Death Sentence Vs Life Imprisonment

In summary: This is how bad it will be if you don't do what I say!" In summary, capital punishment should be abolished because it doesn't make the judges any different from the convicts themselves, it is not reasonable to take what you cannot give back, and life imprisonment is a more humane alternative. Death is more humane as compared to almost 15 years of rigorous confinement, and life after release or during parole is not much of a cakewalk.

Death sentence or Life imprisonment

  • Life imprisonment only

    Votes: 22 48.9%
  • Both, depending on crime

    Votes: 23 51.1%

  • Total voters
    45
  • #1
arunbg
594
0
Should capital punishment be abolished and replaced with life imprisonment ? Is death more humane as compared to almost 15 years of rigorous confinement ? Do you think some criminals actually deserve the ultimate punishment ?

I feel death penalty should indeed be abolished .It doesn't make the judges any different from the convicts themselves. Every man has a right to live his life to the fullest. It is not reasonable to take what you cannot give back. Sure there may be people who are rotten to the core and are a threat to society, but even they ought to be given a second chance, while taking necessary precasutions of course.

Arun
 
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  • #2
I don't think the idea that "Every man has a right to live his life to the fullest" is a good case against the death penalty. The alternative is throwing a man in maximum security prison... and well... no man lives his life to the fullest in there.
 
  • #3
I voted Both. Some people deserve to swing from the gallows.
 
  • #4
What about life after his term or during paroles ?
Even if life isn't at the fullest, it can still be worthwhile .
Death just terminates this opportunity.
 
  • #5
I'm just saying that's a bad reasoning against the death penalty because in fact, they don't get to live a large majority of their life to the fullest or anywhere near that. Life isn't much of a cakewalk after 40 years in prison either when/if you're paroled.

Plus its rather unfair to let someone be released from prison to at least attempt to have a normal life when his very act stopped another persons life dead in its tracks, literally.
 
  • #6
I don't think that anyone should be sentenced to death.
 
  • #7
arunbg said:
What about life after his term or during paroles ?
Even if life isn't at the fullest, it can still be worthwhile .
Death just terminates this opportunity.
Someone that deserves the death penalty should not ever be eligible for parole or a sentence less than life (without the opportunity for parole).

Why should a criminal that is guilty of something heinous enough to warrant the death penalty be entitled to a "worthwhile" life? Some people are just evil and not reformable. I don't think their time in prison should be like summer camp.
 
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  • #8
Pengwuino said:
I'm just saying that's a bad reasoning against the death penalty because in fact, they don't get to live a large majority of their life to the fullest or anywhere near that. Life isn't much of a cakewalk after 40 years in prison either when/if you're paroled.

But, if you're dead, life isn't much of a cakewalk either.
 
  • #9
siddharth said:
But, if you're dead, life isn't much of a cakewalk either.

and this means...

Notice how i said nothing as to the merits of the death penalty...
 
  • #10
The reason I am against the death penalty particularly for murder is that its such a contradictory penalty. You say that killing somebody is wrong and that it is one of the most awful crimes one can comit yet you condone the killing of the murderer afterwards. Doesn't make sense to me. Taking a life is either wrong or it isn't.

EDIT: Second point is in the event of a miscarriage of justice.
 
  • #11
Tom Mattson said:
Some people deserve to swing from the gallows.
Really? By the long or short rope?
Or is frying more humane?


As I see it, the punitive element in the societal reaction towards crime is largely irrational, obscuring the perfectly rational motive of getting some dangerous person off the streets (this, of course, given any type of crime, is most effectively done by killing the person)

One of the primary problems with the whole punishment idea is that the punishment must "fit" the crime, it can't be larger or less.
This means, for example, that a petty crime drug addict must get a "small" punishment if any, instead of being forcibly retained until we may be comfortably certain the guy can be released and do no further offenses.

On the other scale, since "taking a life" is said to be such a horrifying act, a woman finally rebelling after years of abuse by taking her husband's life must be consigned a long prison term (or execution), even though there is just the minutest risk she'll ever do something like that again.


On the death vs. life imprisonment issue, I voted life imprisonment only, since "undecided" wasn't an option.
 
  • #12
But how often is a housewife given the death penalty for killing her abusive husband?
 
  • #13
Kurdt said:
The reason I am against the death penalty particularly for murder is that its such a contradictory penalty. You say that killing somebody is wrong and that it is one of the most awful crimes one can comit yet you condone the killing of the murderer afterwards. Doesn't make sense to me. Taking a life is either wrong or it isn't.
Depends on the person you ask.

Some have those morals while others do not.

Some consider it simply an effective deterrent for others.
"Here, look! This is what's going to happen to you if you do not obey the law!". The criminal is used as an example and warning for others.
 
  • #14
arildno said:
Really? By the long or short rope?
Or is frying more humane?

It was just an expression. I don't mean that we should use the literal gallows. I think that the lethal injection should be used. Actually, I think that's a lot more humane than life in a maximum security US prison, where the local gang of nothing-to-lose, AIDS-ridden convicts would be happy to offer a new convict a lethal injection of an entirely different sort.
 
  • #15
arildno: I concur with this point of view but perhaps go further to say that a lot of petty crimes are born from social factors which largely need to be resolved in society. Beyond that some serious crimes are performed by people whom I imagine have some sort of mental illness. WE agree that anybody in their right mind would not comit murder but we fail to recognise even in this era that mental illnesses are a very broad spectrum indeed. The fact that somebody killed is indeed terrible but if they are fond to be of unsound mind then they deserve the chance to be treated and live a normal life.

This is similar to arildno's beaten wife argument, One could say environmental conditions have pushed her to the edge of sanity and in one brief moment she lashed out and murdered her abuser. With the correct councelling that woan could be freed into society with no danger to anybody else. Of course it depends on whether you believe society should be survival of the fittest type or a one in which we all look out for each other.
 
  • #16
Penguino said:
and this means...

Notice how i said nothing as to the merits of the death penalty...
What I mean is that, I think that every person including the criminal has a right to life.

MeJennifer said:
"Here, look! This is what's going to happen to you if you do not obey the law!". The criminal is used as an example and warning for others.

There's a lot of conflicting studies done on the effect of capital punishment as a detterent. If I remember, some studies even showed that there were higher murder rates in countries with the death penalty. In fact, I don't think that statistical studies can prove that the death penalty actually causes the murder rate to drop, they can at best only show correlation.
 
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  • #17
Kurdt said:
Beyond that some serious crimes are performed by people whom I imagine have some sort of mental illness. WE agree that anybody in their right mind would not comit murder but we fail to recognise even in this era that mental illnesses are a very broad spectrum indeed.
Were does this notion come from that murder must be some kind of mental illness? :confused:
Perhaps from the absurd idea that since "humans must be good and if that is contradicted by the facts then they must 'obviously' be mentally ill, by definition"?

What a few thousand year of history has shown us is that humans murder for all kind of reasons, ranging from pleasure to self defense. Murder is simply a human activity, which by the way is not uncommon in the animal world either. :smile:

I wonder if you would call a lion mentally ill as well? :wink:
 
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  • #18
I do not trust the government enough to let them ban guns so of course I don't trust it enough to allow it to kill its own citizens. I don't trust it to decide who is and who is not a human being either. Our experience with another government that allowed itself that prerogative was negative.
 
  • #19
The mind is not an object that runs by a specific set of rules. Mental illnesses are a spectral disorder many exponentially more severe than others. I'm just saying that the psychological makeup of a murderer is going to be different than that of somebody who does not comit murder. There has to be some trigger. If you believe that murder is a human activity then that suggests that you would quite happily live in a lawless world where anything that occurs is considered just human activity. What I am in favour of is a greater understanding of environmental and genetic makeup of the populaton as a whole and I strongly believe in the spectral nature of mental problems. Perhaps illness was too harsh a word to use.

I would not call a lion mantally ill because a lions survival depends on it eating other animals. A human's survival does not depend on taking the life of another except possibly in matters of self defence.
 
  • #20
Regarding the death vs. life imprisonment,
why not just let that be the criminal's choice?

(whenever there is doubt in sentencing to either death or life imprisonment)
 
  • #21
Kurdt said:
If you believe that murder is a human activity then that suggests that you would quite happily live in a lawless world where anything that occurs is considered just human activity.
I would be highly interested how you make such a conclusion. :confused:
I think it would say much more about you than about me. :smile:

That murder is a human activity is simply a fact. Hiding this fact, or "explaining" it with people being "mentally ill" are simply means to show one does not like this fact.
Whether one likes or dislikes such a fact does in no way imply on how one desires how a society should be run.
 
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  • #22
Kurdt said:
This is similar to arildno's beaten wife argument, One could say environmental conditions have pushed her to the edge of sanity and in one brief moment she lashed out and murdered her abuser. With the correct councelling that woan could be freed into society with no danger to anybody else. Of course it depends on whether you believe society should be survival of the fittest type or a one in which we all look out for each other.
That is how it is in America, there are varying degrees of "murder", it can be ruled "involuntary manslaughter" which means there was no criminal intention to kill and carries a very light sentence, to murder in the first degree, which can carry the death penalty in states where it is allowed. There isn't "one sentence fits all". If someone is found to be mentally incompetant, then they are sent to a mental hospital for treatment.

Killing someone can also be considered "self defense" and the charges will be dropped altogether. This would apply to someone breaking into your home and trying to kill you, and you kill them in self defense.
 
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  • #23
siddharth said:
What I mean is that, I think that every person including the criminal has a right to life.

But life in prison is living... why should the murderer get to walk the streets a free man (as i was saying)?
 
  • #24
bomba923 said:
Regarding the death vs. life imprisonment,
why not just let that be the criminal's choice?

(whenever there is doubt in sentencing to either death or life imprisonment)

Let the criminal have the choice? Why not ask the criminal if he prefers jail or a non-extradition country.
 
  • #25
I understand there are different degrees of murder my point is that a lot of people who are just convicted of I suppose the pre-meditated kind could be considered as havin a mild mental instabilities and should be treated that's all.

With regards to human activity; if you consider this a fact and do no research into why it happens then perhaps that says more about you than me.
 
  • #26
Kill them.
 
  • #27
I imagine myself convicted to die in the electric chair. It must be horrible and i don't want that feeling for any other person
The cliche "some people are intrinsically evil and deserve to die" is wrong. There're no evil people and there're no good people. Some people commit crimes, and we must ask ourselves the reason of that. Is the criminal really "evil"? Or were his/her acts conditioned by education/environment/abuse? It's too easy to destroy what seems dangerous and non profitable, even if it's a human life

i've read in a webpage that USA is the developed country with more murders per capita. Are americans "eviler" than the rest, or is that fact caused by the environment, e.g. free possession of guns
 
  • #28
Kurdt said:
With regards to human activity; if you consider this a fact and do no research into why it happens then perhaps that says more about you than me.
Ok? :confused: :confused:

Research into why humans are as they are?
Ever heared of evolution? Or is that perhaps an ugly word.

Do you think that by "explaining" the goodness of humans by blaming "exceptions" on mental illness, the environment, society and other excuses is going to change one thing about the fact the we are who we are due to millions of years of evolution?
 
  • #29
meteor said:
i've read in a webpage that USA is the developed country with more murders per capita. Are americans "eviler" than the rest, or is that fact caused by the environment, e.g. free possession of guns

So the very fact that you own a gun makes you evil? I had no idea guns had such magic powers! (you'll also want to actually do some research and look at how many murders there are in areas of the US whos gun laws resemble 'progressive' nations in Europe) You're simply excusing all criminals for what they do. People do things because they want to be satisfied. Some people will do a little more. Look at something simple like getting music. Some people will work hard and earn their money to buy music. Some will just download it for free (which is another form of stealing anyhow). Some steal right out of the store. Is the criminal who does such a thing mentally ill? Or did he just want to get something for nothing like most people do...
 
  • #30
Pengwuino said:
Some steal right out of the store. Is the criminal who does such a thing mentally ill? Or did he just want to get something for nothing like most people do...

There are a lot of factors there.. Education is most important, an educated person will behave in a social manner and will try not to steal (there are exceptions, Winona Ryder comes to mind). Then again, a person educated in a criminal environment will tend to behave criminally
 
  • #31
meteor said:
There are a lot of factors there.. Education is most important, an educated person will behave in a social manner and will try not to steal (there are exceptions, Winona Ryder comes to mind). Then again, a person educated in a criminal environment will tend to behave criminally

:rofl: That is way, way wrong. White collar crime results in the loss of more property and money than crime by the poor.
 
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  • #32
cyrusabdollahi said:
:rofl: That is way, way wrong. White collar crime results in the most loss of property and money.
Not so much wrong, but ludicrous.

"...an educated person will behave in a social manner and will try not to steal "

My oh my, I am stunned to see that there are actually people who believe such things. Don't get me wrong they should have to right to believe it and express it but come on.
 
  • #33
I voted for both, depending on the crime. I think it's something that should be very rarely used, and even for the vast majority of murderers, is too extreme, but there is the rare person who is so incorrigible and commits such heinous crimes and who cannot be reformed, and if they ever escaped, would go right back to killing, such that the concept of rehabilitation is lost with them. Those rare few, who we could do little else with other than leave to rot in solitary confinement the rest of their life, they are the ones I would still say the death penalty is appropriate for.
 
  • #34
jimmysnyder said:
I do not trust the government enough to let them ban guns so of course I don't trust it enough to allow it to kill its own citizens. I don't trust it to decide who is and who is not a human being either. Our experience with another government that allowed itself that prerogative was negative.

Agreed. I'm not against the death penalty per se, I believe there are some people that deserve death. However, I don't believe that any government should ever have the right to take the life of its citizens.
 
  • #35
Your statement is a direct contradiction of itself Kazaa.
 

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