News Australian Man to be Executed in Singapore

[Manchot]

We can debate the "morality" of my country's laws till the cows come home. The fact remains that many Western countries (and Asian countries with laxer laws or poorly imposed laws) are suffering from a drug pandemic. Drug peddlers profit from the misery of other humans. Stamping out the drug problem with anything less than full and harsh conviction is bound to fail.

The point many of us are making is that your laws are, in fact, immoral. How can you dismiss that?

On a side note, I hate when people have so much sympathy for the poor drug users. IMO, you have no excuse for even trying and getting addicted, unless you were tricked into it. Even if you have a genetic predisposition to substance abuse, you have the responsibility to stay away from that crap. Personally, given my family history and my own behavior, I know that I have addictive tendencies. I know that I would get addicted to a drug after one hit, and that if I drank, I'd probably become an alcoholic. Do I whine about it and hope that people pity me? No, I take steps to prevent those situations from ever occurring. I have a choice, just as every non-crack baby drug addict has ever had. Therefore, I find it difficult to accept the argument that drug smugglers must be punished with the ultimate punishment, when the people being harmed by them are actually harming themselves.

And by the way, how successful has your country been at "stamping out" the drug problem? Have all drugs been eliminated yet?

 

[Curious3141]

The point many of us are making is that your laws are, in fact, immoral. How can you dismiss that?

Easily. Morality is a relative standard. Do you consider abortion immoral ? How about suicide ? There are plenty of people who hold completely opposing viewpoints about these issues, and each side considers themselves completely "moral".

On a side note, I hate when people have so much sympathy for the poor drug users. IMO, you have no excuse for even trying and getting addicted, unless you were tricked into it. Even if you have a genetic predisposition to substance abuse, you have the responsibility to stay away from that crap. Personally, given my family history and my own behavior, I know that I have addictive tendencies. I know that I would get addicted to a drug after one hit, and that if I drank, I'd probably become an alcoholic. Do I whine about it and hope that people pity me? No, I take steps to prevent those situations from ever occurring. I have a choice, just as every non-crack baby drug addict has ever had. Therefore, I find it difficult to accept the argument that drug smugglers must be punished with the ultimate punishment, when the people being harmed by them are actually harming themselves.

OK, you're making the same tired argument that if the potential "victim" has anything approachng a choice, then the crime of the perpetrator becomes less heinous ?

Dear god, that would open a whole can of worms, wouldn't it ? What's your stance on drug dealing to kids ? Do they have a choice ? Is that choice legally or ethically valid ?

What about pornography involving underaged models ? Don't they have a "choice" ? Why is it then that underaged nude modelling is banned in most Western nations ?

What about date rape ? Doesn't the girl have a choice initially as to whether to go on a date with a creep ? Should the rapist be viewed more leniently from that perspective ?

Your stance has no logical merit whatsoever.

And by the way, how successful has your country been at "stamping out" the drug problem? Have all drugs been eliminated yet?

We have been very successful by any standards at minimising illegal drug abuse. The fact that the problem has not been completely eliminated yet is a testament to how pernicious the problem is, and by no means suggests that the legal measures are failing. I daresay that the problem will worsen if those measures are relaxed.

And I daresay that my country has been a good bit more successful at controlling drug abuse than yours. And just where are you from, BTW ?

 

[Lisa!]

Yeah, could say that being a politician requires one to have at least a 'degree' of pragmatism, which 'translates' to placing price tags -> 'occational' moral lapses as some sort of "applied consequentialism".

For example I noticed that for almost all countries their citizens are usually more important to them out of their own borders. I'm not talking about this case. For example in this case I think Australian government is also guilty and somehow we can belame it too. I mean why this guy should be in that terrible situation that he even has to risk his own life in order to get money. I mean why this guy has a very poor background, I noticed that in most poor family, the value of human's life is too low. They simply risk their life for evrything.

Please do! IMHO I've an agreeable phase going, and have been imhoing all over for the last few weeks ---- or then have learned "manners" which would be a really terrifying addiction. I've probably gotten the IMHO from too much studying (since don't remember anyone 'breaking my bones' as of late ), again noticed that "don't know anything about nothing".

I think if you strat using 'in my humble opinion' instead of i, you quit it very soon. For sure you're not going to use "in my ..." moore than once in every post, because it's long and your post sounds strange. So after a while you can simply back to using "IMHo" but you've learned not to use it so much. (good and short abbreviation are kind of disaster sometimes. I myslf used to use ! as an abbreviation for "I'm kidding" and evrything else. )

Don't remember having a '!' addiction ever, how do you contract that one?

How I get addicted to ! .

 

[PerennialII]

For example I noticed that for almost all countries their citizens are usually more important to them out of their own borders. I'm not talking about this case. For example in this case I think Australian government is also guilty and somehow we can belame it too. I mean why this guy should be in that terrible situation that he even has to risk his own life in order to get money. I mean why this guy has a very poor background, I noticed that in most poor family, the value of human's life is too low. They simply risk their life for evrything.

Yeah, passing judgement seems so easy, can read lots of statements "he had it coming, he deserves to pay the price" +++ ... can't understand the 'emotion' (&emphasis) to punish, convict etc. people - like that would accomplish anything. Treating symptoms rather than the illness. Sure we can do it, it's not like we "need to" value individual life, and seems appropriate to ask "who cares" if we get it wrong from time to time with respect to convictions, but do we want to live in world following such code of ethics? When you're poor what else is there to risk, to lose ... some are bound to turn against a 'system' that has resulted in them ending up in that situation in the first place.

I think if you strat using 'in my humble opinion' instead of i, you quit it very soon. For sure you're not going to use "in my ..." moore than once in every post, because it's long and your post sounds strange. So after a while you can simply back to using "IMHo" but you've learned not to use it so much. (good and short abbreviation are kind of disaster sometimes. I myslf used to use ! as an abbreviation for "I'm kidding" and evrything else. )
How I get addicted to ! .

I'll try to withdraw myself gradually ... I'll try to a few weeks of IMO . ! sounds like a good next one.

 

[alexandra]

Undoubtedly, the man's situation was difficult. But all the same, are we really to believe that the only two ways that Mr. Nguyen could possibly raise money were by either waiting tables or risking his life by committing a capital offense in a foreign country? The lack of detail in the link you presented reeks of a false dilemma.

Yes, there isn't much detail in the links I found on this issue. I also agree with you that it was a rash and foolish choice to risk his life like that - if he had thought to help his brother and mother by doing this, he obviously didn't think ahead. On Australian radio today, his mother has been begging with the Prime Minister to intervene to save her son's life - it's very distressing to hear her pleas. In effect, by not focusing on the possible worst-case scenario, he has made everything a lot worse for his family. He's 25 years old now, so I guess he doesn't even have the excuse of having been really young and inexperienced. In addition, it is well known in Australia that the death penalty applies in many countries in this region if you are caught smuggling drugs - I'm fairly confident Nguyen would have been aware of the risk he was taking (in fact, I think I read somewhere that he admits he knew the death penalty applied).

Well, I hope you don't think that I don't appreciate the gravity and finality of the punishment, because I do. And if Mr. Nguyen were shot dead by the police in Singapore while not posing any threat to them, I would find myself agreeing with most of the people in this thread. But Singapore's laws are known, and I have not read anything that would indicate that Mr. Nguyen is incapable of understanding what he was doing. I do believe that there have been death penalty cases about which one should be outraged. I just do not happen to believe that this is one of them.

Again, I have to agree with your position that this is not the most worrying of cases (as I said earlier in this thread, I have started another thread on David Hicks, because his case concerns me a lot more because of the wider political implications involving citizens' rights to fair trials and to protection from their governments, etc).

I guess watching Nguyen's mother on TV and listening to her begging for her son's life is having an emotional effect on me. Also, I'm a parent and I can just imagine how powerless and sad she must be feeling right now.

alex

 

[Anttech]

I guess watching Nguyen's mother on TV and listening to her begging for her son's life is having an emotional effect on me. Also, I'm a parent and I can just imagine how powerless and sad she must be feeling right now.

So whos been punished here? (retorical question) She is the victim of the crime, (IMO) that is this human rights volation. Someone here already posted this, can't remember who, but I think this execution highlights problems in our society that more deaths won't resolve... Our society needs to fight the source of problems proactively not remove problems one by one.. If you see what i mean.

 

[Art]

Yes, I do believe that innocent people occasionally get convicted of crimes. That happens in any country, in any system of law. What I don't get is why some people use this unavoidable fact to slam the death penalty specifically. Won't there also have been a miscarriage of justice in the case of a wrongful imposition of life in prison ? Let's say a 20 year old with his whole life ahead of him gets mistakenly convicted and thrown into prison for 50 years. Upon his 70th birthday, some new exonerating evidence comes up and he's released with an "apology". Do you really think he's going to get his life back ? Can that punishment be reversed ? What if he had died in prison (stabbed by a fellow inmate through no fault of his own) before the evidence had come to light ? I put it to you that the miscarriage of justice is only marginally (if at all) less in the instance of a wrongful nearly completed life sentence as opposed to a wrongful judicial death.

There are many but to to take just one real life example.

In Britain following a particularly nasty bombing campaign by the IRA in which many innocent people were killed the police were under huge pressure to make arrests.

They obliged and fabricated evidence against 6 Irishmen. Given public feeling at the time and the 'apparent' certainty of their guilt, if Britain had had the death penalty all 6 of these would have been strung up.

Fortunately there is no longer a death penalty in Britain because subsequent investigations championed by a member of the British parliament showed that the police had first tortured the men and when that didn't work simply fabricated 'confessions' from them whilst ignoring evidence that proved their innocence.

Eventually after 20 years their convictions were overturned and they were released. I am sure if asked they would tell you there is much more than a marginal difference between being wrongly hanged and wrongly incarcerated.

 

[loseyourname]

SINGAPORE - An Australian man was executed by hanging Friday for drug trafficking, Singapore announced, hours after his lawyer said he had a "beautiful last visit" with his family.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051201/ap_on_re_as/singapore_execution

So that's that.