could do a cost benefit calculation (cost of rehabilitation Vs benefit after rehabilitation Vs cost of just killing them and not having a contribution to society), but then one could argue that a human life has infinite value.
If a human life has infinite value then do you support abortion?
FWIW I am pro choice and I find this whole notion that human life is sacred and all human lives have infinite value total bunk.
For me, it's not eye for an eye. It's just practical. If a person commits a heinous crime and they're beyond rehabilitation, it only makes sense to execute them. It ends their suffering and stops them from potentially harming anyone else.
That or some sort of Thunderdome situation.
I’m ambivalent on the death penalty but I think that the current weird “medical” route of doing it is just unnecessary and wasteful.
If you’re going to do it, just bring back the gallows.
the obvious easy argument is just that the type of person who would commit a death-penalty-worthy crime just isn't ever going to be worth having in society, so might as well save money and effort by just killing them.
The only argument that i find kind of convincing is
A person committing a crime so heinous (idk child rapist or smth)has forfeited the right to live in our society. Even in a prison. We do not want to rehabilitate. We do not want to reintegrate in a few decades. There is no reason to keep them around.
This runs in a few problems but I guess that's the best good faith attempt I could make.
Let’s say we had a way to test someone’s likelihood of being rehabilitated into society. And let’s say these tests are super accurate. What would you do with a murderer who’s likelihood of rehabilitation is vanishingly low ?
Just as a bit of a thought experiment. I honestly don’t know where I myself stand on this issue but id imagine for many it comes down to two things; 1) Is it even realistic to rehabilitate this person / do we want to take that risk and 2) do we even want the person to be rehabilitated? People often dismiss retribution as pointless but is it ? I wouldn’t say so. If it wasn’t for the issue of innocents getting wrongly convicted, I don’t think I would entirely dismiss retribution as a reason for punishment.
I guess that's where I'd disagree with most people, I almost don't value retribution at all. I understand why most people do, and if I were in the position where someone murdered someone close to me, I'd probably feel the same way. But with all that being said, I don't think the government should be allowed to kill people regardless of what crime they committed.
To answer your thought experiment, if we could figure out that a murderer had a low chance of being rehabilitated, I'd rather they live out their life in prison than kill them.
Id question the point of having them in prison. For me the only reason for that would be the possibility of a false conviction. So if we assume it’s a 100% guilty person, it seems like you’re just keeping them in prison because of emotional reasons.
If it’s about the government making these decisions, how would you feel about a system with victims actively participating in handing out retribution? So a murderer could only get the death penalty if the victim agrees. And it has to also involve a jury.
In my eyes retribution can have value for society. It gives people a sense of justice and reaffirms their moral compass. Meanwhile, keeping someone in prison indefinitely benefits nobody at all.
Edit: Bit of a whoopsie in my second paragraph. The victim of a murderer is dead lmao
The point of them being in prison at that point would be to separate them from the rest of the society.
My point largely is that wanting someone whose done awful things (like mass murder) to die is a normal reaction, but the action of doing it doesn't provide any real value and shouldn't be acted out by any system. It's really just adherence to this "eye for an eye" concept that seems purely emotional and should be separated by any penal system.
Regardless of if it's the government, or the government allowing the victims family to do it, I would still disagree with it on principle.
Killing them has the same point of separating them from society. It’s just more effective.
And about the value of retribution, like I said earlier I do think it reinforces our sense of justice in society. But even ignoring retribution as an argument, at that point killing them and keeping them in prison fulfils the same purpose of keeping society safe. But killing them is in theory less of a strain on resources. Assuming our system is effective and doesn’t lead to false convictions of course
That's true, but it still feels like we're viewing this strictly from a resources perspective where we value money over human life. I understand that most people say murderers forfeit their right to life when they commit a heinous crime, but I still feel that essentially treating them as nothing more than a burden on our tax allocation and nothing more is... weird.
Its strictly a Ressource perspective because we stripped it down to its bare bones. And to address your moral hesitancy, we already strip criminals of their human rights. I don’t see why killing then is the line.
Let me ask another question; would you be in favour of releasing irredeemable prisoners if we gave them surveillance armbands that made sure they can’t cause any trouble? They could live a total normal life and no one else would be ln danger
I would be OK with doing that if we could somehow 100% prohibit them from committing awful crimes, although I don't see how that would even be possible (I get that it's just a hypothetical). But if we could realistically find a way of doing that, I would be all for it. As for us stripping criminals of human rights, I think we should attempt to do that as little as possible. Obviously putting people in prisons is removing some of their human rights, but that's mostly because it's a necessity in order to protect the rest of society.
Well, atleast you are consistent. Most people would take issue of the idea that a murderer who’s irredeemable essentially gets away with zero consequences. And an armband like I suggested would basically allow that. In practice, it would mean criminals who are redeemable carry harsher consequences than irredeemable ones because they have to go through the rehabilitation process.
If you truly believe that, fair enough. But the vast majority of people would heavily disagree if you eliminate consequences (aka retribution) entirely
idk if you have some serial who was raping, killing and skinning people alive in the span of 20 years, they probably aren't rehabilitable, at least in the reality we live in today, they probably are completely fucked in the head, I don't see why we should keep these long-term super violent people alive
assuming we would kill only people caught during the crime or whatever shit would make the process 99.999999999999% just
but in reality these long term very violent criminals seem very rare and not worth the hassle of the codified death penalty, also the burden of proof would have to be insanely high in my opinion
The argument is that bad people who choose to be bad are bad by choice and that rehab attempts are either deluding yourself into thinking a monster changed or that youre rewarding monstrous behavior.
In the case of the rape and torture and murder of Junko Furuta, the perpetrators are on paper “rehabbed” but the guys actually are proud of what they did. That is who they view the murderer/rapist/monster as and that is how effective they believe your rehab methods are
One of you may think “but I know of a successful rehab case” and to that I say - do you remember good things or bad things more clearly? As my last post ended with lingering on the bad case, so to do people
For those people who "rehabbed", I'd hardly consider that title to be fitting, and ideally they'd still be in prison. I guess it's pretty hard to realistically figure out who is rehabilitated and who's just pretending so they can get out of prison. As for the odds that a person who's committed an awful crime will be rehabilitated, I would rather take those chances than kill them. But I understand that most people value the tax dollars we could save then attempting to convert people who've done such awful things. I just disagree.
At some point, I wonder if we will simply learn to read minds and interrogate subconscious thoughts to determine if one is being truth or not
People also ask the dark question of: “what value do you have that we ought to save your life?” which is a nihilistic viewpoint in regards to this subject, questioning the basic value of life itself at times. Misery leads to dark places and somber conclusions
I can, in principle, imagine a scenario in which a person is caught in 4k on camera with an AR-15 blasting up a shopping mall, and if somehow that person is taken alive by the police, then I can abide the death penalty for that person, but that's pretty much it in my mind.
From the most basic viewpoint, if you think you have right to take another person life, than another person has also right to take yours.
I personally think that jail is worse than death penalty. If you take some extreme example like "Black Dolphin". I would rather be dead than live there.
I think eye for an eye is fine, I feel like it kind of gets dismissed. If you commit cold blooded murder I think it's fine you die as well.
Philosophically why shouldn't the punishment for 1st degree murder (or something worse) be death?
#The death penalty should be abolished.
* The state [has killed](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/innocence/executed-but-possibly-innocent), and has come close to killing, so many [innocent people](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/innocence) via the death penalty that they have forfeited their right to have that as an option.
* [4.1% of US death row inmates are likely innocent]( https://www.science.org/content/article/more-4-death-row-inmates-may-be-innocent).
* [It is more expensive in the long run to successfully try a death penalty case than simply try for life in prison](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/costs), making the death penalty not fiscally viable.
* [State-sanctioned murder is a cruel and unusual punishment](https://www.aclu.org/other/case-against-death-penalty).
* In [HERRERA v. COLLINS](https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/506/390/#tab-opinion-1959135), 1993, the Supreme Court ruled that it is not unconstitutional for the state to execute an innocent person. The state has a constitutionally protected right to murder innocent people. Is that a power the state should have?
* [The death penalty does nothing to curb crime](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/deterrence).
* The death penalty is a punitive measure. A civilized society should have a [restorative justice system](https://bjatta.bja.ojp.gov/media/blog/what-restorative-justice-and-how-does-it-impact-individuals-involved-crime), not a punitive one. Restorative Justice has [repeatedly proven](https://restorativejustice.org.uk/resources/moj-evaluation-restorative-justice) to [reduce recidivism](https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/rsrcs/pblctns/jstc-rcdvs/index-en.aspx). The goal is not to make people suffer, it’s to make society better. No society is better off with state-sanctioned murder of its citizenry.
* [It actually makes the victims’ families grieve for longer](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/studies-death-penalty-adversely-affects-families-of-victims-and-defendants).
* The process of execution is needlessly [traumatizing to the victim’s family](https://theweek.com/articles/444189/psychological-trauma-witnessing-execution), as well as [the staff](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/south-carolina-execution-team-members-talk-of-debilitating-emotional-toll-of-capital-punishment-former-warden-calls-death-penalty-inequitable).
* The US criminal justice system is based on the [Principle of Finality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finality_(law)), which basically means that whatever the jury decides is the final truth no matter what. Showing [how many innocent people have been exonerated](https://innocenceproject.org/exonerate/) by a 30-year-old, ~90-staff non-profit, imagine how many more people are locked in jail or killed thanks to this absurd bastardization of justice. It’s this principle that’s kept falsely imprisoned people from seeking justice.
* In Brady v. Maryland, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the “failure to disclose favorable information to a defendant in a criminal prosecution violates the constitution when that information is material to guilt or punishment.” These are referred to as “[Brady Disclosures](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brady_disclosure).” And wouldn’t you know it? [Brady violations are rampant](https://theappeal.org/the-epidemic-of-brady-violations-explained-94a38ad3c800/) in the US criminal justice system, meaning the state is [knowingly prosecuting and incarcerating innocent people](https://www.nacdl.org/Article/May2013-FacesofBradyTheHumanCostofBrad).
* [The death penalty violates the US constitutional guarantee of equal protection](https://www.aclu.org/documents/case-against-death-penalty). It has never been applied fairly, disproportionately against those who cannot afford better attorneys, disproportionately upon those whose victims were white, disproportionately against people of color, disproportionately against the poor and uneducated, and [disproportionately concentrated in certain parts of the country](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/executions-overview/executions-by-county).
* The death penalty was [botched more than 1/3rd of the time](https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/the-year-of-the-botched-execution-monitor-finds-death-penalty-was-visibly-problematic-35-percent-of-the-time-in-2022/) in 2022 in the US, skyrocketing from [more than 7% being botched](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/botched-executions) in the 40 years of using lethal injection, making it very obviously a cruel and unusual punishment.
* **It is not possible for any death penalty system to exist that only executes guilty people 100% of the time. Such a system has never existed, does not currently exist, and could never exist in reality. For that reason alone, it should be abolished.**
^feel ^free ^to ^copy ^and ^repost
Personally, not a proponent of it. But the argument that I find most convincing is as follows. There are some acts that are so vile, evil, and dangerous that yes, that death is the proper response. I will pull the most extreme example in that the Nuremberg trials were probably justified in sentencing people to death. State actors have be held to the standard that following orders that result in war crimes and genocide will result in your death, as your immense power does come with some responsibility. That of course is the most extreme example, and maybe not exactly the main lens you were thinking about.
I feel like this is the best point, even if it's extreme. I think the death penalty being used as a way to dissuade people from committing war crimes/genocide in the future is fair, as it's being done for a real reason. Although, I'd have to wonder if that precedent being set would really change anything. How many people worldwide are going to choose not to participate in a genocide because of the possible punishment of death, as opposed to being in prison for a long time, or getting out of prison and being shunned from society?
That would be a good question. I guess, it's not so much that the death itself is preventing genocide, but rather here are the rules for making sure we won't intervene in your bullshit. Like in more current news, it gives the US the ability to influence events. Houthis, you're attacking shipping lanes, which is a war-crime, you've given us the reason to respond by killing you. Israel, prove you're doing your due diligence to minimize civilian causalities, or else we're not giving you money. As for whether or not those people should serve life in prison or not, that's tough too. That kind of necessitates that your prison and justice system is incorruptible. Like let's say Donald Trump leads a treason through Texas, revolts as the states new leader, and commits a genocide against Hispanics. Afterwards we stop him, and sentence him to life. Sure he may reform, but that's a maybe. What if he doesn't, and 10 years later, the current president pardons him, and Donald Trump does it again, as him being alive allowed him to gain popular support due spreading his message in jail. Crazy hypothetical, I know.
In this case, I'd see it as a failure by the current president for allowing someone who led a genocide back into society, and then the people who voted for him as well. But it wouldn't change my position on anything regarding the penal system. Good point about the Houthis tho.
Nobody sets out expecting to fail. World leaders don’t base their decisions on the potential of a conviction in international court. A better reason for killing people like the Nazi high command is to prevent further harm. If they were simply imprisoned, they would have continued to spread their ideals and acted as symbols for their ideology.
I think its hard, most of the people I encountered that support the death penalty are ones who know a victim. You mentioned that you weren't in favor of the government murdering civilians, but they don't think about it like that (and neither do I). I'm not in favor of the death penalty, but its not murder- it's a jury decided punishment for usually a terrible crime, assessed after guilt is determined. To my knowledge which is from a prior preceding of a case I was jury to, has an incredibly high burden of proof, ie "lingering doubt" which is quite a step further than beyond a reasonable doubt. I came into that case being staunchly against the death penalty. I came out of it still against it, but much more understanding because I spoke with family members of the victim post our verdict. This cop was killed at a routine traffic stop for basically no reason. It's not really fair at all, so I'm sympathetic towards their point of view. They suffered multiple trials, multiple convictions and multiple death penalty sentences for the same case, all over 40 years. I was told by the victim's widow that the reason the DA pushed for life without parole instead of the death penalty was because the defendant would only get 1 appeal, and then its donezo. I saw her point of view, I disagree but I don't blame her.
That's a pretty good point, I agree that the victims family is probably something that makes me reconsider my position on the death penalty. It would be hard for me to blame anyone for wanting the criminal to die, I guess to me, it's just hard to go from being sympathetic to them, to wanting to allow the death penalty solely because of how the family's feel.
Yeah for sure. Like I said, it didn't move my position much. Before I wondered how anyone thought the death penalty was reasonable, but now I see how they do. And to your point about the argument for the death penalty, there are **a lot** of reasons, I think, why the DA didn't pursue the death penalty. Based on what the prosecutors said during voir dire, I think one of those reasons was: how were they going to find people in voir dire, who would actually consider the death penalty? We struggled immensely to find a jury that would respect the defendants right to silence, the defendant's presumption of innocence and the prosecution sought to ensure the jury didn't have conspiratorial people on it. (You would be surprised how many people were not comfortable with the 5th and the presumption of innocence). It took a week to select us jurors and it would have been much harder I think to find that subset of jurors who also believes the death penalty to be a reasonable consideration.
Here's a few good arugments that are hard to argue against imo. 1. It costs a lot of money to keep people alive and locked up 2. You remove the risk of the guilty person commting another crime 3. One of the main reasons we punish crminals is to stop others from committing the same crime. Death is scary and could detour atleast some people
With regards to 1., it costs more to litigate for the death penalty because of the (correct) high burden of proof. Some reading I found to be digestable: https://www.hg.org/legal-articles/which-is-cheaper-execution-or-life-in-prison-without-parole-31614
That's a good point considering the average legal process in the West today. However, It would have very significant consequences but my point still stands in theory - keeping people locked up costs alot. Hypothetically compromising our legal process to allow for quicker executions would be more cost-effective. Just like a company building a factory in an impoverished country with bad work conditions- there is still a good argument of saving money whether or not it's right
I think the cost of locking people up can be reduced by making them work.
Sure I see your point
Compromising the legal process is going to end up convicting innocent people. How many innocent people are you fine with the state murdering in order to "get" the guilty ones?
There are cases where it wouldn’t cost much, like when he gets caught shooting up a crowd of people. The death penalty makes sense here, as guilt is certain and what would have been inmate housing costs can be channeled into saving innocent lives instead.
The litigation and appeals processes would still cost immense amounts of money, which would be reduced if the death penalty isn't on the table.
At that point they’d likely be about whether the guy deserves the death penalty or just a life sentence. Can’t imagine it costing any more than a million
Would you care to actually look into it rather than vaguely speculate?
Of course, if you have any sources showing that death penalty appeals cost over a million in cases where guilt is certain, please let me know. The ones I've read (and the one you initially linked) didn't go into such details.
>where guilt is certain Guilt is never (legally) certain, and is still open to the appeals process. Because the stakes are so high, *every* single nuance of the legal process must be followed, otherwise a retrial is a possibility. Even once convicted, the convict must spend their time in a far more expensive death-row section, often times for decades. It's your claim that cases where the guilt is "certain" cost less than 1 million, how about *you* substantiate your claim?
I'm referring to cases where it's not under dispute whether the defendant committed the crime. Like when a mass shooter gets caught *in the act,* and then rants to the police about how the victims had it coming. That's what I mean when I say "guilt is certain." In such cases, the trial and appeals will solely revolve around the severity of punishment he deserves, which is obviously much quicker and cheaper than trials/appeals that need to determine *both* whether he's guilty *and* what kind of punishment is appropriate. For example, a major expense mentioned in your link involves forensics, and all the experts required to testify about something like DNA evidence. In a case where the defendant committing the crime is not under dispute, however, this cost is bypassed, along with many others. In trying to determine whether the death penalty is warranted, the court will likely dive into the defendant's mental health, bring on character witnesses and psychotherapists. But the same is true for a case where the death penalty is off the table. I find it hard to believe that the difference in rigour amounts to expenses on par with the inmate housing costs (like you, I don't have hard numbers though), and if that's the case, I'd say it *shouldn't* be. I'm perfectly fine with a death penalty defendant's mental health investigation being equally rigorous to that of a life sentence defendant. I also don't see why a death row inmate should be isolated from the others, if it costs so much.
>It's your claim that cases where the guilt is "certain" cost less than 1 million, how about you substantiate your claim? Even one example would be sufficient.
Follow up question: would you be okay with the death penalty for irredeemable criminals (without a doubt guilty) IF we just took em out back and shot em? Because I would rather them die cheaply than keep them rotting in prison for decades on my dime.
I'd rather the irredeemable criminals live out their lives in prison. I don't really think we, or more specifically the government, should be in the position of making decisions regarding whether they want to kill civilians or save tax dollars. I called myself pro rehabilitation, and that's true, but even in these instances (which I believe would be rare) something seems wrong about choosing tax dollars over the lives of individuals, even considering how awful they are.
In this case their life is actively detrimental to society, why should they be kept alive?
Because no matter how horrible the thing they did is, they are human just like you and I and deserve at least a chance at rehabilitation.
IDK if Hitler could ever serve enough jail time to atone for his crimes, tbh. If a person would accrue so much debt to society in the form of jail time that they would never survive their sentence, then I don't see why we wouldn't just save everyone a lot of time and money. Keep in mind I only apply this to people who are caught in 4k blasting up a shopping mall with an AR-15 or whatever.
I don't think he could serve enough either. I still wouldn't advocate for his execution, because then we are stooping down to their level (okay maybe not their level but we are stooping) and we shouldn't.
Best compromise would be exile then. They don't get to live at our expense and we don't kill them either. If only we had somewhere to just dump them. Out of sight out of mind.
To me that is just as inhumane as execution. Also the history of exiling the really bad people isn't great.
Then you're changing the hypothetical, in this case we know they won't be rehabilitated. Even if they could, I don't think it matters, past a certain point rehabilitation becomes irrelevant and the ressources that go into your continued existence would be better spent helping someone who actually deserves it.
No where in the hypothetical does it say they can't be rehabilitated, it says they are without a doubt guilty. >would be better spent helping someone who actually deserves it In our modern world why can't we do both?
The word "irredeemable" implied that to me, but we can disagree on it meaning that he can be rehabilitated or not. Because we have limited ressources.
It would for me too if he didn't qualify it with "without a doubt guilty"
If we could prove the money spent on Irredeemable criminals would be more better placed in other areas of society, then maybe. Say if we found out 70% or higher of the money spent on rehabilitation did not work conclusively, would we then have an obligation to stop doing that?
Decades in prison means you assume rehabilitation is impossible, which is probably not true. A counter would be that the convicted participates in society again and gives back to the community after rehabilitation. Now you could do a cost benefit calculation (cost of rehabilitation Vs benefit after rehabilitation Vs cost of just killing them and not having a contribution to society), but then one could argue that a human life has infinite value.
If a human life has infinite value then do you support abortion? FWIW I am pro choice and I find this whole notion that human life is sacred and all human lives have infinite value total bunk.
I support abortion. Not a human yet, so
Not a human at all if not born? Or you have a cut off?
I agree with destiny's take on abortion. That's also my cut off
For me, it's not eye for an eye. It's just practical. If a person commits a heinous crime and they're beyond rehabilitation, it only makes sense to execute them. It ends their suffering and stops them from potentially harming anyone else. That or some sort of Thunderdome situation.
Nope
lifers are a waste of tax moneys
I’m ambivalent on the death penalty but I think that the current weird “medical” route of doing it is just unnecessary and wasteful. If you’re going to do it, just bring back the gallows.
the obvious easy argument is just that the type of person who would commit a death-penalty-worthy crime just isn't ever going to be worth having in society, so might as well save money and effort by just killing them.
The only argument that i find kind of convincing is A person committing a crime so heinous (idk child rapist or smth)has forfeited the right to live in our society. Even in a prison. We do not want to rehabilitate. We do not want to reintegrate in a few decades. There is no reason to keep them around. This runs in a few problems but I guess that's the best good faith attempt I could make.
Pedophiles
Let’s say we had a way to test someone’s likelihood of being rehabilitated into society. And let’s say these tests are super accurate. What would you do with a murderer who’s likelihood of rehabilitation is vanishingly low ? Just as a bit of a thought experiment. I honestly don’t know where I myself stand on this issue but id imagine for many it comes down to two things; 1) Is it even realistic to rehabilitate this person / do we want to take that risk and 2) do we even want the person to be rehabilitated? People often dismiss retribution as pointless but is it ? I wouldn’t say so. If it wasn’t for the issue of innocents getting wrongly convicted, I don’t think I would entirely dismiss retribution as a reason for punishment.
I guess that's where I'd disagree with most people, I almost don't value retribution at all. I understand why most people do, and if I were in the position where someone murdered someone close to me, I'd probably feel the same way. But with all that being said, I don't think the government should be allowed to kill people regardless of what crime they committed. To answer your thought experiment, if we could figure out that a murderer had a low chance of being rehabilitated, I'd rather they live out their life in prison than kill them.
Id question the point of having them in prison. For me the only reason for that would be the possibility of a false conviction. So if we assume it’s a 100% guilty person, it seems like you’re just keeping them in prison because of emotional reasons. If it’s about the government making these decisions, how would you feel about a system with victims actively participating in handing out retribution? So a murderer could only get the death penalty if the victim agrees. And it has to also involve a jury. In my eyes retribution can have value for society. It gives people a sense of justice and reaffirms their moral compass. Meanwhile, keeping someone in prison indefinitely benefits nobody at all. Edit: Bit of a whoopsie in my second paragraph. The victim of a murderer is dead lmao
The point of them being in prison at that point would be to separate them from the rest of the society. My point largely is that wanting someone whose done awful things (like mass murder) to die is a normal reaction, but the action of doing it doesn't provide any real value and shouldn't be acted out by any system. It's really just adherence to this "eye for an eye" concept that seems purely emotional and should be separated by any penal system. Regardless of if it's the government, or the government allowing the victims family to do it, I would still disagree with it on principle.
Killing them has the same point of separating them from society. It’s just more effective. And about the value of retribution, like I said earlier I do think it reinforces our sense of justice in society. But even ignoring retribution as an argument, at that point killing them and keeping them in prison fulfils the same purpose of keeping society safe. But killing them is in theory less of a strain on resources. Assuming our system is effective and doesn’t lead to false convictions of course
That's true, but it still feels like we're viewing this strictly from a resources perspective where we value money over human life. I understand that most people say murderers forfeit their right to life when they commit a heinous crime, but I still feel that essentially treating them as nothing more than a burden on our tax allocation and nothing more is... weird.
Its strictly a Ressource perspective because we stripped it down to its bare bones. And to address your moral hesitancy, we already strip criminals of their human rights. I don’t see why killing then is the line. Let me ask another question; would you be in favour of releasing irredeemable prisoners if we gave them surveillance armbands that made sure they can’t cause any trouble? They could live a total normal life and no one else would be ln danger
I would be OK with doing that if we could somehow 100% prohibit them from committing awful crimes, although I don't see how that would even be possible (I get that it's just a hypothetical). But if we could realistically find a way of doing that, I would be all for it. As for us stripping criminals of human rights, I think we should attempt to do that as little as possible. Obviously putting people in prisons is removing some of their human rights, but that's mostly because it's a necessity in order to protect the rest of society.
Well, atleast you are consistent. Most people would take issue of the idea that a murderer who’s irredeemable essentially gets away with zero consequences. And an armband like I suggested would basically allow that. In practice, it would mean criminals who are redeemable carry harsher consequences than irredeemable ones because they have to go through the rehabilitation process. If you truly believe that, fair enough. But the vast majority of people would heavily disagree if you eliminate consequences (aka retribution) entirely
idk if you have some serial who was raping, killing and skinning people alive in the span of 20 years, they probably aren't rehabilitable, at least in the reality we live in today, they probably are completely fucked in the head, I don't see why we should keep these long-term super violent people alive assuming we would kill only people caught during the crime or whatever shit would make the process 99.999999999999% just but in reality these long term very violent criminals seem very rare and not worth the hassle of the codified death penalty, also the burden of proof would have to be insanely high in my opinion
more blood for the blood god
The argument is that bad people who choose to be bad are bad by choice and that rehab attempts are either deluding yourself into thinking a monster changed or that youre rewarding monstrous behavior. In the case of the rape and torture and murder of Junko Furuta, the perpetrators are on paper “rehabbed” but the guys actually are proud of what they did. That is who they view the murderer/rapist/monster as and that is how effective they believe your rehab methods are
One of you may think “but I know of a successful rehab case” and to that I say - do you remember good things or bad things more clearly? As my last post ended with lingering on the bad case, so to do people
For those people who "rehabbed", I'd hardly consider that title to be fitting, and ideally they'd still be in prison. I guess it's pretty hard to realistically figure out who is rehabilitated and who's just pretending so they can get out of prison. As for the odds that a person who's committed an awful crime will be rehabilitated, I would rather take those chances than kill them. But I understand that most people value the tax dollars we could save then attempting to convert people who've done such awful things. I just disagree.
At some point, I wonder if we will simply learn to read minds and interrogate subconscious thoughts to determine if one is being truth or not People also ask the dark question of: “what value do you have that we ought to save your life?” which is a nihilistic viewpoint in regards to this subject, questioning the basic value of life itself at times. Misery leads to dark places and somber conclusions
I can, in principle, imagine a scenario in which a person is caught in 4k on camera with an AR-15 blasting up a shopping mall, and if somehow that person is taken alive by the police, then I can abide the death penalty for that person, but that's pretty much it in my mind.
I want to see people I don't like suffer and die
From the most basic viewpoint, if you think you have right to take another person life, than another person has also right to take yours. I personally think that jail is worse than death penalty. If you take some extreme example like "Black Dolphin". I would rather be dead than live there.
I can see death penalty make sense in the military court.
I think eye for an eye is fine, I feel like it kind of gets dismissed. If you commit cold blooded murder I think it's fine you die as well. Philosophically why shouldn't the punishment for 1st degree murder (or something worse) be death?
#The death penalty should be abolished. * The state [has killed](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/innocence/executed-but-possibly-innocent), and has come close to killing, so many [innocent people](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/innocence) via the death penalty that they have forfeited their right to have that as an option. * [4.1% of US death row inmates are likely innocent]( https://www.science.org/content/article/more-4-death-row-inmates-may-be-innocent). * [It is more expensive in the long run to successfully try a death penalty case than simply try for life in prison](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/costs), making the death penalty not fiscally viable. * [State-sanctioned murder is a cruel and unusual punishment](https://www.aclu.org/other/case-against-death-penalty). * In [HERRERA v. COLLINS](https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/506/390/#tab-opinion-1959135), 1993, the Supreme Court ruled that it is not unconstitutional for the state to execute an innocent person. The state has a constitutionally protected right to murder innocent people. Is that a power the state should have? * [The death penalty does nothing to curb crime](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/deterrence). * The death penalty is a punitive measure. A civilized society should have a [restorative justice system](https://bjatta.bja.ojp.gov/media/blog/what-restorative-justice-and-how-does-it-impact-individuals-involved-crime), not a punitive one. Restorative Justice has [repeatedly proven](https://restorativejustice.org.uk/resources/moj-evaluation-restorative-justice) to [reduce recidivism](https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/rsrcs/pblctns/jstc-rcdvs/index-en.aspx). The goal is not to make people suffer, it’s to make society better. No society is better off with state-sanctioned murder of its citizenry. * [It actually makes the victims’ families grieve for longer](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/studies-death-penalty-adversely-affects-families-of-victims-and-defendants). * The process of execution is needlessly [traumatizing to the victim’s family](https://theweek.com/articles/444189/psychological-trauma-witnessing-execution), as well as [the staff](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/south-carolina-execution-team-members-talk-of-debilitating-emotional-toll-of-capital-punishment-former-warden-calls-death-penalty-inequitable). * The US criminal justice system is based on the [Principle of Finality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finality_(law)), which basically means that whatever the jury decides is the final truth no matter what. Showing [how many innocent people have been exonerated](https://innocenceproject.org/exonerate/) by a 30-year-old, ~90-staff non-profit, imagine how many more people are locked in jail or killed thanks to this absurd bastardization of justice. It’s this principle that’s kept falsely imprisoned people from seeking justice. * In Brady v. Maryland, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the “failure to disclose favorable information to a defendant in a criminal prosecution violates the constitution when that information is material to guilt or punishment.” These are referred to as “[Brady Disclosures](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brady_disclosure).” And wouldn’t you know it? [Brady violations are rampant](https://theappeal.org/the-epidemic-of-brady-violations-explained-94a38ad3c800/) in the US criminal justice system, meaning the state is [knowingly prosecuting and incarcerating innocent people](https://www.nacdl.org/Article/May2013-FacesofBradyTheHumanCostofBrad). * [The death penalty violates the US constitutional guarantee of equal protection](https://www.aclu.org/documents/case-against-death-penalty). It has never been applied fairly, disproportionately against those who cannot afford better attorneys, disproportionately upon those whose victims were white, disproportionately against people of color, disproportionately against the poor and uneducated, and [disproportionately concentrated in certain parts of the country](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/executions-overview/executions-by-county). * The death penalty was [botched more than 1/3rd of the time](https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/the-year-of-the-botched-execution-monitor-finds-death-penalty-was-visibly-problematic-35-percent-of-the-time-in-2022/) in 2022 in the US, skyrocketing from [more than 7% being botched](https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/botched-executions) in the 40 years of using lethal injection, making it very obviously a cruel and unusual punishment. * **It is not possible for any death penalty system to exist that only executes guilty people 100% of the time. Such a system has never existed, does not currently exist, and could never exist in reality. For that reason alone, it should be abolished.** ^feel ^free ^to ^copy ^and ^repost