Yes, definately heavy enough...

I believe that if someone is willing to take another persons life out of cold blood, then there is no reason to keep that person around. I would emphasize that this penalty should not be taken lightly, but that is obvious. I think that clearly intentional murder is the only crime that could ever warrent this sentence, and even then it is questionable. In my view, no law should ever recommend death as penalty for not adhering to rules; it should only be decided only after every shred of doubt in the guilt of the accused has been obliterated by long debate.
However, I'm neither informed on the subject nor particularly interested; I'm just opinionated.

my two cents...

I recently had to write a "persuasive essay" for my history class, on any topic I chose. Our teacher was expecting essays on or around the fifth grade level from the directions he gave us (lol, that's not exactly what I turned in). Anyway, I picked the death penalty and researched different aspects and views of it's "pros" and "cons". With the recent actions taken by the former governor of Illinois, George Ryan, it was just made more interesting. I would like to see what other people think about the death penalty, in terms of legality or morality or justice or anything, and what you think makes you feel that way. Is it a yay or a nay?

Technically, a person is only to be considered guilty if every shred of doubt has been obliterated. I'm for the death penalty because no person should have the right to keep their life if they take someone else's. Personally, I think lethal injection is too nice of a way to kill them. It's probably one of the better ways to die, and being murdered is definately one of the worst. Of course, I also think we should go back to the eye for an eye system, so maybe my view on that is a little rougher than most.

I think that the death penalty is perfectly correct if the perp's guilt has been established beyond a reasonable doubt. But I think that too many people are put to death these days on too little evidence. If someone has murdered someone else in cold blood, then they deserve the same.

Leave it to me to be the one going against the flow... ;)

Personally, I don't support the death penalty under any circumstances. I don't believe it's right to tell people not to murder, and to make laws against it, and then turn around and be killing people. I don't care how you do it or what they did "to deserve it", I just don't think it's my (or our) place to judge wether they deserve to die or not.

Well Courtney, the murderer obviously felt like it was his place to judge whether someone deserved to die or not. And the murderer knew the penalty for the crime, so really he chose to kill himself, the victim didn't have that choice.

Just because the murderer felt it was his/her place to judge wether someone deserved to die or not doesn't mean it was in fact his/her place.

I don't think we can justify our own actions of killing someone by the fact that they killed somebody else. We'd end up all killing each other.

The government is known for being hypocritical and I think death is too easy and too quick. I think the person ought to be locked away alone until they died of natural causes. By killing the killer you don't give super ego a chance to kick and make him feel quilty.

That's a good point. Is the death penalty actually even punishment, or is it relief from punishment? When someone dies they either just cease to be, in which case there is no real punishment because the person no longer is in a state of feeling and can therefore not feel humility, loneliness, guilt, or any of the other feeling we would normally associate with punishment, or they go to some unknown after-life, in which case it isn't known what will actually happen, so it could be good or bad. To me that doesn't sound like too bad of a punishment, either getting off with nothing are having basically a toss-up between something good or bad. So why should we do it if it isn't really punishment? Basically, it's better for society if the person is gone, no matter if they would be locked up otherwise. There's always a small chance that he could get out, and if he did then he might kill another person. So the death penalty could be considered the public's way of self-defense.

Ryan - That's true, but it's not always done that way... <_<

Courtney - I understand your position, but don't you see a difference between flat out murder and the punishment for doing so?

Ryan2 - If the murderer really chose to kill himself, then are we promoting suicide? :lol: :unsure:

I know this is headed in the other direction but should really punish someone for killing a person that if the police could have got would have been killed by the government? Theoretically all they have done is saved the government time and money by not having to pay someone to do it.

Do you mean if someone kills a felon at large or something?
That's probably a different story all together.

QUOTE

Courtney - I understand your position, but don't you see a difference between flat out murder and the punishment for doing so?

Do I see the difference and the point you're making? Yes..
But, ....

I don't support murder in any of its forms or for any reason. I think we could all agree that the world would be a happier and better place if we could go without killing each other, but somebody's going to have to take a stand before people would even think about it. How can the government (or our society as a whole) expect people to refrain from killing other people when we are not willing to quit killing people either?

BTW, I'm not claiming to know the answer to our problems. I'm not saying that we should let murderers run free in our streets, but then again, the cost of keeping them in prison would be tremendous. I just think that there has to be a better way to handle the situation than how we're handling it now.

I think I'm still stuck on the mindset that killing for retribution is not murder. Merriam Webster defines the word murder as "the crime of unlawfully killing a person especially with malice aforethought". However, even though the death penalty does not fall under this definition of murder, it is still the lawful killing of another human being. That phrase "lawful killing" is intimidating in itself.

The only real argument I have is that it is the most efficient way to deal with murderers. As Ryan said, there is always the possibility that prisoners can escape and continue their rampage. In that case, it would have been much better for everyone if the criminal had never had that chance. I think that a question that needs to be asked is what would the family/friends of the next victim be told? "This man escaped from his life sentence in jail, where he was placed instead of death row"?

Enough about risk. The question remains, is it right to kill another human for a ghastly crime they committed? I don't have an answer for that because, honestly, I do not think there is one. This has been debated ever since there was law, and will continue to be as long as capital crimes are commited.
Of course, the true solution to all these problems is for crime to cease altogether. Unfortunately for us, the chances of that happening in the near future are not high.

Although it has been proven that it is actually MORE expensive to kill them than it is to keep them in jail the rest of their life... because of court costs for appeals, that sort of thing. I still am in favor of the death penalty, however, but favor something along the lines of the three-strike policy.

I'd be willing to agree to things like a three-strike policie.

I think this gives the greatest balance. Even if someone were to be falsely convicted once, that wouldn't be the end... which is kinda the problem with the death penalty now.

I think I could agree with the three strikes rule. It would allow for false convictions and for someone who just totally screwed up and wouldn't kill again.

Polarris- What are you gonna tell the killer's family? As long as they are still alive they can write home and maybe once a year thier kids can come visit Mommy or Daddy.

I know that the death penalty is based on the biblical "an eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth." So why are the killers not being killed the same way that they killed? Just a thought.

I understood that, I was just wondering if people remember that the killer has family too. It seems that they are thought to pop out of thin air....

ah, Good point.
I *think* that more often then not, the family of the killer are separate and the rest of the family does not associate with said killer anymore. If someone I knew became a murderer, I probably would try to disconnect myself from that person also.
The three strike idea kindof helps in this also, so that no one is ever mischarged.

Good luck disconnecting yourself. I know that I wouldn't be able to do that. My "got to help" reflex would kick in and I would want to believe that it was all a ghastly mistake or a bad dream. :D I think normally that just gets me in trouble though

Well, of course that would be very hard. I also would only try to do it if I was sure that this person intentionally killed another person for a reason that is unnegotiable (unlike self-defense).
I would try to help the person if I didn't think they had become a bad person.
I know that sounds wierd :lol:

Not werid at all. I just believe that if a person can change from good to bad then they change from bad to good. I have a problem believing that a cold-blood killer doesn't have a part of him/herself that they lock away that knows what was done was wrong. (Now that probably does sound werid! :rofl: )

Yeah, I guess that makes sense. I just think the reason that our jails are so full is that getting the good side of some people to come back out is so difficult...

Trying to tame a wild animal always is...

just from a slightly different point of view, the death penalty seems like a fairly good deal given the human population and what you'd have to do to deserve it. there are already 6(?) billion-ish people here, we don't need the ones that are going to run around murdering people so lets get rid of them. of course that logic could lead to all kinds of genocides down the road. anyone seen minority report? theres another kind of cool issue.
but back to the death penalty- personally i say its morally bad, but for the sake of laws and government and girl scout cookies its a good thing.

Yummm...girl scout cookies :P

We just bought minority report on DVD and I plan on watching it tonight so I'll get back to ya.

Good point though but with 6 billion, we can afford to lose a few right? J/K :rolleyes:

i guess i never stated my view on that after i asked, so here it goes. after "researching" the topic, I found three ways to support my being AGAINST the death penalty. first, from a Christian standpoint. the Bible does say the "eye for an eye" rule, but God also says that "revenge is mine". killers will surely get theirs in the end.
legally and morally, Just as abortion and physician assisted suicide are, I believe the death penalty is murder. sure, the convict killed someone, but the government is just in turn becoming a murderer too. It should be unconstitutional for the United States justice system to punish a killer by killing them as well. In that act, the government would have to be tried for murder of its own citizens. Would it sentence itself to death?
third, as was mentioned in earlier posts, the risks of murdering a death row inmate who was in fact INNOCENT, is too great. when the former illinois governor emptied their death row, three men were set free after over a decade on death row because dna evidence was finally brought to attention, proving them innocent. evidence was also found proving that they were tortured into confessions by none other than our own govt's illinois law enforcement. in these studies in illinois, statistics show racial trends in death sentencing. it's not fair, it will never be fair, it should not happen.
also, just for giving the true murderers punishment, I think they are scum of the earth and are horrible people and no, they don't deserve to live, but it's not our place to take their lives. back to the illinois thing, the inmates who were not released were returned to normal prisons, where before they were moved were reported saying that they would rather die than go back to prison. death row inmates have their own cells and are secluded. the federal and state prisons, well, lets just say they are horrible, both the building and the people in them. it's a violation of human rights to some, but they may just deserve to live with it.